Decoding China: How Beijing wants to sway Taiwan's election

On Tuesday afternoon this week at 3:14 p.m. local time (07:14 a.m. UTC), all cell phones in Taiwan sounded an alarm, four times in a row. "Air Raid Alert! Missile flyover Taiwan airspace, be aware," warned the Taiwanese Ministry of Defense in English. 

It sparked the question in many people's minds: Is Beijing attacking days before the Taiwanese presidential and parliamentary elections? 

Many foreign journalists, including DW reporter Richard Walker, also received the warning message during a press conference with Taiwan's Foreign Minister Joseph Wu.

But the minister was able to reassure everyone, as the Chinese language warning message described the situation more clearly: "China launched a satellite at 15:04, which flew over the southern airspace [of Taiwan]. Inform the local police and fire department if any unknown missiles fall from the sky."

Nevertheless, Wu also misunderstood the warning message in Chinese at first.

"The PRC [People's Republic of China] has fired a satellite in this region and it went over Vietnam's airspace," he told journalists.

"It's ok, it doesn't affect us," he added.  

The misunderstanding was due to a line break in the warning text message, which briefly caused confusion.

But the minister's nervousness about a conflict scenario with China was palpable, even when he had to correct himself.

China, in fact, had announced weeks ago the launch of a satellite, which is intended to observe cosmic phenomena like the fusion of black holes and supernova explosions. 

So, are the authorities in Taiwan particularly nervous as the island prepares for elections? Or are they even acting tactically and creating public panic to boost the election campaign?

Beijing flirts with KMT candidate

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Beijing would like the candidate of the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT), Hou Yu-ih, to win the election in Taiwan.

The presidential contender from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Lai Ching-te, once described himself as a "political worker for Taiwan independence," thereby crossing Beijing's red line. China sees Taiwan as part of its territory and has vowed to "reunite" the self-ruled island with the mainland. 

"The CCP is doing everything it can to prevent Lai from becoming president," said Angela Köckritz, a journalist and former senior fellow at the Berlin-based Mercator Institute for China Studies [MERICS] who spent many years in Taiwan. "But the overall social environment in Taiwan has changed dramatically. Even a KMT president would not be able to do what the CCP loves to see," she said.

The third contestant in the presidential race, Ko Wen-je, from the Taiwan People's Party (TPP), set up in 2018,  is likely to secure just under 20% of the votes, according to the latest polls.

This means he has no chance of becoming president, as in Taiwan, a simple majority in the first round of elections suffices to win the vote.

Chinese President Xi Jinping will be eagerly awaiting the briefing this Saturday, when the polling stations in Taiwan close.

Xi has put reunification high on his political agenda, saying that it's a "historical inevitability."

His state apparatus is doing everything it can to manipulate public opinion in Taiwan — and has been doing so without interruption since the island directly elected its first president in 1996, said Köckritz.

"The CCP hopes that this will help it achieve the ultimate goal of reunification," she said.

Beijing's methods are very simple: issuing threats of war and trade boycotts as well as maintaining close contacts with the KMT.

A pragmatic relationship

The CCP maintains a pragmatic relationship with the KMT.

Both parties oppose an independent Taiwan and only want "One China" in any case, although the CCP has the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the KMT has the Republic of China (ROC) in mind.

The high point of this pragmatic solidarity came in November 2015 when Chinese President Xi met the then president of the Republic of China, Ma Ying-jeou, in Singapore.

This meeting was generally seen as mainland China's support for the KMT in the presidential elections held in January 2016.

But it did not help. The KMT lost the election which was won by the DPP's candidate Tsai Ing-wen.

Former President Ma, now as a private individual, also visited mainland China last summer. And KMT Vice Chairman Andrew Hsia visited the mainland three times in 2023, most recently four weeks before the elections.

He met there not only business people from Taiwan, but also high-ranking CCP officials such as Wang Huning, a member of the Politburo Standing Committee who ranks fourth in the party hierarchy.

KMT presidential candidate Hou has formally maintained a distance from Beijing so far. He summarizes his peace policy with three Ds: Deterrence, Dialogue and Deescalation.

This represents continuity of KMT's policy toward Beijing, former President Ma told DW.

"Basically, Hou's three Ds strategy has the same content as my position: no independence, no reunification and no armed force."

China's economic threats 

Despite the political tensions during Tsai Ing-wen's eight-year presidency, the Chinese and Taiwanese economies have remained closely intertwined. But the two governments are making it increasingly difficult to expand existing economic cooperation.

Under President Ma, Beijing and Taipei, both members of the World Trade Organization (WTO), signed the Cross Strait Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) to reduce tariffs and trade restrictions.

This has ensured that a large number of Taiwanese products are subject to reduced or no customs duties when exported to China.

But Tsai's government has issued decrees restricting the export of 2,509 goods to the mainland, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce said in December after months of investigations.

It concluded that these were "trade barriers."

If Beijing retaliates with countermeasures, they could significantly affect Taiwan's exports.

According to Chinese government data, Taiwanese exports to China, Hong Kong and Macau amounted to about $238 billion (€217 billion) in 2022, which is twice the amount of German exports to China that year.

Since the start of this year, Beijing has suspended duty exemptions and reductions for Taiwanese imports in 12 product categories, including chemicals.

On January 9, four days before the elections, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce said that the mainland was considering suspending the duty exemptions even for other goods from Taiwan, such as fishery products, textiles and automotive parts.

Such a move would impact a broader section of the Taiwanese middle class, and might likely force them to reconsider their voting behavior.

"If the DPP fails to dismantle its discriminatory trade barriers against mainland products and shows no remorse, the ECFA as a whole could be suspended," said Li Baoming, an economist at Beijing Tsinghua University.

China steps up military posturing 

Every day, the Ministry of National Defense of the Republic of China in Taipei publishes statistics on the military activities of the People's Liberation Army around Taiwan on X, formerly Twitter.

In the first four days of this week, 33 Chinese military aircraft and 13 vessels were identified operating in the strait between the mainland and the island.

Recently, the ministry has also identified Chinese balloons entering Taiwanese airspace.

"If a war ever breaks out across the Taiwan Strait, it would be disastrous," Ma told DW, adding that it's necessary to do everything possible to avoid war.

He also pointed out that the Rand Corporation, a US think tank, has "done an exercise of hypothetical warfare 18 times between the US and mainland China."

"All 18 times, the US lost," Ma said.

Both the DPP and the KMT have made the threat of war a key issue in the election campaign, in an attempt to win over new voters and non-voters.

The DPP clearly opposes threats of war from the mainland. The KMT, on the other hand, blames the DPP's China policy for the growing threat of war.

Fake news and disinformation campaign

Meanwhile, there is already a war going on over Taiwan, in the virtual world, dominated by fake news and disinformation. Beijing's cyber army is suspected to be behind the wide spread of such content.

More than 5 million out of a total of 23 million people in Taiwan use the platform TikTok, for instance, whose parent company is based on the mainland.

"In the disinformation campaign, the distrust of the US or the dissatisfaction of the population is further fueled," said Köckritz. This is intended to give voters the feeling "that they are being governed incredibly badly."

"Decoding China" is a DW series that examines Chinese positions and arguments on current international issues from a critical German and European perspective.

This article was originally written in German.