Taiwan president to meet US House speaker: What to expect

As Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen wraps up her trip to Central America, where she visited two of Taipei's remaining diplomatic allies, Guatemala and Belize, all eyes are on her scheduled meeting with US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Wednesday.   

According to a statement issued by McCarthy's office, the Republican lawmaker from California and Tsai will meet at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley California, near Los Angeles, at 10 a.m. local time (1700 GMT), marking the first meeting between a sitting Taiwanese president and US House speaker on US soil.

More than a dozen lawmakers from both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party will join the meeting.

China, which claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, has slammed the planned meeting, reiterating its opposition to any form of official contact between Washington and Taipei. Beijing warned it would "take resolute measures to safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Taiwan's Defense Ministry said on Wednesday a Chinese aircraft carrier group was sent to the waters off the island's southeast coast. It said the ships were going for training in the Western Pacific, and that Taiwanese naval and air forces and land-based radar systems closely monitored them.

How will China respond?

All sides are closely watching whether China would respond by staging another round of large-scale military exercises near Taiwan. Following then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taipei last August, the People's Liberation Army carried out week-long drills around the democratic island.

China will view the Tsai-McCarthy meeting as an unacceptable advancement of bilateral relations between Taiwan and the US, said Ian Chong, a political scientist at the National University of Singapore (NUS). "From Beijing's perspective, anything that doesn't isolate or restrict Taiwan is not acceptable," he told DW.

A major Chinese military response to the meeting, however, appears unlikely, particularly as former Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou is currently visiting China. 

Beijing could, instead, respond with targeted sanctions against specific Taiwanese leaders or impose economic sanctions on certain Taiwanese products.

"I think the chance of China responding with escalatory military moves is not high," said Wen-Ti Sung, a political scientist at the Australian National University (ANU). "It doesn't feel like a good deal for Beijing to trade away the extraordinary message of cross-Strait friendship [reflected through Ma's trip] for a once-every-few-years' US trip by Taiwanese presidents."

Strong US-Taiwan relations under Tsai

Prior to McCarthy's announcement of the meeting in California, Tsai had already made a transit stop in New York last week. During a closed-door banquet, Tsai said Taiwan has demonstrated "a firm will and resolve to defend" the island and that Taipei is capable of "managing risks with calm and composure" as well as showcasing its ability to "maintain regional peace and stability."

This will likely be Tsai's last visit to the US as Taiwan's leader as she will step down as president next year. Throughout her tenure, she has emphasized a strong partnership with the US and bilateral ties have deepened on multiple fronts.

"Whether we look at the diplomatic, economic or security aspects of the relationship, they have all been trending upward," said Bonnie Glaser, managing director of the Indo-Pacific Program at the German Marshall Fund (GMF).

Even though Taiwan lost another diplomatic ally, Honduras, just days before Tsai embarked on her trip to Central America, her transit stops in the US show that Taipei's relationship with the US remains "rock solid."

Sung from the ANU said that one of the missions of her current US trip is to create more space for her successor, especially in terms of setting new precedents for the treatment that Taiwanese presidents tend to get in the US.

"The more bells and whistles she is able to secure during this trip, will go a long way in terms of normalizing upgraded treatments for her successor," he said.

Taiwan's impact on US-China ties

Issues over Taiwan are also increasingly impacting US-China relations.

Glaser from the GMF pointed out that Taiwan now features significantly in many bilateral dialogues between American and Chinese officials, and Beijing is growing more concerned about Washington's policies toward Taipei.

"The list of things that the Chinese complain about regarding Taiwan is really notable," she said. "Many people believe a war over Taiwan could escalate, and I think there is no issue that's more important, more sensitive, and more dangerous in the US-China relationship."

Sung from the ANU noted that the closer US-Taiwan relations under Tsai's tenure are also a reflection of a broader strategic shift in US-China relations.

According to him, as the US adopts a competition-oriented approach towards China, Taiwan also feels necessary to take a side in the great power competition between Beijing and Washington.

"It's more difficult for Taiwan to strike a balance between the US and China and the general strategic constraint will be there regardless of which political party is in power in Taiwan," he said.

What are the domestic implications?

Tsai's transit stops in the US will also have a lot of domestic political implications, especially as her predecessor, former President Ma, is in China for a historic visit around the same time.

The trips offer a very "visual contrast" of the focus of Taiwan's two main political parties' foreign policy agenda, said Sung. 

"For the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, they frame themselves as the party that's able to take US-Taiwan relations to new heights," he noted. "The opposition Kuomintang party is trying to create more space and find more point-scoring opportunities in relations with China."

Regardless of which political party wins the upcoming presidential election in Taiwan, Glaser believes it's likely that the expanded scope of bilateral cooperation will continue under the new administration. "Taiwan values its relationship with the United States and it needs the relationship more than ever." 

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru