Taiwan doesn't do enough to protect its tiny free democracy from Chinese conquest.
There was one last 2020 Taiwan Strait transit for the U. S. Navy:
The guided-missile destroyers USS John S. McCain and USS Curtis Wilbur closed out 2020 with a transit of the Taiwan Strait on Thursday, 7th Fleet spokesman Lt. Joe Keiley said.
The ships steamed through the contested, 110-mile-wide waterway separating Taiwan from mainland China to demonstrate “the U.S. commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Keiley said by email.
No doubt this was to warn China about exploiting the transfer of power here in America to strike Taiwan.
But yeah, naturally, if America fights China over Taiwan it will be because it is in America's interests to prevent Taiwan from being conquered by China and not as a favor to Taiwan:
In the final analysis, if China launched an attack on Taiwan and the US fought on Taiwan’s behalf, the US would essentially be fighting for its own interests.So sure, a new American administration is not a point of excessive worry for Taiwan. But that isn't as comforting as Taiwanese may want to think.
That fighting for Taiwan is an American interest doesn't mean Taiwan can relax and count on America to rescue a Taiwan which doesn't even pay for an adequate defense. No, it means Taiwan should be strong enough and have enough resolve to make sure America is fighting to defend a free Taiwan rather than fighting to deny China the free use of Taiwan's territory to further threaten America and our surviving allies:
I want Taiwan to defend themselves for the sake of their liberty and for the sake of our security by giving us a reason to intervene to save them (that is, by giving our intervention a good shot at working rather than being futile), [but] Taiwan needs to arm up to prevent America from becoming a threat.
Remember, if Taiwan is controlled by a hostile China and is a power projection platform for China, America has the incentive to build the capability to destroy Taiwan as a Chinese power projection platform. That's just a sad reality.
If Taiwan isn't strong enough for us to fight with at their side, we will fight China over controlling the battlefield of Taiwan. So Taiwan will face attacks from China and America. Or do you think we didn't bomb France after the Germans took it over in 1940 just because the French had been our friend?
Those are very different things, especially from Taiwan's perspective.
So gentlemen of Taiwan, prepare to defend yourselves. Taiwan had best use their prosperity to build up a broad array of military capabilities rather than trying to find a cheap silver bullet solution to their defense.
