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What Do Nancy Pelosi’s Visit to Taiwan and Subsequent Exercises Tell Us?

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Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States (US) House of Representatives, made a visit to Taiwan in recent weeks. Pelosi explained the purpose of her visit was “to demonstrate the unwavering commitment of the US to the nation of the island that has the right to self-government.”[1] What makes this visit special is that Pelosi is the highest-ranking US official to visit Taiwan 25 years later. At a time when the rivalry between the USA and China is escalating at the global level, the main purposes of such a visit are; to make the US presence felt on the continent and to intimidate China, perhaps the only state that has the power to compete with the US.

This visit has affected the world agenda since the first days of August 2022. Beijing, which has had troubled relations with Taiwan since the past, which sees the island, as a separatist region that must be forcibly attached to its own territory if necessary,[2] and has tense relations with Washington, was greatly disturbed by this development. China has also responded to this situation by launching an unprecedented military exercise in the region near Taiwan. The drills, which were held with the intention of retaliation against both Taiwan and the Washington administration, brought up the possibility of a hot conflict between the US, China and Taiwan in the region.

While Pelosi continues her visit to Taiwan defiantly against the drills in question; The United States has made a statement that “the Washington administration does not interfere with China’s sovereign rights and only supports democracies in the region”.[3] China, on the other hand, demands that no country recognize Taiwan as an independent state and not establish diplomatic contacts with the island administration, which it sees as “separatist”. Indeed, Beijing describes Taiwanese as separatists who must return to their homeland. At the same time, China emphasizes that they will not refrain from using hard power, if necessary, for the unification of Taiwan with the mainland.[4]

US President Joe Biden, on the other hand, stated that in an attempt by China to invade Taiwan, the US will intervene militarily by siding with Taiwan, and that the US commitment to protect the island has become much stronger after Russia’s intervention in Ukraine.[5] All these rhetoric, Pelosi’s visit, and China’s actions near Taiwan; highlighted the possibility of a hot conflict.

These actions and discourses of the US, which aims to compete with China on a global scale and to reveal its presence in the region, are also in line with the political traditions of the Washington administration. For example, the US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman’s definition of China as a “power and violence-hungry country”[6] is like the former US President George W. Bush’s characterization of Iran, Iraq and North Korea as an “axis of evil”. Pelosi’s visit to the island, claiming they’re only there to support the region’s democracy, and Biden expressing that they would intervene militarily if China invades Taiwan bears traces both from the containment policy of the US in the Cold War years and therefore from the “toothless diplomacy” strategy implemented by George F. Kennan in the same years, and from the methods of the US military interventions that it tried to legitimize through the terms “democracy” and “human rights.”

In short, the current situation of the US and the strategies that contain traces of the past reveal that the Washington administration saw China as a rival to its global leadership, just like the Soviet Union during the Cold War period and the threat of terrorism in the 2000s.

On the other hand, the situation in China is quite similar. China’s accusation of the US in the Ukrainie War[7] and the fact that conducted military exercises in waters close to the island after Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan show that the Beijing administration has started to show its teeth towards the US on a global scale and has reached the level where it can advance the competition to a military conflict. After the drills are over, the statement that military exercises by the Chinese Army will continue in the future[8] indicates that the tension in the region will not end in a short time.

In addition to all these, it can be said that Taiwan administration is satisfied with the presence of the US in the region. Kelly Wu-Chiao Hsieh, Taiwan’s official representative to the United Kingdom (UK), urged the US and its allies to conduct operations to protect both the “middle line” and “freedom of navigation” in the Taiwan Strait as a response to China’s military exercises and also calling the UK to support rules-based international principles and to establish closer security, trade and investment relations with Taiwan[9] shows that Taiwan’s loneliness in the region and it seeks allies against the feeling of insecurity.

As a result, it is not surprising that the actor that comes to the forefront in the search for an ally against China is the US, which is called the “gendarme of the international order” and is described as China’s biggest rival on a global scale. In fact, this situation is very similar to the fact that the Western European states sided with the US against the communist threat in the East during the Cold War and entered the integration process by forming a union under the leadership of the Washington administration.


[1] “Pelosi Arrives in Taiwan Vowing U.S. Commitment; China Enraged”, Reuters, https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/pelosi-expected-arrive-taiwan-tuesday-sources-say-2022-08-02/, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[2] “China Says Taiwan Military Drills Are over After Pelosi Visit”, BBC, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-62492350, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[3] “US Clear About One China Policy, Doesn’t Support Taiwan Independence: Kirby”, Business Standard¸ https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/us-clear-about-one-china-policy-doesn-t-support-taiwan-independence-kirby-122080200096_1.html, (Date of Accession: 23.08.2022).

[4] “The Bane of Legitimacy”, Newsitem, https://thecolumnist.org/news/newsitem/the-bane-of-legitimacy?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=g&utm_content=615003486892&utm_term=pelosi%20visit%20taiwan, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[5] “Biden: US Would Intervene with Militarily to Defend Taiwan”, Apnews, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-biden-taiwan-china-4fb0ad0567ed5bbe46c01dd758e6c62b, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[6]  “US Warns Pacific Islands of Struggle Against Coercive Regimes”, Mint, https://www.livemint.com/news/world/us-warns-pacific-islands-of-struggle-against-coercive-regimes-11659864624920.html, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[7] “China Says the US is the ‘Main Instigator’ of the War in Ukraine”, Aljazeera, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/10/china-accuses-us-as-main-instigator-of-the-war-in-ukraine, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[8] “China Says Taiwan Military Drills are over After Pelosi Visit”, BBC, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-62492350, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).

[9] “US and Allies Should Move to Protect ‘Freedom of Navigation’, Says Taiwan Enjoy”, The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/11/us-protect-freedom-of-navigation-says-taiwan-envoy-china, (Date of Accession: 12.08.2022).  

Zeki Talustan GÜLTEN
Zeki Talustan GÜLTEN
Zeki Talustan Gülten graduated from Yalova University, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Department of International Relations in 2021 with his graduation thesis titled "American Foreign Policy" and from Anadolu University, Open Education Faculty, Department of Foreign Trade in 2023. Gülten, who is currently pursuing her Master's Degree with Thesis at Marmara University Institute of Social Sciences, Department of International Relations, was a student at the Faculty of International and Political Studies at Lodz University for a semester within the framework of the Erasmus+ program during her undergraduate education. Working as an Asia-Pacific Research Assistant at ANKASAM, Gülten's main areas of interest are American Foreign Policy, Asia-Pacific and International Law. Gülten is fluent in English.