a first-rate encounter in the fight for global dominance

First modification: 04/05/2023 – 13:19Last modification: 04/05/2023 – 13:18

RFI: Fernando Estenssoro, you are a researcher on issues of political geography, world politics and international security at the Institute of Advanced Studies of the University of Santiago de Chile. Beijing has condemned the meeting and warned that it will undermine relations between Washington and Beijing. Beyond the declaration, what practical consequences can this meeting have?

Fernando Estensoro Practical consequences per se, I don’t think they go beyond what we are seeing. The United States, since Donald Trump, has begun a series of blockades on Western exports to China because it considers that they are strategic items that can be used as weapons against the United States. And I don’t think that’s going to change. Joe Biden has continued a policy of seeking blockades of strategic high-tech items, for example nanotech chips, by which he intends to stifle certain Chinese companies, Chinese technology companies, or delay Chinese development. That I would say is one of the most serious things that is happening. On the subject of China-United States relations, that will not change at all. It is rather a rhetorical issue where China does not accept that countries recognize Taiwan as an independent country. This is part of the State policy of the People’s Republic of China and it blocks, punishes all those nations that establish commercial relations with Taiwan. Obviously, it punishes those weaker nations because the United States cannot be punished. It is the other way around, it is the United States that still, to the extent that it has a greater global force, punishes China. So, practical consequences I don’t think. But it is part of this rhetorical war where the United States sees with increasing concern how China is getting closer and closer to it as a great global power and how it is even surpassing it in some fields. It’s more of a geopolitical rhetoric, but I don’t see any practical consequences so far.

RFI What does Kevin McCarthy gain by hosting Tsai Ing-wen?

Fernando Estensoro It is part of the rhetoric of American politics. The United States desperately needs to show itself to the West as the hegemonic power that emerged from World War II onwards, that is, as the power that has shaped, by the way, international politics for more than 70 years. However, it is already a fact and in the very mainstream In international studies, that is, in the American academy itself, it is already a fact that the power of the United States is declining, above all due to its economic decline, and finally, this ineluctably leads to a political decline, although not of immediate way. Here we have to talk about decades, not about situations, as it is on a day-to-day basis. So the United States sees with concern that its hegemonic power is declining and that powers have appeared that really have the possibility of reaching it in all economic, strategic, technological, and military terms, as is the case of China. So, here what we are seeing in the medium-term geopolitical horizon is a possible hegemonic struggle between China and the United States.

What does the speaker of the House of Representatives do? What does Biden do? This is an issue that is totally embedded in US politics and everyone is concerned that it is declining and sees how little by little the allies are beginning to lose confidence in the United States. He is no longer the boss he was before, and many are being tempted to negotiate with China, which appears as the star in the sky. It is absolutely symbolic. Taiwan is only recognized by 14 countries in the world and all of them are very small. And, in fact, Honduras has just established diplomatic relations with China and is probably going to break relations with Taiwan. So, the Taiwan thing is an absolutely rhetorical thing on the part of the United States. While the United States has interests in the China Sea, it has geopolitical interests. But why? Because it has been the great gendarme of the planet for the last 70 years and that is what is being questioned today. And that is what is under discussion today and this will continue.

RFI: McCarty had promised to follow in the footsteps of Democrat Nancy Pelosi, the former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, who, let us remember, went to Taiwan in August 2022 to meet with the Taiwanese leader. The fact that MacCarthy has opted for a meeting in California instead of traveling to the island to meet the president of Taiwan, can it be read as a way of not polarizing the relationship with China too much, that is, simply, sorry for the expression, show teeth?

Fernando Estensoro In this case I think not, because it is Taiwan that is touring Latin America. As I was saying, it is known that Honduras has just established diplomatic relations with China. The Honduran foreign minister met with the Chinese foreign minister. China promised investment in Honduras, infrastructure, money and Hondurans are happy. The other countries that also have relations with Taiwan and not with China are Guatemala and Belize, and Paraguay and some islands, the Grenadines in the Caribbean are relatively small countries, so what Taiwan is doing is like saluting the flag, do you do you realize? I mean, I mean, it’s more of a thing for the press, demonstrative, because Taiwan at the moment is the United States’ aircraft carrier in the China Sea. Taiwan is totally fingered by Washington, Washington puts on the music and the president dances. In other words, unfortunately we used to speak of things in harsh and brutal terms, that’s what happens. In other words, Taiwan at this time has not finished uniting with mainland China, as was what was discussed at the beginning of the 90s, once Hong Kong was going to move to mainland China, the other thing that came in the agreement it was Taiwan; but as China began to get bigger and bigger and the United States began to see itself more and more threatened and saw that the Chinese little by little began to disrespect them, they no longer treated the United States with as much respect, but they began to talk as equals, they even began to bang on the table, the United States decided to keep Taiwan independently.

What is happening? China insists that Taiwan is a rogue province and that it has to be annexed to popular China and the United States does not allow it. And of course it supports sectors, because the Taiwanese population is also divided on this issue. There has been a Taiwanese president who was closer to China and now this president, who is totally pro-Western, and she responds to the dictates of Washington. So here, too, the United States has to show strength. So it is this president who decided to tour Latin America because Honduras has just closed the door in their faces, and then, taking advantage of the trip, she goes through the House of Representatives. Surely, it cannot be ruled out that President Taiwan invites the Speaker of the House of Representatives to Taiwan and in a while what Pelosi did is repeated. But this also allows China to say that it is deeply angry or show force, that is, they have tremendous military strength, and then forces the United States to reassess the strategic situation. The United States no longer has the strength it had 40 or 50 years ago, or when the Cold War ended and it was thought that American “unipolarism” was going to last throughout the 21st century. That is already clear, that it will not be like that . So here we have a declining power, which is the United States, and a rising power, which is China. So, of course, China is speaking louder and louder. It is totally different from what happened in the early 2000s, when China said “I want a peaceful rise” and did not enter into further discussions with the United States, but now it does not. Now China says we are not going to allow Taiwan to remain independent and we are going to annex it. Sooner or later we are going to annex it to China. That is the tension.