Why Taiwan?: The Geostrategic Justification for China's Territorial Integrity

Why Taiwan?: Geostrategic Rationales for China's Territorial Integrity

Why is Taiwan the only "inalienable territory of China"?
Why is Taiwan the only country worth fighting for China?
Why is Taiwan the only one that matters to China?

From the Qing Dynasty, the Republic of China, and the People's Republic of China, Taiwan's political status in China has fluctuated over the past few hundred years due to various factors, most notably China's relations with external powers. This has always triggered the anxiety of Chinese leaders that "controlling Taiwan is necessary to ensure the security of mainland China."

The author argues that the People's Republic of China's inclusion of Taiwan as part of its "imagined geography" and its determination to incorporate Taiwan are not ideologically driven but rather rooted in a conviction that Taiwan is the heart of Chinese security. Drawing on a variety of sources, including historical archives, government pronouncements, and the writings of both Chinese analysts and Western scholars, this book traces the evolution of China's thinking about Taiwan. Its primary goal is to explain why Beijing considers Taiwan worthy of a fight, and its secondary goal is to place China's militarization strategy in a historical context. A third key feature is that the current phase of the Taiwan Strait dispute cannot be properly understood without considering the impact of geopolitics and pre-1949 history.

★ Shelley Rigger, Professor of East Asian Politics at Davison College, USA | Article Introduction

2023-12-14

國立臺灣大學出版中心

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