Shane Leary joins Miles Yu to discuss the recent earthquake in Taiwan of 7.4 magnitude, the largest quake the island nation has suffered since 1999. They then discuss security developments in the South China Sea, most notably that Japan is in talks to sign a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) with the Philippines in an effort to deter Chinese aggression in the region.
China Insider is a weekly podcast project from Hudson Institute's China Center, hosted by Miles Yu, who provides weekly news that mainstream American outlets often miss, as well as in-depth commentary and analysis on the China challenge and the free world’s future.
Episode Transcript
This transcription is automatically generated and edited lightly for accuracy. Please excuse any errors.
Miles Yu:
Welcome to China Insider, a podcast from the Hudson Institute's China Center. I am Miles Yu, senior fellow and director of the China Center. Join me each week along with my colleague, Shane Leary, for our analysis of the major events concerning China, China threat and their implications to the US and beyond.
It's Tuesday, April 8th, and we have two topics to discuss. The first is the recent earthquake in Taiwan, the worst they've experienced in 25 years. Miles offers his thoughts on its geopolitical implications and the response from the government of Taiwan. Second, we discuss security developments in the South China Sea, most notably Japan working towards signing an agreement to deploy troops in the Philippines. Miles, how are you?
Miles Yu:
Very good, Shane.
Shane Leary:
Wonderful. Well, before we begin, I just want to let our listeners know this Wednesday or tomorrow, if you're listening to this episode on its release day, we'll be publishing an event commemorating the 45th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act. It will be a longer conversation with Miles on the background and legacy of this legislation and its impact on US foreign policy and cross rate relations. You can watch and listen to this event on our website at hudson.org/china-center. I encourage you all to do so, it will be incredibly informative discussion and we're excited to release it.
So, Miles, with that we'll set aside for today and just jump into our first topic. That is, this past Wednesday, Taiwan was hit with its strongest earthquake in 25 years, a 7.4 magnitude earthquake. And as of this weekend, around 400 people were still stranded and awaiting rescue. More than a thousand were being treated for injuries and the death toll was 13 and the tremors could be felt as far as Hong Kong and Shanghai. To say this is a tragedy is obviously an understatement, but it is worth mentioning the last earthquake of similar magnitude, 7.7, which hit in 1999, killed over 2,400 people and injured over 10,000. So, there is a sense that lessons were learned, and the government of Taiwan took some well-needed action in that intervening period to prepare for something like this. So Miles first your reaction to this generally, but also what has been the response thus far of the Taiwanese people and the government of Taiwan?
Miles Yu:
Yeah, well, before I answer your question, that's a very good summary of what's going on. Taiwan sits on the rim of fire along the Pacific Rim, as I said, so it's an earthquake prone region. Taiwanese government has taken dramatic steps to mitigate the possible impact of that. You can see that from the result of this earthquake, even though one person's death is a tragedy, but relatively spmeaking on the magnitude of that kind of disaster, you have fewer than 2000 people perished. That's actually a marvelous accomplishment to say the least. And I think if you go to Taiwan, I mean you look at the amazing building of Taipei 101, that's a very tall, for several years, it was the tallest building in the world and it stood there with great pride. That design was amazing. It's a miracle because not only survive this earthquake, as you say, the 7.7 earthquake also didn't do much harm to that
As a matter of fact, as I said, I was actually on the phone with the operator of that building when soon after that earthquake shook island and there were still some aftershocks felt. [Oh wow.] Yeah. So, it's a very dramatic, so Taiwanese society is a very progressive society. In other words, government by all standards will be considered liberal government. There are policies on social issues, government power, it's pretty much like California. So therefore, they spend a lot of money on this kind of seismic prevention issue. I believe if you want to build a house in Taiwan, you must go through a very rigorous licensing processes. That was done since 2016, I believe. And that's one of reasons why Taiwanese housing is very expensive, because there's a lot of costs involved in the seismic prevention. I think if government responded very responsibly, you see President Tsai in the first real time went to the epicenter or near the Epic Center and personally directing the traffic and making decisions as to rescue and relieve efforts. And it's really amazing how calm the society has become facing such a calamity. You don't see any sort of mass hysteria and don't see many stampedes and I think the firefighters or rescue teams or in order. Taiwanese society is very well organized, well-educated, and well prepared.
Shane Leary:
And zooming out from the immediate reaction in Taiwan to this, are there any global or geopolitical implications of this event that we should be aware of or our listeners should be aware of?
Miles Yu:
Yeah, I think one of the really amazing phenomena of the earthquake is the outpouring of condolences, expression of concerns from all over the world. I know this is not a good happy occasion for getting attention, but Taiwan did get a lot of attention. And you look at the Japanese government, prime Minister Kishida send a very long and moving message to Taiwanese government as well as Taiwanese people because Japan also suffer tremendously from earthquakes, tsunamis. Taiwanese society, it was always among the first, if not their first, to reach out a hand of help. So Japanese people were not very, they're not forgetful. So, every time you have this kind of disasters, Japan's always on [the] frontline helping the Taiwanese people and government and vice versa. Not only that, you get the notes condolences from leaders, virtually every major countries in the world, the UK, Lithuania and Germany, France, and South Korea of course, and the United States. So, this is basically, it shows the degree to which Taiwan has been held in such a high respect. People in the world [inaudible] of Taiwan is a force of good. And I think that's one of the things. There's great amount of the humanity and sense of sympathetic emotion expressed to the people of Taiwan and Taiwanese people of course were very grateful as well.
Shane Leary:
It's well said, and our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Taiwan. Of course, as we're having this discussion, our next topic concerns interesting developments in the South China Sea. Tokyo and Manila are apparently in talks for Japan to deploy forces in the Philippines as part of a larger set of security pacts between the two countries aimed at deterring China's aggression in the region. The Philippine ambassador to the United States, Jose Manuel Romualdez has said that the two countries are close to signing a reciprocal access agreement or RAA, which would let each other's militaries train and conduct exercises in one another's countries. The deployment of troops would occur on a rotational basis as the Philippines’ constitution prohibits permanent deployments of other militaries within their country. And this would be similar to an agreement they currently have with the United States, which allows US troops to operate out of the Philippines. So, we've talked a lot about recent Chinese aggression in the region, particularly with fishing vessels using water cannons in and around the Second Thomas Shoal. But this seems like a momentous development if it goes through. And so I'd like to get your thoughts on the perspective of several countries which would be affected by this development. But let's start with Japan. What do you make of their willingness to do this and to what degree is this a pretty astonishing move for Japan in the realm of their foreign policy?
Miles Yu:
Well, you use the word astonishing. That's exactly what it is. It is astonishing for a country like Japan to have developed such an extensive military and mutual defense ties with the fellow Asian country in the South China Sea. Historically, Japan has been very, very passive since the end of World War II. Japanese constitution even has stringent restrictions on Japan becoming a potential military power again. So for a country [who is sort of the] pinnacle of pacifism to reach such a level of military outreach to a foreign country is really amazing. That's because both Japan and Philippines feel the same common threat from China. And on top of that, Japan and Philippines share something that's very unique because both of them are treaty allies of the United States, even though they are not the treaty allies of each other. But both Philippines, both Philippines and Japan are treaty allies of the United States.
In other words, there was a mutual defense arrangement going on there. Japan has devoted to the idea of itself becoming a global leader in global peace and security. So, it's not just regional. So, this is why the Japanese leadership in recent decades, I should say, starting with Prime Minister Abe has become a global force in terms of the issues affecting global trade, global economy, and global geostrategic importance. So that's why when the Japanese leader changes his course, and it is going to be very impactful. And here is a very concrete example, prime Minister Kishida completely overhauled Japan's defense posture by announcing that Japan is going to spend 2% of its GDP on defense. That's well above the constitutional restriction on 1% of GDP. So, Japan [has] also changed its doctrinal orientation towards the military forces from purely a hundred percent defensive in nature to focusing on developing counterstrike capabilities and even preemptive [capabilities], this is astonishing, I mean even [going] further than the United States, it's a defense posture. So, this is absolutely an astonishing development for Japan. Philippine of course is the weaker of the countries bullied by China on a routine basis. So, it, Manila needs exactly such assistance and a boost of confidence.
Shane Leary:
I want to turn to the United States, which as you noted acts as a sort of linchpin through its bilateral treaties. It creates a sort of multilateral environment, defense environment there. How do you think the current administration is thinking about this and how does this affect US involvement in the region in particular with the Philippines?
Miles Yu:
Well, first of all, this is obvious. There's a welcoming news to the United States because for decades, United States has been the sole guarantee of security for countries such as Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea and Thailand, several other countries in the region. So there is a, of course, United States needs to do this and we're very happy to have done that. But there is also another issue here that is burden sharing. That is as these countries develop economically and militarily and they have the financial wherewithal to develop its own capabilities in conjunction with American's security guarantee, this has been an issue. The burden sharing has been an issue for decades now. The conversation sort of peaked during the Trump administration, and right now the Biden administration continued that kind of talk. So it's always very good for the United States to see our partners and allies in the region with a security arrangement with the United States to develop their own capabilities and to be more assertive in their own self-defense.
So the perfect model here among Americans alliance system is Israel. Israel has not only a great defense arrangement with the United States, but also it has its own self-reliance on its own capabilities. Even without the American's help, Israelis could also defend itself against its adversaries, which are many. You can see Japan is moving toward that in that direction and to becoming a very powerful ally in global security and peace. And I think in conjunction with the United States, Japan and US jointly play a very important role, not only in the Pacific but also globally. This is also evidenced by Minister Kishida’s strong desire to connect the mission of NATO, which was predominantly, which has been the predominantly European security organization, to Japan. So that's why Japan proposed to have a NATO liaison office in Tokyo. And of course, NATO has responded very, very positively. The Secretary General of NATO Jens Stoltenberg has very positively embraced such an idea. And of course, the French, who are normally very cranky on issues like this, objected to it. But the idea is there, and I think that this idea is going to be a source of the momentum that will be unstoppable.
Shane Leary:
And Japan asserting itself is certainly a welcoming development in the region. Turning to China, what can you tell us about the reaction from the Chinese Communist Party or likely reactions going forward? So far we've heard there's sort of usual diplomatic jab, couching, criticism in the language of cooperation and support for general mutual understanding and trust. But they did say that this activity shouldn't target or undermine the interests of any third party, obviously referring to themselves.
Miles Yu:
Well, of course, China always says they're for a cooperation, and China wants to be nice with people as long as those people are completely capitulating to Chinese demands. In the case of Philippines for example, they always send olive branches to Manila to Filipino leaders as the Filipinos do not object to China's territory and American demands in the South China Sea. So that's why there is always a very hypocritical side of China's claim for peaceful coexistence and cooperation and that sort of things. So this development is very significant with China as well, because China's grand strategy to deal with this adversaries is to do its utmost to prevent the formation of a multilateral alliance aiming at China. So it's normal approach is always to pick the weakest of its adversarial circle and to pounce on it ruthlessly and with any other consideration. So obviously the Philippines are regarded by China as a little country.
Chinese officials often said, they told the Filipinos with utter sort of content, say, you are the 小国, you're the little country and we're the big country, we're the 大国. So how dare you challenge my demands. And that's why China focused on the Filipinos in the recent months and in years too. You might say, whoever is closer to the United States and is going to be the primary targets of Chinese bullying and harassment. China in the past focused first on South Korea, you remember last decade, China has been furious with South Koreans [inaudible] stop tourist from going to South Korea and nationalism against this Korean consumer products, cars, and cosmetics and even [sight-]seeing groups. So South Korea has been sort of the primary target for China for a number of years. And recently South Korean leadership and South Korean people were pretty fed up with China. So, they have improved their relationship with Japan, with the United States.
So that northeastern corner of this Americans alliance system has been sort of very strong, a cornerstone of which of course was US-Japan relationship. The Philippines is the third of the Americans mutual defense arrangement countries. And because of that, as a matter of fact, Filipino US Defense Alliance was the oldest of Americans mutual defense arrangement in that part of the world. So, there has been some kind of ups and downs in the US and Philippine relationship in the past, but more or less toward more and more solidified and stronger and stronger relationship. So, in this case, the previous Philippine president, Mr. Duterte tried to fund a third way, that is, he does not want to be seen as Americans ally, but also he wants to sort of suck up to China. And China didn't buy that. They continue to, there were unrelenting, in their demands.
So now you have new president, President Marcos Jr. Who has forged a much stronger tie with the United States and China doesn't like that. So, it constantly provoked crisis to test the bottom line of the United States, to test the resilience and strength of the US Filipino mutual defense alliance. In a way, it's a provoker, it's a [inaudible] countries, that's what China normally does. However, China's trick this time sort of failed, failed miserably on two grounds. Number one, there is a chain reaction. As a matter of fact, I might say on three grounds, China's bullying of the Philippines not only did not stop the Philippines from a certain its sovereign rights of those maritime and island terrains, which is basically supported by international law, but also you add Japan to the Filipino alliance, Japan getting closer to the Philippines, we know that, not only that, the United States, Australia also joined the alliance with the Filipinos just last week right after Japan reached out to the Philippines and decided their negotiation on troop deployment. US, Japan, Australia, and the Philippine navies. This new [inaudible] of democracies hosted a first ever joint naval exercises on Sunday, April 7th.
So China's brain has backfired, you might say. China also has this strategic calculation, which I think is a miscalculation in this case, it's trying to intimidate the United States because there is a major change of military leadership in the Indo-Pacific Command, the admiral commanding general of the Indo-Pacific, which is primarily responsible for the piece of security in the Indo-Pacific region, including the Philippines and the South China and Japan, the whole Western Pacific. And there is an incoming new commander of the Indo-Pacific command. And China is traditionally normally trying to show its toughness, its cantankerousness to the new leadership to intimidate the new military leadership in INDOPACOM.
But China failed because the new commander in INDOPACOM is no pushover. He is the admiral of the highest quality is the best we've got. And he knows China's playbook, he knows China's weaknesses and vulnerabilities, and he understands also the complexity of modern warfare and the multidimensional nature of the campaign against China's aggression in the Indo-Pacific. So, this is why China's calculation normally is a miscalculation. Now China of course never gives up. So just the last week China sent is a former ambassador, Mr. Cui Tiankai, who was the ambassador during the Trump administration with whom I'm pretty familiar. And he somehow managed to get himself into the INDOPACOM headquarters in Hawaii. And he was dispatched by Xi Jinping to basically threaten the US military leadership there and vow to take the island not belonging to the Philippines. And so, this kind of united front approach intimidation, I think China probably [has run out of ideas. It's not going to be working very well.
Shane Leary:
Well, lastly, I'd like to try to put the pieces together. Do you have any closing thoughts on this development and its consequences for global security more broadly?
Miles Yu:
Yes, I think this is very important. You see this trend of countries of like-mindedness coming together. And for common defense, common defense comes from one reason, one reason alone. That is because they all have a common threat. The common threat is China. The speed at which those countries come together is pretty decent, I would say is pretty fast. This is in contrast with the effort organized by the United States and by NATO in the 1950s at that time, Western democracy tried to create a sort of Asian version of NATO. It's called the SEATO, Southeast Asia Trade Organization. It didn't work out very well because at that time, most of the countries in Southeast Asia just came out of the European colonial rule. They obviously felt the threat of communism in Vietnam, in China, in Korea, but they also felt the sort of agony of colonialism at the time.
So, they did not have a shared common threat at the time, at least psychologically. Another reason why SEATO did not work out very well in the 1950s and 60s was because common alliance, common defense also requires more or less basic shared values. And many of the countries at the time in Southeast Asia, in Asia at large, were dictatorships. There are allies with the United States are fighting against communism. But more than that, beyond that, I mean there are dictators in South Korea, in Taiwan, and in the Philippines in particular, so in Indonesia as well. So those were dictatorships. So, there's a lack of common value to defend for now. Those two conditions have changed completely nowadays. So, since about 20 some years ago, there has developed a very strong sense of common threat coming from China across the region. You name it, India, Vietnam, and Philippines, Malaysia, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea of course.
So, all the countries in the region failed, even Australia, I might add that too, failed this threat from this biggest bully in the region that's China. So, they share this common threat. Common threat, as I say, is the fundamental basis for common defense. That's why I see this kind of reformation of the SEATO like mutual defense, multilateral defense alliance system. Secondly, since the 1980s, mid 1980s, with the Americans assistance, one country after another in Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia in particular has become democracy. Starting with the mid-1980s with the people's power movement in the Philippines where people spoke and voted out, the Marcos dictatorship and the Philippines became democracy. That was basically insisted upon the United States. I remember senators like Richard Lugar and congressman like Stephen Solarz, those people spend their lifetime working with the Filipino people, making sure that democracy, democratic institutions will be respected and implemented.
And after the Filipino revolution, you see the one in Taiwan and you see the democratization in South Korea. So, one by one, you have this kind of a rapid development of a shared value of freedom, democracy. And that's why the time is ripe right now to create a NATO-like multilateral collective defense alliance system. That system will provide the best deterrence to aggression, in this case, China. And of course, also Russia is jumping into the game as well. So, despite what you said about the war in Ukraine, the chaos, NATO is the best, most effective multilateral collective defense system in human history. That's why the war in Ukraine, as nasty, as brutal, as full of carnage as it is only has always been confined to the small region of the non-NATO member state. So that's why countries, neutral countries like Sweden and Finland, like to join because they feel the same common threat. So, I think right now the Americans alliance system in Asia Pacific is predominantly un-NATO-Like that is a bilateral, there's virtually no multilateral defense system. And that's why you see one country after another beginning to explore the possibility of a multilateral defense and security package started with say, QUAD, for example.
You also have many other, AUKUS is another one with Australia and the UK. So, this is kind of a multilateral collective defense alliance in the working with NATO's active involvement in this area. And NATO membership ultimately will expand into Asian country. Japan definitely will be among the first to join, Australia definitely will join and so would New Zealand. And I also believe that even if NATO has its own hesitancy to expand the membership to Asian countries, but at least the NATO model of multilateral collective defense system will be transplanted to Asia. So, you can from another, say SEATO, well, the name may be different. So, the best scenario in my view, I wrote an article about this, it's called [inaudible], that is the ultimate formation of North Atlantic Indo-Pacific Treaty Organization. That would be my dream. And I think that is not really a farfetched dream.
Shane Leary:
No, it's certainly becoming a clearer picture as the days go on. Well, Miles, I think that's all the time we have for this week, but thanks so much and look forward to doing this again next week.
Miles Yu:
Okay, great. Thank you very much. And don't forget to listen or watch tomorrow's event from the Hudson Institute about our commemoration of the 45th anniversary of the landmark Taiwan Relations Act.
Thank you for listening to this episode of China Insider. I'd like to thank my colleague Shane Leary, for taking part in this undertaking every week. I'd also like to thank our executive producer, Philip Hegseth, who works tirelessly and professionally behind the scenes for every episode. To make sure we deliver the best quality podcast to you, the listeners, if you enjoy the show, please spread the words for Chinese listeners. Please check our monthly review and analysis episode in Chinese. We'll see you next time.