On the Sunday Special episode of Human Events Daily, host Jack Posobiec dove into the potential consequences of a conflict with China following and broke down China's relationship with Taiwan on the same day China began combat drills in the air and water surrounding Taiwan.
"For almost 30 years, exactly 29, the People's Republic of China, the Chinese Communist Party controls all of mainland China," Posobiec said. "But the United States doesn't recognize them." Eventually, when the US decides to recognize China, the demand from the leadership is adherence to the One China Policy, which is a principle that says the US recognizes Taiwan, which has a government independent from China, is actually part of the People's Republic of China."
Posobiec explained how from the moment in 1949 when Communist leader Mao Zedong formed the People's Republic of China, the US, throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s, did not create diplomatic ties with the country.
As the Star Trek character Spock said in the motion picture Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, "only Nixon could go to China."
Posobiec said, "So Nixon, of course, and Kissinger go over there. They say 'look, we can break up the communist bloc of countries on nationalist lines, and then we can start opening up to China and we can maybe break them away from the Soviets.'"
Posobiec explained the realpolitik principle of "great power politics," or "this idea of if there's another great power when we get them on our side, we can use them as a bulwark against our greater foes at that time: the Soviet Union."
Nixon's trip paved the way for Jimmy Carter, who in 1978 officially opened up ties with China, but the trade-off was adherence to the One China policy.
Taiwanese leaders claim they are their own country, the Republic of China, and were never a part of Mao Zedong's revolution.
"So the US position has always kind of been this interesting fence-striding position," Posobiec said.
"President Truman once famously said that if the United States and China should ever go to war, then Taiwan would essentially be an organic floating giant aircraft carrier," Posobiec added.
He then explained that in the tenuous balance that if Taiwan officially declared themselves independent and circumvented the status quo, " that would trigger a full-on war launched by the PRC launch by the Red Army. They have said that's a red line for them. And so the status quo has stayed like this. Since 1978."
Posobiec spoke to the greater ambitions of China's current leader, "Now, Xi Jinping is in power. And Xi Jinping views Taiwan as unfinished business, the same way that Putin saw Ukraine as unfinished business."Posobiec explained how, if tensions escalated in the region, China would likely create a blockade around Taiwan, cutting it off from the rest of the world.
"Because of course, under this administration, the Biden administration, what else could they do?" Posobiec said of the limp response Biden would likely muster if an event like the blockade occurred.
Posobiec again broke down pragmatics and explained how, in the face of a conflict with the US and China, the CCP would disrupt our supply chains, upon which we heavily rely on the PRC to provide, and increase fentanyl into the US.
