The U.S. and the U.K. held high-level closed-door talks in March over China''s threat to Taiwan. According to the U.K.''s Financial Times, the two sides explored conflict contingency plans for the first time. Sources say top officials from the two sides discussed what role the U.K. would play, if the U.S. and China went to war over Taiwan.
Landing craft slice through the waters. Carrying amphibious armored vehicles and troops, they’re off to launch an attack on a beachhead. Chinese state media CCTV released a video of this military exercise, emphasizing that it was conducted in the waters of the Pearl River Delta. It was a pointed attempt to intimidate Taiwan.
China’s ambition to invade Taiwan has not diminished, and nations all over the world are closely watching the Taiwan Strait. In a foreign policy speech last week,
U.K. foreign secretary Liz Truss specifically mentioned the need to ensure Taiwan’s ability to defend itself.
Liz Truss (April 28)
UK secretary of foreign affairs
We need to preempt threats to the Indo-Pacific. Working with our allies like Japan and Australia to ensure the Pacific is protected. And we must ensure that democracies like Taiwan are able to defend themselves.
It was a rare mention of Taiwan by a British politician. According to the U.K.’s Financial Times, the U.K. and the U.S. held closed-door talks on the Taiwan Strait in early March, during a broader meeting on Indo-Pacific strategy. The U.S. was represented by White House Indo-Pacific coordinator Kurt Campbell and Laura Rosenberger, its top National Security Council official on China. They met with senior U.K. representatives, discussing conflict contingency plans for the first time. The dialogue explored the role that the U.K. would play if the U.S. and China went to war over Taiwan. According to an unnamed U.K. official, this meeting was the two sides’ “highest-level” and “most significant” discussion on Taiwan to date.
Lin Ying-yu
National Sun Yat-sen University Asia-Pacific affairs professor
They are sharing intelligence, partly because of the AUKUS partnership. Following the outbreak of war in Ukraine, the U.S., U.K. and even some NATO countries – how are they viewing the problems of the Indo-Pacific? It’s clear that they’re not going to brush aside the security issues of the Indo-Pacific, the Asia-Pacific, or the Taiwan Strait.
According to the scholar, the U.S.-U.K. dialogue reflects how, amid the Russia-Ukraine war, Washington is involving more of its allies in the defense of Taiwan. Its strategy appears to “internationalize” the Taiwan Strait to reduce the chances of war, he said.
