Taipei storm greets US
evacuees By Jens Kastner and
Wang Jhy-perng
TAIPEI - After the massive
earthquake and tsunami wrecked Japan's Fukushima
nuclear reactors on March 11, the United States
evacuated its embassy personnel and, as
unconfirmed reports have it, members of the United
States Marine Corps to Taiwan. Not everybody
believes that Washington's location choice was as
innocent as claimed.
Having switched to
formally recognizing the People's Republic of
China in 1979, the United States does not hold
diplomatic ties with Taiwan. US military contact
and exchange with Taiwan remains a most sensitive
issue in US-China relations.
When it
become evident that Japan was facing its biggest national
tragedy since World War II,
the US was quick to come to aid of its ally and
host of US military bases. The US Navy brought out
the big guns. Immediately assigned to take part in
the relief efforts were the super-carriers USS
George Washington and USS Ronald
Reagan, as well as the guided-missile cruiser
USS Chancellorsville and the destroyer
USS Preble.
The Pacific Command
furthermore ordered amphibious assault ship USS
Essex and the USS Harpers to abort a
Malaysia visit; the dock landing ship USS
Tortuga came up from its mother port in
Japan's south, and the command ship USS Blue
Ridge called off a voyage to Singapore.
But, seeing no sign that things would turn
out well at the badly damaged Fukushima nuclear
plant, the US resorted to Plan B for American
officials, private citizens and their dependents,
who were flown from Japan to Taipei on charter
flights.
Among them was the entire staff
of the US Embassy, allegedly accompanied by 40
marines. Apart from the protection of the embassy
personnel, the soldiers' mission has reportedly
been the safeguarding of highly confidential
documents. To house the evacuees, the de facto US
Embassy in Taiwan, the American Institute in
Taiwan (AIT), is said to have rented not fewer
than 900 Taipei hotel rooms where a number of the
Americans remain residing to this day.
Given Taiwan's tenuous diplomatic
situation, it's hardly surprising that the
evacuation meant the island's political TV talk
shows had a field day.
"The Americans have
Kadena air base on Okinawa, so why didn't they
bring the evacuees there?" said talking heads
challenging official explanations that Taiwan was
chosen because it's safe, convenient and cheap.
"If the wind doesn't blow radioactive clouds
towards Taiwan, then they won't go to Okinawa
either, because it lies in the same direction."
According to the pundits, apart from China
and North Korea, any country in the region would
have been a more plausible choice than the island.
This is mainly because Beijing certainly wouldn't
like seeing anything with the slightest hints of
official cooperation between Taipei and
Washington, even for humanitarian reasons.
To make their case, commentators pointed
out that in South Korea, the US has about 30
military camps and bases, and that there's the US
naval base on Guam, not so much further away from
Japan than Taiwan. Even Hawaii would have made
more sense, let alone the Philippines, a country
designated by the US as a "major non-North
Atlantic Treaty Organization ally".
And
there are still Vietnam, Singapore and Thailand,
with the latter two being important refueling and
transit points for the US Navy. But, instead,
Taiwan was chosen, possibly to pull Beijing's leg,
or to "build a bridge" to the Taiwanese
government, so said the commentators.
"The
US makes Taiwan its First Island Chain-backup
center," one Taiwanese reporter sensationalized,
referring to a maritime line in the West Pacific
which encircles China's coast and runs along
countries friendly to the US, including Taiwan,
therefore forming an obstacle to China's naval
ambitions. "By evacuating the US Embassy to
Taipei, Washington turns Taiwan into a
quasi-ally," he went on.
Experts
approached by Asia Times Online for comment,
however, don't quite share such rather hot-headed
enthusiasm.
"I do not subscribe to the
notion that this is an effort by the [Barack]
Obama administration 'to build a bridge to
Taipei'," said Rupert Hammond-Chambers, president
of the US-Taiwan Business Council. The head of the
non-profit organization which fosters trade and
business relations between the US and Taiwan says
the US government has balked at many other
opportunities to enhance relations with Taipei.
To Hammond-Chambers, the evacuation of
Japan-based US personnel to Taiwan was a practical
decision based on geography and flight
frequencies, convenience and cost, as well as on
comfort for the American families. "Taipei is a
wonderful place for non-Taiwanese families to
stay, and they will be well taken care of during
this difficult period," he said.
Steve
Tsang, professorial fellow in Taiwan Studies at
Oxford University, dismisses speculation that
diplomatic maneuvering was behind Washington's
decision. To him, the hypotheses presented on
Taiwanese TV talk shows made no sense at all.
"I would ask the question the other way,
namely, why should they not be evacuated to
Taiwan? To avoid Taiwan would only have been
because of a need or wish to avoid Beijing
expressing anger as if Washington's decision
should imply enhanced recognition of Taipei,"
Tsang said.
Tsang added another
significant reason for Taiwan being a plausible
choice. "Taiwan is a friendly place where the US
personnel will find support and plenty of good
facilities. Since other countries may well be
using Korea for this purpose rather than Taiwan,
it is probably logistically easier to send them to
Taiwan."
Nonetheless, although in Tsang's
eyes the evacuation did not imply any basic change
in Washington's relationship with Taipei and
Beijing, it could probably be seen as an indicator
that "Washington is now less worried about a
negative People's Republic of China reaction".
The source of news that the evacuees were
accompanied by active-duty US-military personnel,
and the nature of the soldiers' function, isn't
clear. No American strolling down Taipei's streets
and alleys in US military uniform has been caught
by the island's TV cameras. Rumors that US Marines
delivered confidential documents to a Taiwanese
intelligence facility may have come from a handful
of Taiwanese journalists - they were later picked
up by mainland Chinese netizens.
As the
evacuees weren't flown on military aircraft but
onboard aircraft chartered with China Airlines,
which is the Taiwanese flag carrier, it's obvious
that both Washington and Taipei kept the
evacuation as low-key as possible. No word has
been heard from Beijing on the matter.
Huang Hua-hsi, a Taiwanese legislative
assistant, shed lights on the impression the
evacuation has made on the Taiwanese public.
According to him, unlike some political
commentators, ordinary Taiwanese didn't sense a
hidden political agenda. The television footage of
Americans fleeing Japan for Taiwan affected the
public quite in another manner.
"The
evacuation fueled the notion that this time, the
crisis was really serious," Huang said. He
ventured thought on the psychological impact on
the Taiwanese public if the US had skipped Taiwan
and brought the evacuees straight to the
Philippines.
"That would have looked as if
the US doesn't trust the Taiwanese government at
all. Only then, the Taiwanese public would have
begun with political speculation."
Jens Kastner is a Taipei-based
journalist. Wang Jhy-perng is an associate
research fellow at the Association for Managing
Defense and Strategies.
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2011 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights
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