[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 30 (Thursday, March 7, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1634-S1636]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  CHINA, TAIWAN, AND THE UNITED STATES

  Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, shortly after I announced that I would be 
retiring from the Senate, President Clinton called and suggested that 
from time to time, I should give a report on some issue facing the 
Nation, and today I am again doing that--this time with a few 
observations about the relationship between China, Taiwan, and the 
United States.
  My interest in this subject is more than a sudden thrust caused by 
recent developments. My parents were Lutheran missionaries in China and 
had returned to the United States 1 month when I was born. I tell 
Chinese-American audiences that I was ``made in China.'' I grew up in a 
home that had Chinese art, guests, and influence. That gives me no more 
expertise than others, but I mention it because my interest has been 
longstanding.
  Before the Shanghai communique that recognized the People's Republic 
of China, I favored recognizing the mainland Chinese Government, as 
well as the Government on Taiwan. It would have been somewhat similar 
to our recognizing both West Germany and East Germany as two separate 
governments. Neither Germany was particularly happy with that, but it 
acknowledged reality, and it did not prevent the two governments from 
eventually merging into one Germany.
  Following that course with China and Taiwan would have been a wiser 
policy, and it would have acknowledged what is a reality: There are two 
separate governments.
  But that did not happen, and hindsight is an easy luxury.
  The situation now is confusing and could turn dangerous. Our 
colleague Senator Dianne Feinstein has described United States policy 
toward China as one of zig-zagging, and that, unfortunately, is an apt 
description.
  Let me outline where we are and why I believe a firm and consistent 
U.S. policy is desirable for all parties.
  China has moved generally in a constructive direction since the 
emergence of Deng Ziaoping's leadership following the death of Mao. All 
of us who have been visitors there are impressed by

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the economic gains, and with those gains has come some greater 
openness--within tight constraints--even on political expression, 
particularly in the southern part of China near Hong Kong. But the 
violent suppression of those who demonstrated peacefully for human 
rights at Tiananmen Square shocked Americans and all democratic 
nations, as well as the thousands of Chinese students in the United 
States. I remember speaking to a large gathering of Chinese students at 
Grant Park in Chicago. All of us were stunned by the Chinese 
Government's action. I also joined those peacefully protesting outside 
the Chinese Embassy here in Washington. The benign face of the 
Government of China many had come to expect, suddenly turned 
malevolent.
  After none-too-swiftly denouncing the Government violence at 
Tiananmen Square, President Bush sent two of our top officials to 
Beijing to meet with their leaders, and whatever the content of the 
talks, the pictures that came back to us on the wire services were of 
two highly placed Americans, toasting the Chinese leadership that had 
just squelched, in a bloody fashion, the yearning for freedom of many 
of their people.
  In the meantime, the nearby island of Taiwan has moved more and more 
toward the human rights we profess to support. Taiwan now has a 
multiparty system, a free press, and freedoms that are comparable to 
those we enjoy. Its Parliament is at least as confrontational as is our 
Congress, and on March 23, there will be an election for President with 
the incumbent President, Lee Teng-hui, ahead in the polls. It is 
significant that he is a native Taiwanese. Taiwan has been our seventh-
leading trading partner and is No. 2 in the world in holding foreign 
currency reserves.
  Here is where our zip-zagging comes in. At least on paper, we applaud 
democracies and say we will support them, and we frown upon 
dictatorships. But the Shanghai communique states that the United 
States will recognize only one China. And so we have turned a 
diplomatic cold shoulder to Taiwan, showing greater sensitivity to a 
dictatorship than to a democracy.
  In terms of power, it is not a choice of two equals. For the same 
reasons that many in the State Department and Defense Department did 
not want to recognize Israel, which had significantly more-numerous 
Arabs as neighbors, and have had a tilt toward Turkey in her 
difficulties with less-numerous and less-powerful neighbors in Greece 
and Armenia, so there are many in key positions who say--once again--
that the choices should not be made on the merits but on the numbers 
and the potential power of the two governments. China has 1.2 billion 
people, and Taiwan has 21 million.

  However, there is something that makes many of us uncomfortable when 
the cold calculations of population and power are used as the 
overriding criteria in deciding whom we befriend. When we said, as we 
did for a period, that President Lee, the chief executive of a 
democracy, could not come to Cornell University for a reunion of his 
class because it might offend China, it showed weakness and lack of 
support for our ideals. Eventually, President Clinton reversed that 
decision, and I applaud him for it.
  With an election in Taiwan coming soon, the Chinese Government, which 
certainly must be a top contestant in the bad public relations field, 
has been making military noises that cause apprehension in Asia and 
concern everywhere--apparently in a heavy-handed attempt to influence 
the Taiwanese elections.
  Complicating the Chinese situation is that they face a transition in 
leadership, and no potential leader wants to look weak on the issue of 
absorbing Taiwan into the mainland. So leaders and potential leaders 
try to one-up each other in sounding tough on Taiwan. The irony is that 
tough talk makes an eventual peaceful reunion of the two governments 
less likely.
  While it is probable that China will not invade Taiwan in the near 
future, or launch a missile attack, people struggling for leadership 
power sometimes do irrational things. And public officials are risk-
takers. No one becomes a United States Senator without taking risks, 
and no one moves into leadership in China without taking risks. What 
has to be demonstrated to China is that their belligerent talk and 
actions are creating hostility around the world and that an invasion or 
missile strike would be a disaster for the Chinese leadership and the 
Chinese people.
  The position of the United States should be one of firmness and 
patience as China goes through this leadership change, evidencing our 
strong desire for friendship, but also our determined opposition to the 
use of force to achieve change. The lesson of history is that dictators 
who seize territory and receive praise for it from their own controlled 
media are not likely to have their appetite satisfied with one bite of 
land. If China should turn militaristic and seize Taiwan, that would be 
only the first acquisition. Mongolia to the north is a likely next 
target, and as we should have learned from Hitler, dictators can always 
find some historic justification for further actions.
  Editorial voices from the New York Times to the Washington Post to 
the Chicago Tribune to the Los Angeles Times--all newspapers that have 
been friendly to China--have denounced that nation's belligerent 
noises. And the sentiment in the Senate and House is equally clear.
  What should we be doing?
  Our policy should be clear and firm, friendly but not patronizing, 
toward both governments.
  The United States should enunciate a defense policy--joined in, 
ideally, by other governments--that military actions such as an 
invasion or missile strike would evoke a military response from us. I 
personally would favor a strong response with air power by the United 
States and other nations, if an attempt were made to invade Taiwan or 
an appropriate military response if they launch a missile attack, but 
the means of responding militarily do not need to be spelled out. I do 
not believe an invasion or an air or missile attack are likely in 1996, 
but any future leaders who may emerge in China should be put on notice. 
Secretary of Defense William Perry has hinted at that possibility, and 
the presence of a United States aircraft carrier in the international 
waters between China and Taiwan is a good signal. But hints are not 
enough. The Los Angeles Times editorially praised Perry for his 
statement as ``the strongest indication that the United States might 
intervene if China attacked Taiwan.'' The best way of preventing 
military action is to move beyond ``might.'' We should state our 
posture unequivocally. No military leader should even consider gambling 
on our hesitancy. Our able Ambassador to China, James Sasser--who I 
once encourage to run for President--should quietly meet with their 
leaders and tell them we are serious about that message and that the 
belligerent noises are hurting the Chinese image around the world.

  Another reason for doing this is that other Asian nations have 
serious questions about our military resolve, not our military 
capability. They see a few terrorists chasing us out of Somalia; they 
note that until recently, we were long on talk and short on action in 
Bosnia; and they see us quake when the Chinese Government growls. If 
our policy in this situation is not more clear and more firm, 
inevitably, Japan and other nations will invest significantly more in 
weapons and defense personnel, and an arms race in Asia will be 
accelerated. That is in no one's interests, other than the arms 
manufacturers. The United States has assured Japan and other Asian 
nations that we would come to their defense if attacked--but we also 
once gave that assurance to Taiwan. The nations of Asia are asking a 
fundamental question: Can they count on the United States?
  Defense Secretary Perry has suggested that the top security officials 
of Asia should get together regularly in order to reduce tensions and 
increase understanding, an idea somewhat similar to Senator Sam Nunn's 
suggestions some years ago about Soviet and United States military 
leaders exchanging visits. The Nunn initiative produced some lessening 
of tensions. If China declines such a suggestion, nothing will have 
been lost. But anxieties among the nations of that area will diminish 
if China accepts such an invitation.
  If China continues a policy of sending missiles to Pakistan and 
conducting military exercises near Taiwan, the United States should 
reexamine our trade policies, which now are heavily

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weighted in China's direction. China has a huge $34 billion trade 
surplus with the United States. We can ask organizations like the World 
Bank, which in 1994 made a $925 million, interest-free loan to China 
through the International Development Association, to act with greater 
prudence toward China. IDA loans generally go to poor nations; the 
average recipient country's per capita income is $382 a year. China's 
average of $530 is well above that, and China has foreign reserves of 
approximately $70 billion. When China's bellicosity toward Taiwan is 
combined with human rights abuses, the picture painted is not good. Our 
relationship should be correct but not condescending or cowering. When 
China sells nuclear weapons technology to Pakistan our response should 
be clear, not quavering. Tough nonmilitary means of sending a message 
to China's leadership may need to be used.
  If China's leaders will lighten up a bit, and see their present 
foreign policy orientation as self-defeating, there is no reason China 
and the United States cannot have a good, healthy, and fruitful 
relationship that will help the people of both of our countries. If 
China reaches out with a friendly hand toward Taiwan, rather than with 
a fist, China will make gains economically and politically.
  In the meantime, we should welcome visits by Taiwan's leaders to the 
United States and by our leaders to that Government. We should stop 
playing games, and stop treating Taiwan as if it is a relative with a 
social disease. Because of past policy errors on our part, formal 
recognition in the immediate future is not advisable, at least until 
the Chinese leadership situation is sealed. But we should encourage 
Taiwanese participation in international organizations, and do whatever 
else we might do to encourage a friendly Government that is both a 
healthy trading partner and democracy.
  And when areas of uncertainty arise, as they inevitably will, the 
United States should remember our ideals, and do what we can to further 
the cause of human rights and democracy, not as a nation that has 
achieved perfection--we obviously have not--but as a country that wants 
to give opportunity to people everywhere to select their governments. 
When we stray from our ideals, everyone loses.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Gorton). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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