Will the Trump Administration Send a US Aircraft Carrier Through the Taiwan Strait?
The Trump administration may be setting the stage for a show of reassurance toward Taipei.
By Ankit Panda
June 06, 2018
Earlier this week, a Reuters report, citing unnamed U.S. officials, noted that the Trump administration is considering “sending a warship through the Taiwan strait.†The move would come at a time of intensified U.S. scrutiny of Chinese actions in the disputed South China Sea and would come after Washington disinvited China from the 2018 Rim of the Pacific exercise, staged the first known freedom of navigation operation near a disputed China-held feature in the South China Sea using more than one warship, and after U.S. Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis publicly rebuked Beijing’s rule-breaking behavior in a speech in Singapore.
For Taiwan, the move would come as a welcome sign of the Trump administration’s commitment to maintaining the cross-strait status quo. Over the last two years, the so-called “diplomatic truce†that prevailed between Beijing and Taipei for the duration of the Ma Ying-jeou-led Kuomintang administration has crumbled, with China gradually plucking away Taiwan’s remaining diplomatic allies. In May 2018, both the Dominican Republic and Burkina Faso shifted their diplomatic recognition over to Beijing.
https://thediplomat.com/2018/06/will-the-trump-administration-send-a-us-aircraft-carrier-through-the-taiwan-strait/
