Xi Can't Have Taiwan

The Chinese National People’s Congress recently passed the “Promotion of Ethnic Unity and Progress Law,” mandating patriotic education and codifying the use of Mandarin. It did so to promote unitary “Chinese” national identity, a priority of Chairman Xi Jinping. The forced creation of a singular Chinese national identity seems a Herculean feat, if not impossible, in a country as ethnically varied as China. The aims are even more perplexing, given how difficult they are to achieve, especially considering the stated desire of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to “reunify” with its “sacred territory” of Taiwan. One wonders how the People’s Republic of China (PRC) plans to coerce a people with their own history and ethnographic composition, let alone political system, into homogenization with the mainland. It is perhaps through the oversimplification of Taiwan’s history that the PRC is able to justify, to its people and to the world, its entitlement to do so.  

In his new book Ghost Nation: The Story of Taiwan and its Struggle for Survival, American journalist Chris Horton sets out to demonstrate that the PRC’s justifications are not only ill-founded, but also completely disconnected from reality. Horton has spent the past 11 years based in Taipei covering the country’s foreign and domestic policy, as well as their civil society. Most contemporary books about Taiwan approach the subject from a foreign policy lens, exploring the United States’ relationship to Taiwan and the implications of those ties. Horton takes a different approach. He introduces the reader to the small island off the coast of mainland China through its history, weaving policy arguments into the narrative and punctuating his points with interviews from his journalism career. The result is an approachable yet substantively dense book that leaves the reader with a sense of the Taiwanese struggle for freedom and what role the West should play in it.  

The bulk of Ghost Nation focuses on condensing a complex history into eight succinct chapters. The historical narrative begins when the island first enters the historical record, around the time its first colonizers, the Dutch and the Spanish, arrived. Through a detailed account of the period, Horton makes evident the Japanese and the Chinese’s lack of interest in what the Portuguese traders called the Ilha Formosa, or “Beautiful Island.” In doing so, he effectively refutes the CCP’s revisionist history, which claims ancient ties binding the mainland to Taiwan. It was only after the Dutch had settled it that China showed an interest in the island when Koxinga, a pirate Ming loyalist, attacked the Dutch settlement and established a military base. Though it marked the first Han Chinese-led regime on the island, Koxinga’s “Kingdom of Tunging” was short-lived. During the following period, the Chinese Qing Dynasty annexed Taiwan and encouraged mass migration. Yet Horton again illustrates that, even during this period of annexation, the Qing Dynasty was not the welcome party the CCP would like to portray. A common complaint among the Chinese during the Qing era was “every three years an uprising; every five years a rebellion” – hardly a warm welcome from the Taiwanese. After the Qing occupation, the Japanese, the next occupiers, while no more welcome, were more successful at pacifying the people of Taiwan. Again, Horton successfully muddies the Chinese “historic” claim to Taiwan since they were neither the first to settle on the island nor the first to rule successfully. 

In the following chapters, Horton brings the reader from the Second World War up to democratization. We learn that, following the Cairo Conference in 1945, the United States and the United Kingdom agreed that Taiwan would be “returned” to the Republic of China (ROC) following the war. Despite the hopes of educated Taiwanese for a new China under ROC rule, Kuomintang (KMT) rule led to the White Terror and the imposition of martial law, which lasted from 1945 until 1987. As the book transitions to a more recent period, it comes fully alive as Horton intersperses interviews with key players to underscore the historical points he makes. In the “Three Immortals” chapter the book shines.  

Demonstrating the tenacity of the Taiwanese and their desire to live free from oppression, Horton highlights three individuals instrumental in midwifing Taiwanese democracy. Most notable is his interview with Lee Teng-hui, the first native born President of Taiwan. This interview with President Lee, a fierce advocate of Taiwanese democracy and a distinct Taiwanese identity, is the heart of the book. Lee animates all the author’s themes of the independent Taiwanese spirit and their perseverance in securing a free state.  In discussing his legacy, Mr. Lee conveys pride in successfully nationalizing the military. Addressing Mr. Horton, he said, “National defense is the crucial foundation for national security, and it is the most important symbol of national sovereignty. My democratic reforms were necessary to make a sustained push for the military to never again belong to an individual or political party.’” Here, Lee’s words foreshadow the critical need for Taiwan’s military strength to prevent future single-party rule. After decades of brutal martial law under the Kuomintang (KMT), the Taiwanese won’t trade their democracy for another reign of terror under the Chinese Communist Party.  

After finishing the historical portion of the book and bringing the reader up to present-day Taiwan, Mr. Horton reintroduces the imminent threat to the young democracy. China’s Xi Jinping consistently states in speeches, “Taiwan is China’s sacred territory.” Taiwan’s current leader, President Lai Ching-te, retorts, “On this land, democracy and freedom are growing and thriving – the People’s Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan.” China believes the annexation of Taiwan is in its national interest for reasons that have nothing to do with uniting in brotherly love and everything to do with strategic positioning, economic benefit, and national pride.  

As he demonstrates throughout the book, Horton possesses not only a deep knowledge of Taiwan but also great love for the country and is willing to speak difficult but necessary truths. He spares no feelings, laying out the brass tacks of what needs to be done to protect the country from the CCP. He also directs criticism at those who have failed to support the threatened nation, including his own journalism community. In his final chapter, he presents one final piece of evidence as to why Taiwanese independence should matter to the United States and the West: semiconductors. Should Taiwan fall to China, the chips fabricated there, which are essential to the American economy, would cease to flow. This note of realism is necessary to bring skeptics on board. Yet, Horton might have ceded ground in the epilogue where he argues that refraining from supporting Taiwan is an approval of Beijing’s “expansionist agenda.” While true, this argument may prove less convincing than Horton intended or perhaps hopes for, as the same argument did little to lend support to the Ukrainians with certain parts of the general public in their fight against an adversary of the United States.  

If we are to learn anything from waning support for Ukraine in the United States, the aggressor’s injustices matter less than how the threatened country demonstrates sufficient utility to us. The book, rich in historical detail, makes strong arguments for defending Taiwan, to which any traditional American China hawk might find themselves nodding along. However, the area Horton might run into trouble is not his knowledge, nor his perspective, but rather his framing in certain portions of the book.  

We find the first example right out of the gate in the first chapter. Horton opens on a scene of the Taiwanese government offering their first public apology to the indigenous Taiwanese people after 392 years of colonization. No one would argue that those years of colonization were just, and, as Horton later demonstrates, they were often filled with brutality. Yet the scene bears some resemblance to a land acknowledgment ceremony, anathema to so many whom Horton seeks to convince. Horton does not do the Taiwanese any favors by potentially alienating part of his intended audience in the opening pages.  

As the chapter progresses, he finds himself on more solid ground, citing a letter from the Indigenous peoples of Taiwan, delivered in 2019, in response to Xi Jinping. The letter, written just days after Xi claimed the Taiwanese and Chinese were a “‘family’” and “‘compatriots,’” boldly asserts, “‘Mr. Xi Jinping, you do not know us, so you do not know Taiwan. We are the Indigenous peoples of Taiwan, and we’ve lived here in Taiwan, our motherland, for more than 6,000 years. We are not so-called “ethnic minorities within the Chinese nation.’” Though speaking solely for the Indigenous people of Taiwan, the letter captures the spirit of the Taiwanese fight for independence. They are a people with their own history, culture, and identity. It is this spirit that is far more profound than the oppressor-oppressed narrative, which may alienate Horton’s audience. Meeting the Indigenous Taiwanese in this context, there is no question that they do not claim victimhood, and in doing so make themselves a much more enticing strategic partner.  

We see this misstep in framing once again as Horton lays the groundwork for his central thesis. With his vast cultural knowledge, Horton describes “Ghost Month,” the seventh month in the lunar year, when tradition dictates the gates to the underworld open to forgotten souls whose specters haunt the land of the living. Taiwan, he argues, is similar to these spirits. Only it is the international community that is responsible for the nation’s potential fading into the unknown. Though a clever comparison utilizing the local culture, his phrasing leaves the reader with the saccharine aftertaste of the “why can’t we all be friends” flavor of progressive foreign policy. Condemning our “ghosting” of Taiwan, he writes, “We have ghosted Taiwan, and in doing so, have lost a little of our own humanity – the connection we should feel with all our fellow inhabitants of this planet. But we have also kept a neighbor and valuable partner out of our community.” Such universal humanitarianism is wrong-headed and undoubtedly turns away the very people it hopes to convince. He might have considered the loyalty and memory of the nation, the Taiwanese nation, not only as true and worth defending against Chinese aggression, but also as a more fertile source of appeal to an American readership.  

Understanding Taiwan’s history and its strategic importance is critical as the United States enters direct talks with China at the May summit between President Trump and Xi Jinping. Taiwanese history is not easily distilled, which makes it ripe for the CCP to manipulate in support of its goal to annex the island. Equally important is how it is presented. At its best, Ghost Nation presents Taiwan as intent on liberating itself from oppressive rule, not yearning to be fully reunited with its “family” across the strait. On occasion, Horton hurts his cause by potentially alienating those he seeks to convince about the importance of the country he loves so deeply. Yet it is the author’s spirit and knowledge that make the book not only convincing but effective. As demonstrated by former President Lee, it is a belief in democracy, the unique Taiwanese identity, and a heavy dose of pragmatism that will lead to Taiwan’s preservation. 

Anne Lord is the Director of Government Affairs covering Defense Policy for the Vandenberg Coalition. A former staffer for Senator Ben Sasse, she holds a master’s in strategic studies from the University of St. Andrews.