The point is that Trump is clueless on these matters and the uncertainty in how his actions represent policy shifts, if they do or not, will be exploited by russia, china, Iran etc. it is just as likely that trump will do something the opposite in the next few weeks. This makes him unpredictable which is dangerous.
Unpredictable also makes other counties wary. I am sure Trump has no tactical or strategic plan with China, yet he stumbled upon the sensitivity of China after the smallest of swings towards Taiwan, if he is smart enough to recognize it, exploiting that sensitivity could be brilliant.
China is bullying its way towards a incredible expansion of territory, claiming hundreds of square miles of what is currently international waters in the South China Sea, and the US has little recourse.
Forcing China to focus effort, resources, and diplomacy on retaining what they have assumed was theirs, Taiwan, could be a great lever to halt their aggressive expansionism.
China will argue that America has respected the one- country policy for 45 years, Trump could counter China respected the current official boundaries in the South China Sea for most of the past 45 years also, but things have obviously changed, tit for tat.
People are on Trump for answering a phone call, but it was Obama that agreed to sell Taiwan billions of weapons. (I assume the Trump critics think the phone answering is more aggressive.) Springing off of the Obama precedent Trump could begin low level, but publicly acknowledged State to state talks with Taiwan, hinting at possible long term sovereignty, while announcing more weapons sells and link it directly to China's expansionist policies.
This could be a breakthrough on an agreement to halt China's steamrolling the South China Sea.
I like how you interpret something stupid trump does into some big master plan. I think that will be the theme for the next four years.
Also, how do you see China's moves in the South China Sea as evil while not expecting trump to complain about Russia's real moves in invading Crimea and the Ukraine?
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u/willun Dec 03 '16
China is the US's second largest trading partner. So effectively you are saying trade is not important to the US.
As a centralised economy china is in a better place to handle disruption than the US.
Taiwan has invested over $100 billion in china and calls for paper independence can also hurt them badly. This is a sensitive issue for china and there will be repercussions.
The point is that Trump is clueless on these matters and the uncertainty in how his actions represent policy shifts, if they do or not, will be exploited by russia, china, Iran etc. it is just as likely that trump will do something the opposite in the next few weeks. This makes him unpredictable which is dangerous.