A leading politician suggests a moment of national crisis requires a strategic, cross-party response.
Trump’s announcement of a 32% tariff on Taiwanese exports comes at a time when the Taiwanese government and opposition parties are in heated confrontation, and the cross-straits situation is particularly tense.
In an article on a Taiwanese media platform, a leading politician warns: “this is not just a simple economic and trade issue, but also a major test of Taiwan’s overall strategic resilience”. Lin Fu-nan, a senior member of the Taiwan’s People’s Party, urges the public to look beyond the economic implications to consider it as a national security challenge. Tariffs, he says, should be seen as an extension of the ‘America First’ approach in the US-China struggle. If Taiwan doesn’t react fast it could suffer economically and lose its strategic foothold in global supply chains.
Lin Fu-nan argues that the government should take the lead in traversing party lines: “Now is not the time to argue about internal affairs; the government should work together to face external pressure, or we will be the laughingstock of the international community”. He suggests a “strategic dialogue platform” should be established to build a solution that has cross-party consensus.
Calling on the government to have a pragmatic approach to the cross-straits relations, he suggests “Taiwan should not be forced to take sides but should make good use of its role in key supply chains and become a bridge for regional stability and technological cooperation”.
Strategic balance, he suggests, is crucial to navigating the trilateral relationship between the US, China and Taiwan.
Original article was written in Traditional Chinese by Xu Bingwen and published in Storm Media (風傳媒) on 5 April 2025. It’s available here.
Storm Media (風傳媒) is a Chinese-language online news media headquartered in Taipei.
Summary by TMH.
