By Zhang Hua
Recently, Raymond Greene, director of the so-called "American Institute in Taiwan (AIT)", claimed at a forum in Taichung that Taiwan should build a "hornet's nest" of unmanned combat systems in the air, at sea and underwater to "deter" the Chinese mainland. In essence, the remarks are aimed at reinforcing Taiwan's role as a political pawn and turning the island into cannon fodder for the United States' strategy of containing China. As a result, they have triggered strong backlash on the island and drawn sharp criticism from the Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) of the State Council. On July 8, a spokesperson for the TAO said that Greene's remarks and actions contradicted the serious statements made by US President Donald Trump, undermined peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, and attempted to steer both China-US relations and cross-Strait relations in a highly dangerous direction.
It is well known that Taiwan plays an important role in Washington's strategic layout in the Asia-Pacific. After World War II, the United States established the so-called "First Island Chain" as part of its strategy to contain China, with Taiwan serving as a key link connecting Japan and the Philippines. The United States has long sought to turn Taiwan into a forward outpost for containing China by supporting and controlling the Taiwan authorities.
At a time when the Chinese mainland was economically underdeveloped and militarily weak, the United States sought to maintain a qualitative edge in weaponry over the mainland by selling advanced arms to Taiwan, and prevented the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) from liberating Taiwan. Today, however, the Chinese mainland has secured overwhelming military superiority over Taiwan. In response, the United States has shifted to promoting the concept of "asymmetric warfare" on the island, successively advancing such operational concepts as the "Porcupine Strategy," the "Hellscape" scenario and, most recently, the "Hornet's Nest" concept.
These notions are, in essence, aimed at enabling Taiwan to punch above its weight by enhancing its capacity to confront the Chinese mainland, in the hope of deterring the mainland from taking necessary countermeasures and continuing to leverage Taiwan as a political pawn of the United States.
Greene's erroneous remarks have triggered strong opposition on the island, where peace and stability across the Taiwan Straits remain the mainstream aspiration. Multiple opinion polls on the island show that more than 80 percent of Taiwan residents hope to see stability maintained across the Taiwan Strait and oppose the Lai Ching-te authorities' provocative policies toward the Chinese mainland. Media outlets on the island, including China Times, have published commentaries criticizing Greene's remarks, saying that they expose that Taiwan's role on the US strategic chessboard is becoming increasingly instrumentalized and function-oriented, and that the so-called "Hornet's Nest" concept amounts to nothing more than reconfiguring Taiwan to suit US needs.
Regrettably, however, the island's ruling authorities have gone out of their way to embrace Greene's proposals. Not content with the regular annual defense budget, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authorities have proposed a special defense budget totaling NT$1.25 trillion. More recently, they introduced a draft special act on the procurement of indigenous unmanned defense systems, which would allocate up to NT$210 billion for the procurement of coastal surveillance unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), coastal attack UAVs, and small suicide unmanned surface vessels (USVs), among other systems.
If the so-called "Hornet's Nest" strategy is implemented, it will pose a serious threat to the island's economic and social security.
Such enormous defense expenditures would substantially increase Taiwan's fiscal burden and crowd out public spending on social welfare, education and other essential public services. Meanwhile, corruption scandals involving Taiwan's politicians and military authorities continue to surface. How much of these funds will ultimately end up in the pockets of senior DPP officials?
The United States and the DPP authorities are keen to hype up the risk of conflict across the Taiwan Strait solely to serve their own interests. Should conflict break out across the Taiwan Strait, they would be the only beneficiaries, while all other parties would suffer losses. Ordinary people on the island would bear the greatest costs, paying a heavy financial price while facing the risks of war.
From the "Porcupine Strategy" to the "Hellscape" scenario and now the "Hornet's Nest" concept, the United States has continued to escalate the "asymmetric warfare" concepts it has devised for Taiwan. Yet Taiwan remains nothing more than a pawn on the chessboard of US hegemony — one that can be sacrificed at any time. People on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are bound by blood and share the same roots. Only by working together to oppose "Taiwan independence" separatist activities and reject external interference can they truly safeguard peace across the Taiwan Strait.
(The author is director and research fellow of the political economy research department at the Institute of Taiwan Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.)
Editor's note: Originally published on china.com.cn, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.