Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was a dangerous and open provocation — precisely as intended

Nancy Pelosi’s recklessly provocative visit to the breakaway Chinese province of Taiwan will have far-reaching consequences for Sino-US relations going forward. That one aged US Senator and senior Washington functionary believes that the road to stability and peace in East Asia will be served by triggering an international incident is a metric of how out of touch with reality she and her advisers are.

Taiwan in its current mode of existence is a dagger pointed at the Chinese mainland’s heart. Its strategic location and history as a major jumping off point for the Japanese invasion and occupation of China in the 1930s — during which the atrocities and crimes committed against the Chinese people were legion — makes this issue more than one of territorial integrity. It is also about security.

The One-China Policy, recognised by successive US administrations since 1979, is an inviolate international agreement that anti-China hawks in Washington, such as Nancy Pelosi, are intent on undermining not out of some noble or honorable principle, but out of determination to halt China’s rise and growing geopolitical footprint. Rather than deal with Beijing in a spirit of understanding and positive engagement, however, Washington prefers the path of confrontation and provocation.