U.S. Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA) said if China acts against Taiwan, the global community will support Taiwan.
“If Communist China makes a move against Taiwan, it won’t only be the United States to come to Taiwan's aid,” Scott told State Newswire. “The CCP is fully aware of this risk, and we will stand firm against them if they breach Taiwan's independence.”
Scott was responding to “Reunification with Taiwan through Force Would Be a Pyrrhic Victory for China,” recently released by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and authored by Jude Blanchette, Freeman Chair in China Studies at CSIS, and Gerard DiPippo, Senior Fellow of the Economics Program at CSIS.
The report argues that if China used direct lethal force to defeat Taiwan’s army and get rid of the island’s existing civilian leadership, Beijing would face potentially severe costs, both directly and indirectly, on multiple fronts. The report assumes, for the purpose of a simplified analysis, that China would not use nuclear weapons, and that U.S. military forces would engage in a limited intervention that would not ultimately defeat China. The report asserts that if China succeeds in “reunification” with Taiwan through forceful means, Beijing will sacrifice the progress it has made toward its ambition of becoming a global superpower.
The report states that one consequence of “reunification” is that China would promptly be met with economic repercussions from the global community that would restrict its ability to import and export goods. Also likely are a detrimental effect on the value of Chinese currency, on China's domestic markets, and on business sentiment towards China, according to the report. “Meaningful” intervention by the U.S. military would drastically increase the costs incurred by China. The report notes that the military conflict would most likely take place close to China's “most economically important and populated provinces.” It said that if China succeeds in “reunification,” Chinese forces will then be occupying an island with “a hostile population” and “a shattered local economy, including its semiconductor sector.”
The Taiwan Relations Act, enacted in 1979, asserts that the U.S. aims to maintain peaceful trade and cultural relations with both Taiwan and China. It specifies that “the United States shall provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character and shall maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or social or economic system, of the people of Taiwan.”
Scott is serving his sixth term as Georgia’s Eighth Congressional District representative, according to his website. He prioritizes strengthening the U.S. military to ensure it is capable of defending against adversaries including China and Russia, and advancing legislation that benefits Georgia's farmers and rural communities.
