WASHINGTON--The White House on Monday insisted that Washington's "one China" policy should not be used as a "bargaining chip" with Beijing after President-elect Donald Trump said the United States did not necessarily have to be bound by its long-standing position that Taiwan is part of China.
Signaling further resistance Trump will face in Washington if he tries to overturn a principle that has underpinned more than four decades of U.S.-China relations, Republican U.S. Senator John McCain said he personally backed the "China policy" and no one should "leap to conclusions" that the president-elect would abandon it.
"I do not respond to every comment by the president-elect because it may be reversed the next day," McCain told Reuters when asked about Trump's statement in an interview broadcast over the weekend.
Trump set off a diplomatic firestorm when he told Fox News: "I don't know why we have to be bound by a 'one China' policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things, including trade." This followed an earlier protest from China over the Republican president-elect's decision to accept a telephone call from Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen on Dec. 2.
The issue is highly sensitive for China, which considers Taiwan a renegade province, and Beijing expressed "serious concern" about Trump's latest remarks. It called the "one China" policy the basis for relations, and Foreign Minister Wang Yi warned against moves to damage China's "core interests," saying that "in the end, they are lifting a rock only to drop it on their feet."
China's Foreign Ministry said cooperation was "out of the question" if Washington could not recognise Beijing's core interest on Taiwan, indicating it would reject any effort by Trump to use the issue as a bargaining chip in a long list of commercial and security problems facing the two countries. "China has noted the report and expresses serious concern about it. I want to stress that the Taiwan issue concerns China's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and involves China's core interests," said ministry spokesman Geng Shuang.
"Upholding the 'one China' principle is the political basis for developing China-U.S. ties. If this basis is interfered with or damaged then the healthy development of China-U.S. relations and bilateral cooperation in important areas is out of the question," Geng told a daily news briefing.
In a separate statement, the ministry cited Foreign Minister Wang Yi as warning during a trip to Switzerland against moves to damage the "one China" principle, having been asked by a reporter about Trump's call with Tsai.
"China is paying close attention to developments," Wang said. "I can clearly say that no matter whether the Tsai Ing-wen authority, any other person in the world, or any other force, if they try and damage the one China principle and harm China's core interests, in the end they are lifting a rock only to drop it on their feet."
Despite China's discontent, it has reached out to Trump. Spokesman Geng said China's top diplomat Yang Jiechi, who outranks the foreign minister, had met with Trump advisers, including his pick for national security adviser, retired Army Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, during a transit in New York on his way to Latin America in recent days.
"Both sides exchanged views on China-U.S. ties and important issues both are concerned with," Geng said, without elaborating. He did not give a precise date for the meeting, and it was unclear if it occurred before or after Trump's latest remarks on Taiwan, which Beijing considers a renegade province.
Geng urged the incoming Trump administration to fully recognise the sensitivity of the Taiwan issue and uphold a 'one China' policy to "avoid the broader picture of China-U.S. ties being seriously interfered with or damaged". "The China-U.S. relationship has global and strategic significance. This not only concerns the happiness of both countries and their people, it concerns the peace, stability, development and prosperity of the Asia Pacific (region) and internationally."
Some U.S. analysts warn that Trump could provoke a military confrontation if he presses the Taiwan issue too far. Scott Kennedy, director of the Project on Chinese Business & Political Economy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington called Taiwan "the third rail of U.S.-China relations."
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the United States is committed to the "one China" principle and will not use the Taiwan issue to gain leverage in any dealings with Beijing. "The United States does not view Taiwan and our relationship with Taiwan as a bargaining chip," he told a daily briefing, calling Taiwan a "close partner". "And bargaining that away is not something that this administration believes is our best interest.
"Disrupting this policy," he said, "could have a disruptive effect on our ability to work with China in those areas where our interests do align. That reflects the high priority that China puts on the policy and on Taiwan."
While saying the "one China" policy should remain intact, McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and an outspoken critic of Democratic President Barack Obama's foreign policy, said that "somebody should hold China responsible" for its behaviour with regard to Taiwan, Hong Kong, island building in the South China Sea and "propping up" North Korea.
After Trump's phone conversation with Taiwan's president, the Obama administration said senior White House aides had spoken with Chinese officials to insist that Washington's "one China" policy remained unchanged. The State Department's senior diplomat for Asia, Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Russel, was due to speak to China's ambassador to Washington on Monday, the State Department said.
Trump has tempered his strong criticisms of China and call to Taiwan's president by announcing plans last week to nominate a long-standing friend of Beijing, Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, as the next U.S. ambassador to China.
However, he is also considering John Bolton, a former Bush administration official who has urged a tougher line on Beijing, for the No. 2 job at the U.S. State Department, according to a source familiar with the matter. Bolton has said the next U.S. president should take bolder steps to halt China' military aggressiveness in the South and East China seas and consider a "diplomatic ladder of escalation" that could lead to restoring full diplomatic recognition of Taiwan.
