The US is only there because Taiwan wants them there. If they have an election and elect a party who is against US involvement they can mostly just kick them out. But right now they are pro US.
Dude, they have their fucking chip factories rigged to self-destruct in case China invades. They don’t trust China even a tiny bit, peaceful solution my ass.
It’s not black and white like that! Saying Taiwan is pro US is incredibly reductive. It’s true that the majority of Taiwanese people welcome US support. The majority of them also think that the military first way in which the US is supporting them is going to push Taiwan towards war, something they do not want. A majority also voted for parties that prefer to find diplomatic solutions to the tensions with the PRC.
Also, Taiwan doesn’t have to trust the PRC to for a diplomatic solution to be possible. Rarely is diplomacy solely based on trust. I genuinely believe they could find some sort of compromise that is amenable to all parties. However both Taiwan’s current president, elected with only a plurality of the vote, and the US are not working to find a permanent diplomatic solution and are therefore escalating tensions against the will and interests of the Taiwanese populace. This isn’t good for anyone except the US which wants to use Taiwan as a pawn to contain its adversary, the PRC.
There is no diplomatic solution except one: China recognizes Taiwan as an independent country.
That’s it, done, this is the only solution to this whole fuckery. If that happens the US could just bugger off (well, if we hope China keeps its word and doesn’t suddenly attack afterwards). What other damn solution is there?
That’s not how diplomacy works. You can’t just declare the outcome you want and expect the PRC to abide by it when they have no incentive to. The PRC also likely believes that if they ever recognized Taiwan as independent the US would immediately look to set up military bases on Kinmen and other islands Taiwan controls. They rightly see that as massive threat to their ability to trade if the US ever decided to try and enforce a blockade.
Don’t doubt that the US has always wanted to exert military pressure on the PRC. It’s why the US supported Chiang Kai-shek’s militarily and then protected his retreat to Taiwan with the US navy. It’s why they continued to support the KMT and the ROC as the legitimate government of China even as they were massacring the indigenous people’s of Taiwan. The Korean War was also viewed by the PRC as an extension of US aggression against its regional security. They weren’t really wrong either. Douglas MacArthur famously wanted to go so far as to nuke the PRC into submission during the Korean War. US-PRC relations only really got better after the Soviet-Sino split when the US saw they could use the PRC as an instrument against the USSR. However, even today the US aims to maintain military supremacy in the region and so it continues its military first approach towards the situation with Taiwan. The ROC’s transition to a liberal democracy means nothing to them.
The PRC looks at that all and it just confirms their fears about the US. If you wanted an actually diplomatic solution it would almost certainly require that the US military is excluded from Taiwanese land. With that, I’d be willing to bet the PRC would agree to a solution which maintains the pretext of “one China” under the guise of an economic union even as Taiwan maintains full political autonomy. The reality is though that neither the US nor the current Taiwanese government have given any indication that’s a negotiation they’re willing to have. As such, tensions rise and the people of Taiwan are left to wonder if war is coming without having any serious ability to stop it.
