I think there's a phenomenon where people get information from Asia that's a big outdated. The 35-45 age demographic in Taiwan is pretty pro-DPP, but the 20-35 demographic very much is not. And it seems a lot of Western observers are still basically living in 2015 (you know, back when Huang was a Sunflower protest leader) and thus have assumed a "demographics is destiny" argument based on the voting behavior of what they think is the youngest generation.
Well, young Taiwanese aren't really pro-reunification but neither is the KMT. It also is relevant there aren't that many young Taiwanese because of a highly inverted population pyramid, so the DPP won in 2024 despite coming in THIRD among young Taiwanese.
That being said, "accommodation, diplomacy, and economic engagement as the best method to maintain the status quo" seems like a fairly popular opinion among the youngs - as opposed to the current DPP strategy of "being an appendage of the Trump Administration."
It's easier to bribe then to fight. Nobody understands this quite like China.
By the time China is ready to invade, Taiwan will be among the drone manufacturing and asymmetric warfare leaders.
The window begins to close in 2027. While the world gets less democratic and Free speech deteriorates all across the world, a young democracy like Taiwan only gets more aligned with itself.
You can’t invade your own country. That alone shows how confidently you’re talking about something you don’t really understand. And the idea that Taiwan is just going to outcompete China in manufacturing, including drones? Sure, trying to outproduce China industrially is basically like trying to win a fight against gravity. Bold strategy.
But what really stands out is how casually you talk about all this, like it’s some kind of strategy game. It sounds very neat and exciting when you’re not the one dealing with the consequences. Taiwan isn’t your geopolitical hobby. These are real people, real lives. It’s easy to sit comfortably and cheer for confrontation and feel insightful about it.
And let’s be honest, if anything actually turns violent, you won’t be anywhere near it. You’ll be safely watching from afar, probably still posting takes online while others deal with the reality. Your really sound like these people cheering Trump and Israel bombing on Iran just because the Iranian government sucks. Despicable.
Or, more likely, it could be that Beijing has decided that immediate forcible unification is impossible or horribly risky, or that Taiwan would be too hard to absorb even if possible (both of which are true), and so it's trying to walk back any recent demands
Long-term, the sociological reality is that Taiwan will be drifting further and further away, with unification already likely too late, and certainly more and more true in the future. One way to forestall the inevitable acknowledgement of reality - that Taiwan won't be any part of China, especially after the failure of OCTS in HK- is to fall back on person-to-person and organization-to-organization links to groups like the KMT as the last hail mary bid to keep unification an open prospect.
The Taiwanese will no doubt continue to be more and more immune to such pressure. And with the changing nature of military conflict, making attack that much more difficult and defence far more practical, and given the catastrophic Russian failure in Ukraine (birthing the Ukrainian nation anew, more or less), the gamble on soft power in Taiwan looks like the only gamble.
The Global Majority sees Taiwan, the Province of China as an internal matter for the People's Republic of China. Only betrayers, extortionists and pirates view it differently. That is a weak and fading perspective.
Excellent analysis. But I wonder about Xi’s emphasis on shared culture, history, language as the foundation for peaceful reunification. A recent Pew survey suggested that relatively few Taiwanese view themselves as “Chinese,” while another small group self-described as “both Chinese and Taiwanese.” And Xi’s prescription for greater cross-Strait trade, visitation, cooperation _may_ help reduce tensions (and only if the KMT returns to power), I don’t think they provide the basis to alter Taiwan’s residents’ self-perception.
We should not blindly and naiively believe biased articles in Foreign Policy. No we should instead blindly and naiively believe public statements by China's president…
In 47 years of de facto and formal 'peaceful reunification' China has managed to win over 1.2% of Taiwan (MAC survey August 2025). So yeah, patience, however you like to dress it up, is the only option.
I worked in Taiwan for five years. If China were to force the issue of reunification, the CCP apparatchiks would have nowhere to stash their graft and their mistresses. 😂
Give your opponent plenty of time to destroy itself while it’s hard at it. The unification could be the last step. “The Spanish–American War brought an end to almost four centuries of Spanish presence in the Americas, Asia, and the Pacific” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish–American_War
Russia isn’t fighting in a vacuum. Ukraine is heavily backed and armed by the US and Europe, but that part always gets conveniently ignored. As for Hong Kong, once the most violent protesters left, things stabilized and the city moved closer to the mainland again. Not exactly the collapse people predicted.
And Taiwan isn’t your geopolitical hobby. These are real people and real lives, not a strategy game for comfortable observers. It’s always interesting how some in the West are the loudest about independence, as if it’s a moral project with some mixture of imperialism and white savior complex. Easy to promote confrontation when you won’t be the one dealing with the consequences.
China hasn’t tried to attack Taiwan, but somehow there’s always a new invasion date floating around. 2027, next year, the year after. At some point it starts sounding more like fantasy than analysis. Viewing everything through a conflict-driven lens says more about your bloodthirsty mindset than about reality. China has gone through internal divisions before, and history didn’t end there.
Meanwhile, millions of people travel and live between Taiwan and the mainland. Not exactly the picture of two sides completely drifting apart, despite how often that narrative gets repeated.
Time is running out for Taiwan, not China. Reunification will happen eventually, regardless of the circumstances. At the moment, Taiwan still has some leverage to negotiate a favorable outcome, but as time passes, the island risks becoming economically and internationally less relevant, leaving it with little bargaining power.
People in Taiwan need to understand that the greatest threat to peace comes from pro-independence movements. Hopefully, younger generations will realize that pushing for independence increases the risk of conflict and that they would be the ones sent to the front lines to fight if war were to break out. For that reason, it is not a particularly wise strategy.
Good perspective and insights on cross-strait issues!
I think there's a phenomenon where people get information from Asia that's a big outdated. The 35-45 age demographic in Taiwan is pretty pro-DPP, but the 20-35 demographic very much is not. And it seems a lot of Western observers are still basically living in 2015 (you know, back when Huang was a Sunflower protest leader) and thus have assumed a "demographics is destiny" argument based on the voting behavior of what they think is the youngest generation.
If young Taiwanese are pro-reunification, they have a funny way of showing it b/c the KMT is yet to win a national election.
Well, young Taiwanese aren't really pro-reunification but neither is the KMT. It also is relevant there aren't that many young Taiwanese because of a highly inverted population pyramid, so the DPP won in 2024 despite coming in THIRD among young Taiwanese.
That being said, "accommodation, diplomacy, and economic engagement as the best method to maintain the status quo" seems like a fairly popular opinion among the youngs - as opposed to the current DPP strategy of "being an appendage of the Trump Administration."
Yep, that is indeed their tactic.
It's easier to bribe then to fight. Nobody understands this quite like China.
By the time China is ready to invade, Taiwan will be among the drone manufacturing and asymmetric warfare leaders.
The window begins to close in 2027. While the world gets less democratic and Free speech deteriorates all across the world, a young democracy like Taiwan only gets more aligned with itself.
You can’t invade your own country. That alone shows how confidently you’re talking about something you don’t really understand. And the idea that Taiwan is just going to outcompete China in manufacturing, including drones? Sure, trying to outproduce China industrially is basically like trying to win a fight against gravity. Bold strategy.
But what really stands out is how casually you talk about all this, like it’s some kind of strategy game. It sounds very neat and exciting when you’re not the one dealing with the consequences. Taiwan isn’t your geopolitical hobby. These are real people, real lives. It’s easy to sit comfortably and cheer for confrontation and feel insightful about it.
And let’s be honest, if anything actually turns violent, you won’t be anywhere near it. You’ll be safely watching from afar, probably still posting takes online while others deal with the reality. Your really sound like these people cheering Trump and Israel bombing on Iran just because the Iranian government sucks. Despicable.
My dear, Taiwan is a country, accept it
I know you can't read Chinese, but try to find a translation of the Constitution of the Republic of China. Hope it helps my dear.
Or, more likely, it could be that Beijing has decided that immediate forcible unification is impossible or horribly risky, or that Taiwan would be too hard to absorb even if possible (both of which are true), and so it's trying to walk back any recent demands
Long-term, the sociological reality is that Taiwan will be drifting further and further away, with unification already likely too late, and certainly more and more true in the future. One way to forestall the inevitable acknowledgement of reality - that Taiwan won't be any part of China, especially after the failure of OCTS in HK- is to fall back on person-to-person and organization-to-organization links to groups like the KMT as the last hail mary bid to keep unification an open prospect.
The Taiwanese will no doubt continue to be more and more immune to such pressure. And with the changing nature of military conflict, making attack that much more difficult and defence far more practical, and given the catastrophic Russian failure in Ukraine (birthing the Ukrainian nation anew, more or less), the gamble on soft power in Taiwan looks like the only gamble.
But it's still not a good one for Beijing.
you cannot “reunify” if you’ve never been together
The Global Majority sees Taiwan, the Province of China as an internal matter for the People's Republic of China. Only betrayers, extortionists and pirates view it differently. That is a weak and fading perspective.
Excellent analysis. But I wonder about Xi’s emphasis on shared culture, history, language as the foundation for peaceful reunification. A recent Pew survey suggested that relatively few Taiwanese view themselves as “Chinese,” while another small group self-described as “both Chinese and Taiwanese.” And Xi’s prescription for greater cross-Strait trade, visitation, cooperation _may_ help reduce tensions (and only if the KMT returns to power), I don’t think they provide the basis to alter Taiwan’s residents’ self-perception.
We should not blindly and naiively believe biased articles in Foreign Policy. No we should instead blindly and naiively believe public statements by China's president…
In 47 years of de facto and formal 'peaceful reunification' China has managed to win over 1.2% of Taiwan (MAC survey August 2025). So yeah, patience, however you like to dress it up, is the only option.
I worked in Taiwan for five years. If China were to force the issue of reunification, the CCP apparatchiks would have nowhere to stash their graft and their mistresses. 😂
When Taiwan runs out of oil, it will join the mainland.
Give your opponent plenty of time to destroy itself while it’s hard at it. The unification could be the last step. “The Spanish–American War brought an end to almost four centuries of Spanish presence in the Americas, Asia, and the Pacific” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish–American_War
Russia isn’t fighting in a vacuum. Ukraine is heavily backed and armed by the US and Europe, but that part always gets conveniently ignored. As for Hong Kong, once the most violent protesters left, things stabilized and the city moved closer to the mainland again. Not exactly the collapse people predicted.
And Taiwan isn’t your geopolitical hobby. These are real people and real lives, not a strategy game for comfortable observers. It’s always interesting how some in the West are the loudest about independence, as if it’s a moral project with some mixture of imperialism and white savior complex. Easy to promote confrontation when you won’t be the one dealing with the consequences.
China hasn’t tried to attack Taiwan, but somehow there’s always a new invasion date floating around. 2027, next year, the year after. At some point it starts sounding more like fantasy than analysis. Viewing everything through a conflict-driven lens says more about your bloodthirsty mindset than about reality. China has gone through internal divisions before, and history didn’t end there.
Meanwhile, millions of people travel and live between Taiwan and the mainland. Not exactly the picture of two sides completely drifting apart, despite how often that narrative gets repeated.
Time is running out for Taiwan, not China. Reunification will happen eventually, regardless of the circumstances. At the moment, Taiwan still has some leverage to negotiate a favorable outcome, but as time passes, the island risks becoming economically and internationally less relevant, leaving it with little bargaining power.
People in Taiwan need to understand that the greatest threat to peace comes from pro-independence movements. Hopefully, younger generations will realize that pushing for independence increases the risk of conflict and that they would be the ones sent to the front lines to fight if war were to break out. For that reason, it is not a particularly wise strategy.
Do you also accept the Marxist teleological view of history?