Kinmen Islands, Taiwan- How serious is the military provocations against China?

Two different Scenarios to consider

When the war is forced-upon, it would be a just war for the defending side. 

The gossips on the deployment of US military personal to the Kinmen Islands (main and little island) in addition to the billions of dollars  “military aid” to Taiwan have become the third serious world issue following Ukraine and Gaza. 

Since US and the rest of the world acknowledge one- China-policy, such action, at least geographically would be similar to China deploying its military personal to Nantucket island off the coast of Boston, and/or  to Grand Bahamas, or better to Puerto Rico. Such an action would be an extreme example of “forcing war upon” a nation.  I will not dwell on such comparison or the  NED Socialist’s “learned by rote theories”, sophistries, and demagogies. I will try to break down the realities based on concrete conditions and situations and see if these provocations really have any merits at all and make an argument that it is not Taiwan that China is really concerned about but, regionally,  it is Myanmar that a serious provocation is on the way to be a case of Ukraine in the South East Asia. 

Whether it is a gossip or not, the Western media reports; 

Taiwan Acknowledges Presence of U.S. Troops on Outlying Islands 

Rare comments came in response to a report that American special forces trainers would be sent to Kinmen, 3 miles off the Chinese coast – Wall Street Journal 

And confirming that, one of the Think-Thank group states; 

Breaking a Seven-Decade Taboo: The Deployment of US Special Forces to Kinmen 

Since the 1950s, U.S. policy has deliberately excluded Taiwan’s offshore islands, particularly Kinmen and Matsu, from its defense commitments under the Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty (1955–80) and the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979. These islands, due to their proximity to mainland China—just a few miles off the coast—were considered indefensible in a strategic sense and too sensitive geopolitically. 

The rationale was grounded in three main considerations.

First is these islands’ proximity to mainland China. Kinmen is only about six miles from Xiamen, China, making it geographically vulnerable to Chinese military action.
Second, these islands carry geopolitical sensitivity. Defending these islands could escalate tensions unnecessarily and drag the U.S. into direct conflict with China, contrary to the longstanding U.S. objective of maintaining peace and the status quo across the Taiwan Strait. 
Third, the military logistics of defending these islands were deemed unfeasible and not in the strategic interest of the United States, given their location beyond the median line of the Taiwan Strait where the capital warships of the U.S. 7th Fleet routinely patrolled. (Hoover Institution) 

China from Kinmen Island

Kinmen Islands are around 150 sq-km with a population of around 150,000. It took me  four hours to travel all around the little Kinmen, and 8 hours for the main Kinmen. It is 200 Kilometers away from Taiwan but only seven kilometers from Mainland China. 

As the history indicates, after the defeat by the Chinese People Liberation Army, the Kuomintang (KMT) established itself on the island of Taiwan in 1949. Since then, the Kinmen Islands and its people have been on the frontlines of cross-Strait’s  fluctuating relations. During this time Kinmen islands became intensely militarized. Little Kinmen had a population of military personnel outnumbering the civilians. 

The developments in China affected Kinmen and helped its transformation  from a militarized fortress to a tourist destination while keeping the military population to a larger degree. Trade activities connected Kinmen with the neighboring Chinese city of Xiamen through direct people-to-people activities. This radically transformed Kinmen into a melting pot of Chinese and Taiwanese which the Kinmen people still fiercely advocates. That trend confirms itself throughout all the election results as Kinmen Islands traditionally a KMT’s electoral stronghold. 

The New Party an offshoot of the KMT which strongly advocates for Taiwan’s unification with China, gained political success in Kinmen in the 2001 legislative elections. It is not coincidence that the KMT members are re-elected in legislative elections including in 2024. As for the  presidential election, while the KMT won the 61.40 percent of the vote in Kinmen, he faced a competition during the campaign from the TPP, TPP successfully stole some of Kinmen’s residents away from their traditional KMT loyalties, winning the support of 28.58 percent of Kinmen’s electorate. 

Legislative Election 2024: Kinmen County Constituency

Party                     Votes                    %            ±%

Kuomintang           28,846                 65.28    +18.64

TPP                      13,177                 29.82   

Independent            2,168                    4.91      

No tourist but celebration goes on

This, as I have argued during my discussion with some university students, was a reflection of the overall strategy of the DPP (designed and supported by the US) to divide the votes of KMT in order to win the presidency since in Taiwan a party does not have to get 51% of vote but the highest vote . That was the main reason for their activities and propaganda to prevent the formation of a coalition between Kuomintang and TPP. As the election results clearly indicates, if the strategy didn’t work , DPP would have lost the election with a large margin.

The election results in Little Kinmen Island  indicates that the pro-US  ruling DPP has no presence to speak about. Considering the fact that the island is largely resided by the military personnel and their families, it wouldn’t be a far fetch assumption that even the military on the island is not pro-US but for good relations with China.  The primary reason for this is economic since the livelihood and the development of the Kinmen is contingent on good relations with China. Before DPP ,  the island has been open for tourism and mainland Chinese tourists have been able to travel to Kinmen Island by ferry without a permit since 2015. According to the statistical data in 2019 nearly 1.2 million tourists from Mainland China  had visited Kinmen. 

Considering these, although the US military deployment would be crossing the redline of China and does not look plausible (other than a very small number of “advisers”), such an action that will put them in an immediate danger cannot be welcomed by the residents of Kinmen. 

Let’s look at Taiwan in general. 

2024 results are shown on a long list. I have kept only the ones with highest votes and seats in the parliament.

113 SEATS
Party		Party list			Constituency/Aboriginal			Total seats	+/–
		Votes	%	Seats	Votes	%	Seats
	Democratic Progressive Party	4,982,062	36.16	13	6,095,276	45.09	38	51	–10
	Kuomintang	4,764,576	34.58	13	5,401,933	39.96	39	52	+14
	Taiwan People's Party	3,040,615	22.07	8	403,357	2.98	0	8	+3
	New Power Party	353,670	2.57	0	96,589	0.71	0	0	–3
	Independents				1,069,758	7.91	2	2	–3
Total		13,778,302	100.00	34	13,518,140	100.00	79	113	0
Valid votes		13,778,302	98.10		13,518,140	97.41
Invalid/blank votes		267,306	1.90		359,917	2.59
Total votes		14,045,608	100.00		13,878,057	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		19,566,007	71.79		19,468,969	71.28
Source: Central Election Commission

If we consider the common election frauds and vote-buying and the unexplained difference between the voters turn out and total votes, based on the experience from similar elections, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to assume that solely pro-US votes in Taiwan elections is in the range of  % 30 and less. That translates in to a conclusion that %70 of the Taiwanese people are for good relationship with Mainland China. 

Looking at such a picture, we can say that China will not have to take a military action against Taiwan unless the “war is forced upon” him leaving no other alternative. 

Now let’s discuss the possibility of a war between China and US over Taiwan issue. 

Aside from the fact that the US recognizing one China policy, and yet “forcing a war upon China over Taiwan will be exposed one more  time and condemned by most of the world, such an action of US would be suicidal for it has no military power to challenge China on its borders. 

Most US-Nationalist ex-military , ex-CIA officers and even some Neo-Con professors are openly arguing that the US has no military power to defeat China on its own land. Same experts pointing the war in Ukraine as a war between the US-West against Russia with a long land border. They reiterate the fact that the US-West combined could not and cannot beat Russia with which they have land access. China is thousands of miles away with no land access, a requirement for winning the war against such a great power. 

Most importantly, living in a fantasy land with their exceptionalism, superiority state of mind the Neo-Cons of the US, while trying to pit Russia against China, China and Russia against North Korea set the foundation for and facilitated the formation of an unbreakable, existential-alliance between them. Gradually strengthening  alliance of China-Russia-North Korea has become an unbeatable one both economically and militarily. They will have to help North Korea for its economic development and improve its military capacity with the latest technology. North Korea  has the function of deterring the US proxy South Korea and Japan which is a couple miles away from Russia and with which it is technically still at war. Their existential question has become interlaced. 

Ukraine proxy war and the defeat of the US-West encouraged most of the South East Asian countries to take a neutral stand, most likely due to the fear of becoming a proxy to US and face the same consequences as of Ukraine. Already people of Japan and South Korea filling the streets against a war in the region and against their government’s proxy steps. 

US has no alliance in South East Asia other than Philippines who are willing and anxious to play the role of proxy for the US. Let’s not forget that Philippines has its own problems with the 150,000 strong Guerillas spread over 100 fronts waiting for such an opportunity. 

There always will be exceptional situation for a war breaking out. However, the concrete conditions, situations and facts shows that a war between China and US  over Taiwan is highly unlikely. The US Neo-Cons are , as the latest events have proven, bluffing with a bad card in their hands in order to corner China to give concessions. However, as Russia has woken up from its delusion about the US-West and stopped its appeasement policy, looks like the latest events left no other choice for China, but to stop their appeasement policy towards the US.  That means China is not bluffing with its redline about Taiwan. Even if the Neo-Cons cannot see that, most US experts do. 

The only country left to make a proxy at the border of China is Myanmar in which the NED’s PDF “guerillas” fighting to overthrow the military government toppling of which will open the door for the US to deploy its military to 2,129 km long Chinese border. That’s why Myanmar issue is more challenging for China than the issue of Taiwan. 

The “peace and neighborly relations” policy of China gained credibility and trust among its neighboring countries. In case of the defeat of Myanmar military and a proxy PDF government (currently exile government situated in Washington)  will inevitably bring about the US military presence  in to Myanmar. Any military action by China in Myanmar would be highly damaging  politically. If China does not get involved and prevent that happening, China might find itself facing much more a difficult situation. That is why Myanmar  is a much more challenging issue than Taiwan for China. Forcing upon a war on China is much more easier through a small bordering country, Myanmar, than through its own officially recognized land, Taiwan. Let’s not forget that Myanmar’s neighbor  India’s China policy is no different than anti-China faction of Neo-Cons. In this sense, US may have an ally in its proxy war against China through Myanmar. 

Under the current initial stage of the multi-polar world US is declining militarily, Europe’s military is deteriorated to a degree that has no fighting power and going through a worsening economic crisis. The US, with its world dominant financial capital and military industry remains to be an economic world power. However, with the 1990s set of mind and warmongering policies, deepening cracks in its economic and military alliances, its economy may well collapse in the near future. Having being aware of that, the finance capital of the US will definitely interfere for a compromise while permitting the provocations and bluffing with bad hand in order to reach to a point that is ripe for a handshake and peace deal with China and Russia.  A peace deal in order to improve its military capabilities and strategic, economic alliances in order to prepare itself for new wars – most likely proxy wars. “Capitalist society” says Bukharin, “is unthinkable without armaments, as it is unthinkable without wars…the rule of finance capital implies both imperialism and militarism. In this sense militarism is no less a typical historic phenomenon than finance capital itself.“ 

Although the period of peace, regardless of its duration, will be  a duration for war preparations on the finance capital side, it will be a beneficial duration for the struggle of revolutionary democrats. 

Erdogan A
May 2024
Taiwan