- The Russia-Ukraine war has prompted observers to think if China plans to take Taiwan by force soon.
- Taiwan's military has been studying the war in Ukraine for "asymmetric warfare" plans.
- However, its defense minister said Taiwan has not seen any unusual deployments from China.
Taiwan is studying how Ukrainians are holding back Russian aggression in preparation for "asymmetric warfare," the island's defense minister told lawmakers Thursday.
"Taiwan's military is studying how Ukrainian forces are leveraging on its home battlefield advantage and experience in cognitive warfare, so that we can incorporate those learnings into our plans for asymmetric warfare," Chiu Kuo-cheng said in comments were captured in a video from local broadcaster FTV News. He was responding to queries following a discussion on a report to the parliament on the implications of the war in Ukraine.
Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, there's been increased speculation about whether China will take the chance to attack Taiwan. China claims the self-governing island as part of its territory.
Both China and Taiwan have stressed that the Ukrainian invasion is not parallel to Taiwan, with representatives from both governments saying it was inappropriate to compare the two.
Still, Joseph Wu, Taiwan's foreign minister, called the Ukrainian resistance "an inspiration to the Taiwanese people in facing threats and coercion from authoritarian power."
In the meantime, the US has been bolstering support for Taiwan. President Joe Biden sent a delegation of former officials to meet Taiwan's democratically-elected president Tsai Ing-wen in Taipei last week, with retired Adm. Mike Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, saying the US "will continue to oppose any unilateral changes to the status quo."
At Thursday's session, Chiu noted that Taiwan hadn't seen any "unusual" military deployment from mainland China, Radio Taiwan International (RTI) reported. He suggested that this could be because Beijing is focused on maintaining stability in mainland China as Xi Jingping pursues a third term in office.
At the same press conference, Chiu added that a war would be disastrous for all parties. "No one wants to go to war," he said in a video from Chung T'ien TV, adding: "But once we're at war, everyone will be miserable."
