TaiwanPlus speaks with political analyst Ja Ian Chong on what the Taiwan Conflict Deterrence Act could mean for cross-strait relations if it passes the U.S. Senate. It has already been approved by the U.S. House of Representatives.
00:00Do you think that threatening to reveal CCP officials' financial transactions is an effective method of deterrence for a possible conflict between China and Taiwan?
00:11So these sanctions are probably okay for dealing with lower intensity kinds of situations, including gray zone kinds of operations.
00:20But if we're talking about some sort of higher intensity blockade or invasion scenario, then I think they would probably be less effective because by that point, the CCP leadership has already decided that they're going to pull out all the stops and it's really high stakes.
00:37And it would take a lot more than this sort of financial information, perhaps potentially embarrassing personal information to discourage them from taking those more drastic forms of action.
00:51Why is this bill being brought up now? Does that indicate that China may be increasing its aggression right now?
00:59Yeah, so this bill comes up from time to time. We'll see whether it passes.
01:03It's one of these things that Congress and various administrations have mulled over, which is the use of financial information to embarrass potentially senior CCP leaders in order to get them to back off from some of their more threatening behavior.
01:20I guess the effectiveness, the scope of such information, I suppose, in terms of actually affecting CCP behavior has given some pause to previous attempts.
01:34We'll have to see whether that happens again this time around.
01:37So you mentioned that the bill has been brought up before. Do you think it will pass in the Senate this time?
01:42I'm not sure whether it would pass in the Senate this time around.
01:46There doesn't seem to be much momentum building, in part because I think when you look at the targeted sanctions in the past, they have effect, but the effect tends to be slow.
01:53For instance, with the case of Russia, it's not fully discouraged Russia from, you know, continuing with its invasion of Ukraine.
02:00And I guess some of this might hinge also on what the Congress, especially the Republicans, think of Donald Trump's efforts to negotiate some sort of arrangement with the PRC on trade.
02:14So they probably don't want to complicate or derail Trump's efforts.
02:19So a lot may hinge on those other considerations too.
