Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Dec 23 2 tweets 3 min read Read on X
This is hands down the best talk I've heard in a long time on Taiwan, the underlying dynamics at play and what could be a solution. If you want to understand the issue, this is an absolute must-watch.

It is by George Yeo, who is undoubtedly one of the outsiders who best understand China and Taiwan. He was a Singaporean cabinet minister during 21 years, including Minister for Foreign Affairs during 7 years. He's speaking in Taiwan in front of an audience made of senior ROC officials, including former president Ma Ying-jeou.

He explains that as things stand China would likely win a conventional war with the U.S. over Taiwan, and the U.S. know this. And therefore it's now all about nuclear deterrence: China is working on having an assured nuclear counterstrike capability and the U.S. on denying them this. Yeo believe that China will undoubtedly obtain this counterstrike capability and when they do, it's basically over: the U.S. would lose a conventional war and couldn't credibly threaten China with nuclear warfare (because they themselves would get hit in a counterstrike). This means that, according to Yeo the status quo is "a ticking time bomb" and it is in Taiwan's interests to find a political accommodation today when they still have some negotiation leverage.

His proposal is to create "some kind of Chinese commonwealth", whereby there wouldn't be a common executive (so it wouldn't be the PRC taking over the ROC or vice versa), or any executive at all, but both sides would meet from time to time to "talk about trade, cooperation, problems, agree on certain principles, etc". He likens it to the old Icelandic commonwealth () or to the old Swiss confederacy ().

According to Yeo this proposal could be accepted by the mainland which, given the fact he knows most PRC leaders intimately, he wouldn't say lightly. He reminds the fact that China accepted willingly a Portuguese administration of Macau during two dynasties, Ming and Qing, and even refused initially to get it back from Portugal when they proposed it in 1973, asking them to delay the handover for another 26 years! He says that to illustrate the fact that China has absolutely no problem with these types of arrangements as soon as the entity in question is essentially being a good neighbor.

This proposal is extremely smart because it could be a win-win for everyone involved. It'd be a win for the ROC because they'd continue to be their own selves and could even have more independence than they do now, because their status with regards to the PRC would be more formalized and a lot of the tensions and stigma would be removed. And it'd be a win for the PRC because they'd be "reunited" with Taiwan under one "roof", albeit not the PRC roof. In effect it wouldn't be "one country, two systems" but more something like "two countries, two systems united under a common roof."

I really hope that Taiwanese leaders see the wisdom in these types of proposals because, as Yeo says, "the alternative is a dead end and tragedy, not just for Taiwan and the mainland but also for Singapore, the entire region and the world."en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic…
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Swiss…
This is the source video for the whole talk:

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More from @RnaudBertrand

Dec 22
Quite a crazy story in Australia:

Prominent journalist @antoinette_news was fired by the country's main public broadcaster ABC after she wrote an article alleging that a controversial video shared by the Australian Jewish Association of antisemitic chants during a pro-Palestinian protest had likely been doctored (her article in next tweet).

What's happening to journalists around this conflict is absolutely astonishing. When they're not outright killed in Gaza (more journalists have been killed in the first 10 weeks of the war than have ever been killed in any single country over an entire year: ), they're getting cancelled left and right all over the West if they produce inconvenient reporting... Showing once more that "freedom of the press" is a principle that's easy to brandish when it produces narratives that are in your interests but quite rapidly dies down when it doesn't...canberratimes.com.au/story/8467384/…
cpj.org/2023/12/israel…
That's the story she apparently got fired for
Mary Kostakidis, another Australian journalist, shares more details about the importance of Lattouf's story in the current Australian context
Read 4 tweets
Dec 20
It's interviews like this that demonstrate how Israel is a weapon of mass destruction of the West, and of the morally superior image it tried to portray:

This is UK Minister of State Lee Rowley responding to the fact that an IDF sniper killed a Christian mother and her daughter IN A CHURCH in Gaza. An act the Pope himself called "terrorism" and that Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the most senior Catholic cleric in England, characterized as a “cold–blooded killing”.

Minister Rowley's response? This is Israel "trying to defend itself" and the "only way to end the situation in Gaza is Hamas laying down their weapons and stop using their population as human shields".

In other words to him this isn't even the IDF's responsibility, murdering women and their daughters in churches is just par for the course until the other side surrenders...

Which is something you could maybe imagine the most evil terrorist organizations saying - "we'll murder your wifes and daughters in your places of worship until you surrender, your deaths are on you!" - but now we have UK ministers essentially saying this stuff, which is absolutely insane!

Does this reflect something that was always there, only hidden under a veneer of pretense morality? Or is it the product of a more recent degradation of morality in the West? At the end of the day it doesn't matter, fact is I can't see how there's any recovery possible from this for a long, long time. The whole world sees this kind of talk which is pervasive among almost all Western leaders. And they just won't forget, we're looking at a future where any talk of "values", "principles", "respect of rules", etc. by the West will be met by laughter and ridicule by the rest of the world for decades to come.
This is what he is asked to react about 👇
And this is the Pope's reaction, characterizing it as "terrorism" 👇
Read 4 tweets
Dec 15
This might be the best explanation I heard for "why Oct 7" and, surprisingly, it comes from Ami Ayalon, former head of the Shin Bet, Israel's secret service, and commander-in-chief of the Navy.

Here what he says (this is the first video, there are a couple more below which you'll really want to watch):

He says the "most important cause [of Oct 7]" was "the political paradigm", whereby Israel's policy was "divide and rule", meaning Israel "had to make sure Palestinians would not have a unified leadership" and could therefore always say "nobody to talk with, nothing to talk about". Concretely "in order to do it [Israel] had to make sure Hamas would go on controlling Gaza and the Palestinian authority the West bank", and incite them to "fight each other". This is why Israel "enhanced and assisted Hamas, transferred money, etc."

As a result of all this Hamas "got the Palestinians' support" because "they became the only administration who fought against the Israeli occupation and for the purpose of Palestinian freedom" while Fatah and the Palestinian authority became perceived as "Israeli collaborators". In his assessment "between 70 to 80% of the Palestinians are supporting Hamas, only because Hamas is perceived as the one who fight for [their] freedom."

He says Israel completely misunderstood the situation before Oct 7 because it measures "hardware" whilst Hamas measures "software", meaning that after every fight between Israel and the Palestinians, success for Israel is measured in "losses in human life, in military installations, in military infrastructure" whereas what Hamas measures is "the support of the people." As an illustration he says that in May 2021 - when there was fighting during 2 weeks and around 300 Palestinians were killed (to 17 on the Israeli side) - Israel thought that Hamas "suffered a huge loss and a huge military defeat" but from Hamas's standpoint it was "a huge victory" because this led to Hamas, for the first time, getting "more than 50% of the support from the Palestinian people."
He says another key cause was "the new Middle-East [plan] presented by Biden" because "Palestinians were not mentioned".

To him this was a major mistake because "the Palestinians see themselves as a people, a nation" and this made them "feel alone and abandoned". As a result the Palestinians "chose the Samson option" because "they felt that they had nothing to lose and this was the only way for them to show to the world 'you will not be able to create stability in this region if you will bypass Palestinians.'" He concludes: "the tragedy is that they succeeded".
This part is absolutely extraordinary: he compares Israel's current strategy to that of "ISIS and Al Qaeda".

He says many people in the current Israeli leadership set as a "political goal" to "create a human disaster in Gaza because from the chaos we shall start again." He says "this is exactly the theory of the most radical, fundamental Muslim organizations; this is exactly the theology and the strategy of ISIS and of Al Qaeda."

Remember the Netanyahu government's talking point that "Hamas is ISIS"? Here we have the former head of the Shin Bet actually saying that the current Israeli government is ISIS. Quite something!
Read 6 tweets
Nov 30
My favorite Kissinger video was when he introduced his wife to Mao, who got his mind absolutely blown by the height difference 😅
Kissinger was immensely impressed with Mao, as he later wrote: "There were no trappings that could account for the sense of power Mao conveyed. Mao emanated vibrations of strength and power and will. In his presence even Chou [Zhou Enlai] seemed a secondary figure." Image
This transcript of a discussion between them is also quite fascinating:

For instance at some point they discuss India and Mao explains why "India did not win independence", judging that "the influence of Ghandi’s doctrine on the Indian people was to induce them into non-resistance".digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/memor…
Read 4 tweets
Nov 16
There you go, China obviously displeased.

And I suspect simply dumbfounded: "why would you ask us over to improve the relationship and publicly insult us?" It makes no sense.

It's also terrible for the US's image in the world, highlights they just can't do diplomacy anymore.
Read 4 tweets
Nov 13
Macron's list of continuous flip flops on Gaza is due another update after his more recent declarations so here it goes (proving how utterly confusing France's foreign policy has become):

- 12th of October: France bans all pro-Palestinian protests (the French, as they do, don't care and protest anyhow)

- 24th of October: Macron goes to Israel and even propose France joins the fight against Hamas (!)

- 28th of October (4 days later!): France was one of the very rare Western nations that voted the UN resolution for a "humanitarian truce".

- 2nd of October (another 4 days later): Benjamin Haddad, the spokesperson for Macron's party, says he isn't for a ceasefire.

- 11th November: Macron now says he's for a ceasefire and tells the BBC that he "urges Israel to stop" because "there is no reason and no legitimacy [for killing civilians"

- 13th of November (today): Macron now declares he "unequivocally supports Israel and its right to self-defense."

Again, Macron's most singular political strategy is the "en même temps", trying to stand on all sides of all issues at the same time. Resulting in this: France ends up being led on a road to nowhere and no-one understand where it stands.
12th of October, France bans all pro-Palestinian protests
24th of October, in Israel "Macron proposes that the coalition against the Islamic State [which France is also a member of of] can also fight against Hamas"
Read 7 tweets

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