Taiwan Crisis Tied to China Power Struggle

China’s missiles are aimed at Taiwan, part of an intimidation campaign as the island prepares for its first direct presidential election. But the true target of this week’s massive military exercises is at least as much internal as it is external.

“I think a lot of this has to do with the grand succession battle we’ve heard so much about,” a Western diplomat here said of China’s firing of three M-9 missiles into the Taiwan Strait on Friday. “The central leadership is trying to curry favor with the military.”

As 91-year-old Deng Xiaoping, China’s senior leader, slowly fades from the scene, a handful of Communist Party leaders is vying to take his position at the helm of the Beijing regime. Leading the pack is China’s president, Jiang Zemin, who also serves as general secretary of the Communist Party.

In a succession struggle, none of the top leaders can afford to appear soft on the core issue of Chinese nationalism--the long-sought repatriation of Taiwan to the mainland. Support of the military is key.

This was abundantly clear last June when Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui made his controversial “private” visit to the United States to attend a reunion at Cornell University in upstate New York.

In the aftermath of the visit, which provoked China into withdrawing its ambassador from Washington, Jiang came under fire from the military for not taking a strong enough stand in response.

This reportedly cost the 69-year-old Jiang, a former Shanghai mayor with no direct military experience, some of the support in the army that he had painstakingly collected after being named Deng’s handpicked successor in 1989.

As a result, Jiang spent much of last year trying to recoup by directing an increasingly aggressive campaign of harassment against Taiwan.

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In July and again in August, China conducted a series of missile tests off Taiwan’s coast.

In October, Jiang was shown on state television somberly reviewing massive military exercises at an unnamed locale in eastern China.

The unarmed missiles fired Friday targeted areas off Taiwan’s two biggest ports, Kaohsiung and Keelung. Like those of a marksman setting his sights, the missile shots were bracketed at the northern and southern extremes of the island, proving the Chinese military’s capability of reaching any part of the heavily populated territory.

In a speech before the National People’s Congress on Friday, Jiang vowed to continue the hard line against Taiwan.

“Our struggle will not stop for a single day so long as Taiwanese authorities do not cease activities to split the motherland,” Jiang said.

It is no accident that the week of military maneuvers and missile firings overlaps with the meeting of the congress at the Great Hall of the People here.

The congress, which meets once every five years, elects the Central Committee of the Communist Party, appoints members to the powerful Central Military Commission and names the general secretary of the party. As such, it is integrally involved in the political succession process.

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The Taiwan crisis has given the current session, which opened Tuesday, an extremely nationalistic tenor that was reflected in the opening address by Premier Li Peng.

“The question of Taiwan is China’s internal affair,” Li said. “China will brook no interference by outside forces under whatever pretext and in whatever form. We are in favor of and have consistently been working for peaceful reunification, but we shall not undertake to renounce the use of force.”

Details of Friday’s missile firings were not discussed at congress meetings.

The missile tests were not mentioned in the evening broadcast of the state television news, although several speeches on the Taiwan issue were prominently featured.

Also unreported were the strong reactions to the tests from the United States, Japan and other countries.

U.S. Defense Secretary William J. Perry called the tests reckless and “an act of coercion.”

He said the Pentagon is using Navy ships and an Air Force spy plane to monitor the flight paths and electronic emissions of the Chinese missiles.

Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto said the military exercises show that China’s policy toward Taiwan is headed in an “unfortunate direction.”

Japan, which has a key shipping route near one of the test zones, took the precautionary measure of stationing a coast guard cutter and a helicopter in the area.

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In Taipei, Taiwanese Defense Minister Chiang Chung-ling said that, “if they trespass into our territorial waters, of course we will fight back.” He did not elaborate on the statement, made after an emergency Cabinet meeting.

In one of the few direct references to the military actions in the Taiwan Strait, Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen said Taiwanese residents need not “panic,” although China’s designated missile testing zone is at some points only 20 nautical miles from the island.

Qian, the architect of China’s foreign policy, is considered one of the moderates in the Communist hierarchy.

But his comments before the deputies of the congress on Friday reflected the cocky, bristling mood of the leadership in this time of high tension and political succession.

If Taiwan continues its steady push toward independent recognition, he said, the result could be a “real disaster.”