Three quarters say they’re ready to defend the island in the event of a war. In fact, a peaceful resolution to the status quo has run into the wall of reality: according to the polls, only 6% of the 24 million Taiwanese wish to reunify with China, while 8% define themselves primarily as Chinese - despite Taiwan's overwhelmingly ethnic Han demographics. Giving it up is unthinkable for the Chinese leader, as illustrated by his insistence, in his “Chinese Dream” doctrine, that “Taiwanese separatism” would be the “most serious threat to national rejuvenation.” Reintegration will happen, according to him, by means fair or foul. Indeed, Xi Jinping’s regime is obsessed with the idea of reintegrating the “rebel island,” as it calls Taiwan - arguing that it was under Beijing’s control for part of its history (from 1683 to 1895 the rest of the time, it was under Portuguese, Dutch and then Japanese sovereignty, before the remains of the nationalist regime, defeated by Ma, landed there in 1949). A Beijing victory would allow it to dominate all of Asia-Pacific. Such a conflict could involve European countries and possibly the Philippines, Japan, Australia, Vietnam and India. Everything points to this dramatic scenario, which would lead to an economic and perhaps even military conflict between Beijing and the U.S., vying for position as the world’s leading powers and “bosses” of the Pacific. BEIJING - In all probability, China will attack Taiwan one day.
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