The US military will see Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan as bad

Washington. A possible visit by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan is raising concerns in Washington and President Joe Biden has said the military is opposed for fear of escalating tensions with China.

Asked about this potential visit, Biden responded Wednesday night: “The military thinks it’s not a good idea.”

Several US delegations recently visited Taiwan, an island supported by the US but which China claims as part of its territory.

Nancy Pelosi would be the highest-grossing American to go to the country in decades. In fact, the legislator comes after Vice President Kamala Harris, who will succeed the president according to the constitution.

Pelosi’s office has not yet confirmed that she will go, but a leak in the press has angered Beijing.

“China firmly opposes any form of official exchange between the United States and Taiwan. (…) If Pelosi visits Taiwan, (…) it will have a serious impact on the political foundation of Sino-US relations and will lead to sending On Tuesday, the “wrong signal to the pro-independence forces on the island.”

“If the United States continues to follow its own idea (on Taiwan), China will take resolute and strong measures to safeguard its national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he said.

The controversy comes at a bad time as Biden plans to speak with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping “in the next 10 days,” he said Wednesday night.

No doubt about the CIA

The US president, already dealing with the invasion of Ukraine and a mountain of domestic problems, does not want to open a new front, when tensions over Taiwan are already high.

CIA chief Bill Burns said recently that the question is not whether China will invade the island, but “when and how.”

Biden has already infuriated Beijing by claiming in late May that the United States would intervene militarily to support Taiwan in the event of an invasion of communist China.

The president later retracted and used the term “strategic ambiguity”.

This deliberately ambiguous concept, which has governed Washington’s policy toward Taiwan for decades, is for the United States to establish the principle of “one China” with its capital in Beijing.

It does not officially recognize Taiwan, but supports it militarily and avoids saying whether it would intervene militarily to defend it in the event of an invasion.