China has now taken back Macau, two years after it took back Hong Kong. It is now looking to Taiwan. The Government in Beijing regards Taiwan as an integral part of China, just as it regarded Hong Kong and Macau as an integral part of China. Hong Kong island was a British colony for 150 years and the New Territories were part of the colony for 99 years before being resumed by China. Macau was a Portuguese territory for 450 years. Taiwan, on the other hand, has had a separate administration from Beijing for just 50 years.
Should the alarm bells be ringing about China’s designs on Taiwan? The background suggests not, even though there has been an increase in military activity on both sides of the straight.
China has always been willing to take the long view. For more than two decades after the 1949 communist revolution it preferred diplomatic isolation rather than accept Taiwan as a sovereign independent entity which was the going price for diplomatic recognition by the United States and at least two dozen nations. The Chinese leadership thought history was on its side. And it was. Ultimately the US and most other countries recognised China in the 1970s and the Beijing Government took the Chinese seat at the United Nations.
So, too, with Hong Kong and Macau. And most likely with Taiwan.
With Hong Kong and Macau, China could have forced the issue much sooner. In 1966, to example, it could have taken advantage of riots in both colonies to march in. At any time thereafter it could have forced a British and Portuguese withdrawal by simply turning off the water supply. Industry would have collapsed. People might have died of thirst and the colonial powers would have had to go. But no. China bided its time.
In the case of Hong Kong, the game was up. Although Hong Kong island was legally ceded (if one accepts unequal treaties), the New Territories were on a 99 year lease. It would eventually run out and China would get them back legally. If that happened Hong Kong island would be unsustainable. Britain, even under the very tough nationalistic Margaret Thatcher, knew the game was up and negotiated a handover.
That set the political climate for a handover for Macau.
If Hong Kong as an economic entity had not included such a large portion that was merely leased, who knows how long China might have had to wait for a return. And if Hong Kong had not gone, Macau might have not have gone either.
The important point, though, is that China has behaved without aggression in both cases. Unlike India which forcibly moved into the enclave Portuguese colony of Goa, China tolerated for a very long time the aberrant situation of having European enclave colonies on what it considered its territory. China preferred a peaceful solution to a forced one and there is no reason to believe that China’s approach to Taiwan will be any different. Moreover, China agreed to a one-nation, two-systems solution, so that Hong Kong and Macau kept their legal and administrative structure but handing over defence and foreign affairs to Beijing.
Taiwan, however, will be a more difficult nut to crack for China. It has a far greater population and the wherewithal to defend itself against any military move by the Government in Beijing. Taiwan is in a position to resist any proposal from Beijing that involved surrendering defence and or foreign affairs. Taiwan is now a full democracy. The likelihood is that far greater democratic changes must take place in mainland China before any reunion is acceptable in Taiwan and in the meanwhile China will just patiently wait — as it has done in the past.