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Mar 22, 2012
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/NC22Ad02.html
Taiwan-Singapore soup turns bitter-sweet
By Jens Kastner
TAIPEI - Taiwan's media has been abuzz with the notion that the island's ties to Singapore have taken a dramatic nosedive lately. In the past few weeks, Taipei's representative to the city-state has been recalled supposedly over misbehavior, and even decades-old bilateral military cooperation was reportedly suspended. Some observers see Beijing pulling the strings while others say the media have made a mountain out of a mole hill.
In mid-February, the story broke that Vanessa Shih, the island's representative to Singapore, had been assigned to a new post
because the Singaporean government was strongly displeased with her. At a party on occasion of the Republic of China (ROC) National Day, she not only dared to display the ROC flag in public but also sung the ROC anthem, the reports read.
Given that Singapore like most other nations recognizes Beijing's People's Republic of China (PRC) but not Taipei's ROC, Shih's moves, if indeed conducted in public, amounted to a diplomatic faux-pas. It was furthermore alleged that Singapore's founding father Lee Kuan Yew and other high-ranking officials did not like Shih's making contact with Chen Show Mao, a member of the opposition Workers' Party who happens to be an immigrant from Taiwan.
Notwithstanding that Shih's three-year appointment was just about to come to a natural end, and that the Taiwanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs quickly labelled the story "inaccurate", the developments led to intensive media coverage on the island.
The situation soon got even worse: After Taiwan's Minister of National Defense Kao Hua-chu visited the Singapore Air Show, the largest aerospace and defense event in Asia, Taiwanese media claimed Kao had conducted secret military exchanges with Singaporean military brass on the sidelines of his trip. Those talks were the highest level bilateral military exchanges in recent years, and because Taipei had promised to keep them secret, a raging Singaporean government ordered the suspension of all military cooperation, so went the speculation.
This story was also dismissed by Taiwanese officials, as were rumors that talks on a Taiwan-Singapore free trade agreement (FTA) had since fallen victim to the spat. What the reports chose not to mention was that last year, too, saw significant military-related visits to Singapore by Taiwanese figures, namely Chief of General Staff Admiral Lin Chen-yi and former Minister of National Defense Chen Chao-ming.
Although geographically not exactly neighbors, Taiwan and Singapore have held strong ties. After the Chinese Civil War, both the predominantly ethnic Chinese societies shared deep distrust against Mao's communism. When in the 1970s tiny Singapore started building its Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) to deter potential military adventurism by much more populous Malaysia and Indonesia, the Taiwanese under then-president Chiang Ching-kuo offered timely assistance by providing training areas because land in the city-state is of extremely short supply.
Taiwan's and Singapore's troops did not train together, and neither was there an official military alliance, but even today, the SAF's infantry and special operation forces train in various locations over the island. The existence of the "Starlight" program became undeniable in 2007 when a Taiwanese F-5 crashed into a military base near Taipei, killing three active-duty Singaporean servicemen, as well as injuring a few others who happened to be in the wrong spot at the wrong time.
After Singapore switched diplomatic relations from the ROC to the PRC in 1990, it resisted more than other countries in the region pressure from Beijing to cut ties to the island, and Lee Kuan Yew and his ministers continued to visit Taipei when Chiang's successor Lee Teng-hui ruled over the island.
The Far Eastern Economics Review in 2004 described how these trip were handled: "Singapore ministers officially take leave, notice of which is published in the government gazette, so they can describe the trip to Taiwan as private; Singapore informs Beijing, which asks that the visit not take place and threatens unspecified consequences if it does; Singapore goes ahead anyway."
Later on in Lee Teng-hui's presidency, and especially after the island's first direct presidential elections in 1996 which Lee won, Taiwan-Singapore relations soured significantly, however. Taiwan's Lee and the city-state's Lee developed a personal antipathy, and ties hit rock-bottom when Lee Teng-hui's successor Chen Shui-bian, next to generally messing up Taiwanese foreign relations with his drives for independence, famously described Singapore as "a booger-sized nation".
In 2008, the Kuomintang's (KMT) Ma Ying-jeou became president in Taipei, and the climate between the two became friendlier.
In May 2011, apparently after Beijing has given its nod, ties became so friendly that talks on an FTA were started, making the city-state the first nation that maintains diplomatic ties to the PRC carrying out such a move.
Then it was all messed up by a tipsy diplomat and a defense minister who of all things chose the spotlights of the world's third largest airshow for conducting a cloak-and-dagger mission, local media says.
Unsurprisingly, some Taiwanese observers see Beijing behind the Vanessa Shih scandal. They believe that while the Chinese consented to a Taiwan-Singapore FTA before Taiwan's presidential elections in mid-January to give Ma Ying-jeou political ammunition, after Ma's win, they wanted to end his fantasies of gaining "international space".
Others say that because the Ma administration's enthusiasm for diplomatic breakthroughs was so great that it perturbed cautious Singaporean leaders. Neither theory is implausible, but this isn't true of the allegations that Singapore planned to scrap military ties.
The Singaporeans have for decades insisted on a strong US military presence in the Asia-Pacific region and are offering the Americans usage of naval facilities for warships. The main function of which is to counter China's maritime presence in the region's seas. Such a move against Taiwan would suggest the Singaporeans made a swift u-turn and had begun dancing to Beijing's tune.
This would've set alarm bells ringing in Washington as well as in China-wary regional capitals, further complicating the US's evolving strategy of cementing alliances and extending its physical presence in Southeast Asia. A perceived drift into Beijing's orbit - and perhaps even making use of China's long-standing offer to switching from Taiwanese to Chinese soil for military training - wouldn't benefit the SAF much, given its dependency on sophisticated US-made weapon systems.
When approached for comment, Jean-Pierre Cabestan, professor at and head of the Department of Government and International Studies at Hong Kong Baptist University, saw the Taiwanese media's analyses as a laughing matter.
"The ex-representative should be decorated, given a medal for having sung the ROC national anthem," he said. "Singapore will recover sooner or later, and the spat won't dramatically affect the ongoing FTA negotiations. Not to mention military ties. The Singaporeans need to train their army somewhere, and they still prefer Taiwan to Malaysia, don't they?"
Jens Kastner is a Taipei-based journalist.
(Copyright 2012 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and
Mar 22, 2012
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/NC22Ad02.html
Taiwan-Singapore soup turns bitter-sweet
By Jens Kastner
TAIPEI - Taiwan's media has been abuzz with the notion that the island's ties to Singapore have taken a dramatic nosedive lately. In the past few weeks, Taipei's representative to the city-state has been recalled supposedly over misbehavior, and even decades-old bilateral military cooperation was reportedly suspended. Some observers see Beijing pulling the strings while others say the media have made a mountain out of a mole hill.
In mid-February, the story broke that Vanessa Shih, the island's representative to Singapore, had been assigned to a new post
because the Singaporean government was strongly displeased with her. At a party on occasion of the Republic of China (ROC) National Day, she not only dared to display the ROC flag in public but also sung the ROC anthem, the reports read.
Given that Singapore like most other nations recognizes Beijing's People's Republic of China (PRC) but not Taipei's ROC, Shih's moves, if indeed conducted in public, amounted to a diplomatic faux-pas. It was furthermore alleged that Singapore's founding father Lee Kuan Yew and other high-ranking officials did not like Shih's making contact with Chen Show Mao, a member of the opposition Workers' Party who happens to be an immigrant from Taiwan.
Notwithstanding that Shih's three-year appointment was just about to come to a natural end, and that the Taiwanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs quickly labelled the story "inaccurate", the developments led to intensive media coverage on the island.
The situation soon got even worse: After Taiwan's Minister of National Defense Kao Hua-chu visited the Singapore Air Show, the largest aerospace and defense event in Asia, Taiwanese media claimed Kao had conducted secret military exchanges with Singaporean military brass on the sidelines of his trip. Those talks were the highest level bilateral military exchanges in recent years, and because Taipei had promised to keep them secret, a raging Singaporean government ordered the suspension of all military cooperation, so went the speculation.
This story was also dismissed by Taiwanese officials, as were rumors that talks on a Taiwan-Singapore free trade agreement (FTA) had since fallen victim to the spat. What the reports chose not to mention was that last year, too, saw significant military-related visits to Singapore by Taiwanese figures, namely Chief of General Staff Admiral Lin Chen-yi and former Minister of National Defense Chen Chao-ming.
Although geographically not exactly neighbors, Taiwan and Singapore have held strong ties. After the Chinese Civil War, both the predominantly ethnic Chinese societies shared deep distrust against Mao's communism. When in the 1970s tiny Singapore started building its Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) to deter potential military adventurism by much more populous Malaysia and Indonesia, the Taiwanese under then-president Chiang Ching-kuo offered timely assistance by providing training areas because land in the city-state is of extremely short supply.
Taiwan's and Singapore's troops did not train together, and neither was there an official military alliance, but even today, the SAF's infantry and special operation forces train in various locations over the island. The existence of the "Starlight" program became undeniable in 2007 when a Taiwanese F-5 crashed into a military base near Taipei, killing three active-duty Singaporean servicemen, as well as injuring a few others who happened to be in the wrong spot at the wrong time.
After Singapore switched diplomatic relations from the ROC to the PRC in 1990, it resisted more than other countries in the region pressure from Beijing to cut ties to the island, and Lee Kuan Yew and his ministers continued to visit Taipei when Chiang's successor Lee Teng-hui ruled over the island.
The Far Eastern Economics Review in 2004 described how these trip were handled: "Singapore ministers officially take leave, notice of which is published in the government gazette, so they can describe the trip to Taiwan as private; Singapore informs Beijing, which asks that the visit not take place and threatens unspecified consequences if it does; Singapore goes ahead anyway."
Later on in Lee Teng-hui's presidency, and especially after the island's first direct presidential elections in 1996 which Lee won, Taiwan-Singapore relations soured significantly, however. Taiwan's Lee and the city-state's Lee developed a personal antipathy, and ties hit rock-bottom when Lee Teng-hui's successor Chen Shui-bian, next to generally messing up Taiwanese foreign relations with his drives for independence, famously described Singapore as "a booger-sized nation".
In 2008, the Kuomintang's (KMT) Ma Ying-jeou became president in Taipei, and the climate between the two became friendlier.
In May 2011, apparently after Beijing has given its nod, ties became so friendly that talks on an FTA were started, making the city-state the first nation that maintains diplomatic ties to the PRC carrying out such a move.
Then it was all messed up by a tipsy diplomat and a defense minister who of all things chose the spotlights of the world's third largest airshow for conducting a cloak-and-dagger mission, local media says.
Unsurprisingly, some Taiwanese observers see Beijing behind the Vanessa Shih scandal. They believe that while the Chinese consented to a Taiwan-Singapore FTA before Taiwan's presidential elections in mid-January to give Ma Ying-jeou political ammunition, after Ma's win, they wanted to end his fantasies of gaining "international space".
Others say that because the Ma administration's enthusiasm for diplomatic breakthroughs was so great that it perturbed cautious Singaporean leaders. Neither theory is implausible, but this isn't true of the allegations that Singapore planned to scrap military ties.
The Singaporeans have for decades insisted on a strong US military presence in the Asia-Pacific region and are offering the Americans usage of naval facilities for warships. The main function of which is to counter China's maritime presence in the region's seas. Such a move against Taiwan would suggest the Singaporeans made a swift u-turn and had begun dancing to Beijing's tune.
This would've set alarm bells ringing in Washington as well as in China-wary regional capitals, further complicating the US's evolving strategy of cementing alliances and extending its physical presence in Southeast Asia. A perceived drift into Beijing's orbit - and perhaps even making use of China's long-standing offer to switching from Taiwanese to Chinese soil for military training - wouldn't benefit the SAF much, given its dependency on sophisticated US-made weapon systems.
When approached for comment, Jean-Pierre Cabestan, professor at and head of the Department of Government and International Studies at Hong Kong Baptist University, saw the Taiwanese media's analyses as a laughing matter.
"The ex-representative should be decorated, given a medal for having sung the ROC national anthem," he said. "Singapore will recover sooner or later, and the spat won't dramatically affect the ongoing FTA negotiations. Not to mention military ties. The Singaporeans need to train their army somewhere, and they still prefer Taiwan to Malaysia, don't they?"
Jens Kastner is a Taipei-based journalist.
(Copyright 2012 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and
