Seems that not all went smoothly on Secretary Powell's most recent foray to East Asia. A "slip of the tongue" may have produced not only a major brouhaha that managed to unite Taiwanese across the political spectrum in outrage. He may also have shot an $18 billion purchase by Taiwan of US weapons that the US has been pushing for the past three years.

The fateful words from the otherwise extremely cautious Powell, were uttered during a CNN interview in Beijing. From Lawrence Eyton in the Asia Times:

In interviews on Tuesday, Powell spoke in unusually harsh terms on the topic of Taiwan's sovereignty. "Taiwan is not independent. It does not enjoy sovereignty as a nation, and that remains our policy, our firm policy," he said.

In Taipei this was regarded as the harshest, most decisive expression of this principle made for some time, at least during the administration of US President George W Bush.
[...]
But it was Powell's subsequent remarks that left Taiwan in a state of shock. "We want to see both sides not take unilateral action that would prejudice an eventual outcome, a reunification that all parties are seeking," Powell told CNN.
[...]
So, apropos of Powell, one simple fact is that not all parties are seeking unification. Forty-three percent of Taiwanese (pro-independence plus pro-status quo forever) don't want it at any price and another 40% don't even want to consider it until China has changed into a democracy - the essence of the status quo now/decision later position.

But there is another problem on top of this, which is that it is a long-held US position that it does not take sides on any particular outcome in negotiations between Taiwan and China, nor does it act as a mediator; it only insists that the issues between them be solved peacefully. And yet Powell's remarks suggest that the United States does in fact favor one particular outcome - reunification - and, of course, that just happens to be the outcome least favored by most Taiwanese.
[...]
Since Tuesday, in fact almost since the CNN broadcast, the US has been trying to put things right. The State Department said the same day that Powell had not meant "reunification" - that was a slip of the tongue. What he had meant was "resolution." Wednesday saw the Taiwan Foreign Ministry summoning US representative to Taipei Douglas Paal, a man before whom it usually quails, to "clarify the US position". Paal said the US position hadn't changed but he could not say why Powell had used the word "reunification". A clearly still very angry Foreign Minister Mark Chen later said that Powell's remarks had damaged Taiwan's democracy and hurt its status, and he demanded a US restatement of the "Six Assurances".

The Six Assurances, enunciated on July 14, 1982, made clear that the United States:

• Had not agreed to set a date for ending arms sales to the Republic of China on Taiwan.
  
• Had not agreed to hold prior consultations with the Chinese government on arms sales to the Republic of China on Taiwan.
  
• Would not play any mediation role between Taiwan and China.
  
• Had not agreed to revise the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act.
  
• Had not altered its position regarding sovereignty over Taiwan.
  
• Would not exert pressure on the Republic of China on Taiwan to enter negotiations with the People's Republic of China.

Currently the situation is that both the United States and Taiwan know that Powell goofed badly. The US wants to pass it off as a simple slip of the tongue. But Taiwan is well aware that China is likely to ignore a denial and make as much hay from Powell's remark as it can. Indeed, on Wednesday Zhang Mingqing, spokesman for the Chinese government's Taiwan Affairs Office, told a press conference, "Some people have said Powell made a slip of the tongue, but I don't believe it."

Taiwan well knows that in this game, something once said can be used and exploited, even if it is was said by accident. It can only be negated by categorical denial as part of a restatement of policy. This is why it wants a restatement of the Six Assurances, so the lasting impression is not that the US favors reunification but that the US will not play a role and does not favor any particular outcome. The US is reluctant to make Powell look foolish. It will be interesting to see who prevails.

With the Chinese harshly attacking the Bush Doctrine and the Iraq adventure upon Colin's return, seems like he must not have had a very good time on what could be his final tour of East Asia in his current capacity.

And to add insult to injury, he just had his head handed to him via a public smack-down by the former Foreign Minister of India. Think maybe he's about had it with this job?

It's a step in the right direction -- an open political debate within the Sunni community about whether to participate in the elections. And open discussion about the ways the election will be open and fair between the Independent Electoral Commission and Muslim Scholars Association, which has been the advocating an election boycott.

This process is as critical to "democracy-building" as the actual mechanics of voting.

How would you like it if you hadn't had a trash pick-up since August 5. Well the residents of Sadr City are finally getting not only the basic services back after months of fighting, but the promised sanitation infrastructure repairs and improvements are about to get underway after the weapons buy-back program appears to have worked to reduce the level of violence.

Not that there aren't enough weapons floating around for the Mahdi Army to rise again, but the program and the cash seem to have been the agreed signal to start getting life back on a more normal footing.

Perhaps most important -- around 130,000 Iraqis are to be employed on the projects.

The signals from China during the US presidential campaign have been fairly relaxed, with Xinhua articles pointing out that relations with the US have been on a fairly good footing in the last several years, despite some of the pointed policies that the Bush Administration brought with them when they entered office. And they've noted that Kerry's Democrats are likely to be more sensitive on certain trade matters, such as the remnimbi rate.

That makes all the more striking the statement hitting the wires via Reuters just one day before the election.

On the eve of the U.S. election, China criticized the "Bush doctrine" of pre-emptive strikes, said the Iraq war has destroyed the global anti-terror coalition and blamed arrogance for problems dogging the United States around the world.

In a strongly worded commentary, Qian Qichen, one of the main architects of China's foreign policy, said the United States was dreaming if it thought the 21st century was the "American century."

"The Iraq war has ... destroyed the hard-won global anti-terror coalition," Qian said in the article in the English-language China Daily newspaper.

"(It) has made the United States even more unpopular in the international community than its war in Vietnam ... The 21st century is not the 'American century'. That does not mean that the United States does not want the dream. Rather it is incapable of realizing the goal."

Oh my... Somebody in DC seeing the campaigns' internal polls, maybe?

[UPDATE 10-31-04 11:30PM] by nadezhda
Seems that not all went smoothly on Secretary Powell's most recent foray to East Asia. A "slip of the tongue" may have produced not only a major brouhaha that managed to unite Taiwanese across the political spectrum in outrage. He may also have shot an $18 billion purchase by Taiwan of US weapons that the US has been pushing for the past three years.

I think it's more than plain from what I have written for chez Nadezhda so far that I badly want George W. Bush to lose the upcoming election. That means not just that I won't be voting for Bush, but also that I'm not going to be voting for Ralph Nader or for that Libertarian guy or anyone else that doesn't have a chance of winning. But I haven't given much of a hint as to what I think about the guy I will be voting for.

So now I'd like to talk a little bit about Senator John Forbes Kerry, the man I very much hope will soon become the 44th President of the United States. I'm not going to talk much about his platform or his biography; I think Kerry has done a decent job of introducing himself and his program with his campaign, and if you want to know more about those things, there is plenty of information for you on the Web. What I want to do is talk honestly about my sense of John Kerry the man, born of watching with some interest his entire career on the national political scene, and especially from watching him closely over the last 15 months or so.

   more »

So says Steve Pearlstein, and he assembles a pretty long list of troublesome points. I don't know about you, but between oil prices likely to remain at over $50 a barrel and a current account deficit on an upward path toward 6% of GDP , I'm starting to get a little antsy about, say, interest rates and growth rates going in the opposite (wrong) directions in the medium-term that don't have anything to do with the business cycle.

[UPDATE 10-31-04] by nadezhda
Seems I'm not the only one fretting. See below the fold.   more »

In thinking on what is at stake on Tuesday, I was struck by coming across the same allusion to "careless people" by two very different bloggers:   more »

Glad to see the Whiskey Bar has opened again for a couple of sessions. Billmon apparently couldn't stay away as the election came down to the wire.

His post immediately after the release of the OBL tape was a terrific piece. He covered one of several reactions I had when I heard about the tape. As I've been covering at chez Nadezhda, if the election goes the way the polls have moved every time we've had an elevated terror alert, OBL had just handed the election to Bush unless the Dem's GOTV is extraordinary. The fear factor has been dominating the very volatile "swing" or "undecided" margin.

Now Billmon comes back today with a Fox poll which has the race tied among "likely" and Kerry up 2 among registered. Seems OBL didn't help Kery any, but hasn't yet helped Bush reverse Kerry's momentum. As Billmon says:

If Gorman [Fox's pollster] is right, than I think I can sincerely say I have never been so happy to be wrong.

Two of the last three Republican Presidents, Ronald Reagan and the younger Bush, are men who came late in their lives to politics, patently lacked extensive policy knowledge, and were notoriously unable to engage in nuanced extemporaneous policy discussions. Both of these Presidents have won enthusiastic support nearly verging on the worshipful from a large core of true believers who scarcely bother to argue with the perception that their beloved leaders fell somewhat below the level of policy scholars. What is important, those supporters argue, is that the President have a clear and consistent vision, clearly enunciated, not that the President should be able to micro-manage the various departments and policies of the Federal government. What does the record of the Bush Administration tell us about this model of a President as a titular chief who delegates real authority to agency heads while concerning himself primarily with the duty of providing themes for his Administration?   more »

I had been under the impression that the Bush administration's handling of tensions between India and Pakistan--which brought the two countries to the brink of war in 2002--had been one of its rare diplomatic successes. Apparently, there are, ahem, conflicting accounts as to just how central a role Colin Powell played in calming the waters:

Powell said that at the time, in 2002, India and Pakistan had seemed on the verge of nuclear war, and "now the dialogue has paid off" with diplomatic relations, easy travel between the two countries and official talks to resolve differences on a range of issues. "I think that's been a success of the administration," Powell said.

Powell's comments were widely reported in India, which views itself as an independent great power. But Jaswant Singh, foreign minister at the time, told a news conference in New Delhi this week that Powell's account of arranging the call and his assertion that Pakistan and India had been on the brink of nuclear war were figments of his imagination.

"The way he has gone about claiming credit is a total concoction and a matter of imagination, the way he conjured up biological weapons in Iraq," Singh said. "I don't know whether the State Department of U.S.A., in addition to attempting to run U.S. foreign policy as best as it can, is also a telephone exchange and now is acting as a kind of elocution instructor to South Asia."

Needless to say, these are not the kind of criticisms that happy allies make. It also shows that Powell's Clown Show in front of the UN has had real consequences for American prestige.

There is a great deal of resentment in India about America's historical tilt toward Pakistan. India, with its vibrant if messy secular democracy, its rapidly modernizing economy, and its generally responsible behavior in world affairs, feels slighted by a long tradition on the part of the United States of arming and coddling its enemy, currently a military dictatorship, despite some outrageous betrayals. Paradoxically, Pakistan has been rewarded for spreading nuclear technology, terrorism, Islamist radicalism, and instability around the world. And yet, what is the alternative? Isolating and ignoring Pakistan clearly backfired during the 1990s. Democratically elected Pakistani leaders have proven to be duplicitous, weak, corrupt and chronically incapable of confronting the radicals or refraining from nuclear proliferation. Musharraf, faced with a U.S. ultimatum immediately after 9/11, has been largely cooperative, has begun to purge the nefarious elements of the ISI, has worked to liberalize and expand the Pakistani economy and has succeeded in overturning years of misguided strategic thinking. Pakistan has (nervously) tethered its security to the United States instead of to the illusory pursuit of "strategic depth" in Afghanistan, where India's preferred candidate, Hamid Karzai, has thus far managed to marginalize or coopt Taliban leaders who had once been supported by Pakistan.

Could he be doing more? Should he allow opposition parties and promote democracy and civil society at the local level? Should A.Q. Khan be questioned and punished? Should he (and us) be pouring money into Pakistan's education system? Absolutely.

But it would be a mistake, in my view, to let the perfect be the enemy of the good here. Musharraf has been nearly assassinated twice now and is facing two low-level insurgencies in Balochistan and the NWFP, so he is not particularly eager to face a third rebellion over Kashmir. I think that a tougher public line on Pakistan might make India happy and might be more in line with America's pro-democracy rhetoric, but it would have to be done very carefully or it would backfire. Not to mention that we don't appear to have a backup plan in case Musharraf goes. Perhaps I'm not thinking creatively enough--I'd be interested in hearing readers' ideas about what else could be done--but I just don't see too many other options right now.

Thanks to The Acorn for the link.