Not Without Incident: Questioning Big Brother's Platitudes

“The wise warrior avoids the battle.”[i]– Sun Tzu

In February, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez attended the Munich Security Conference offered a response to a question on whether the US should send troops to Taiwan if it were invaded that evoked the ire of Republicans and Democrats alike.[ii] Her answer to this straightforward yet loaded question was that  “I think that, uh, this is such a, a, you know, I think that this is a, um, this is of course a, uh, a very longstanding, um, policy of the United States, and I think what we are hoping for is we want to make sure we never get to that point.”[iii] What she was stumbling over was the US position of strategic ambiguity, in which the US ‘acknowledges’ that there is one China and simultaneously seeks to maintain the status quo in the Taiwan Strait. She was roundly criticized for her long winded and nonsensical response, as well as her obvious lack of knowledge about Taiwan and China. JD Vance called her comments “embarrassing”, and he suggested that Ocasio-Cortez should perhaps read a book about Taiwan and China and have some “humility”[iv] The National Review’s Jim Geraghty called Ocasio-Cortez’s position “strategic incomprehensibility”[v]

As ignorant as Ocasio-Cortez is, the real reason there is bipartisan outrage about her answer about Taiwan is not that it was word salad, or that it didn’t stake an affirmative position on whether she thinks the US should intervene on Taiwan’s behalf, it’s that she didn’t give the correct answer, the establishment dogma. We saw a similar reaction to comments made by Darlene Graham, the late Lindsey Graham’s sister and candidate for his seat in the Senate. When asked in a debate whether Taiwan and the South China Sea she said, “I just want to be honest here. I’m not on national security,”, and she affirmed her support for the military while noting that national security is not her area of expertise.[vi] Her primary opponent Ralph Norman and his supporters jumped on this and declared that this proves her inexperience and that she is not fit to deliberate on issues of national security in the Senate.[vii] As well as these two instances of political candidates butchering what is itself a contradictory policy, last Sunday I wrote about Donald Trump’s refusal to greenlight an arms deal with Taiwan.[viii] Together, these events have caused the illiberal liberal class to shudder with both fear and anger. Fear of the possibility that people who do not share their consensus view on Taiwan will potentially influence US foreign policy, and anger that the policy they have clung to for decades, which has made the Taiwan Strait, as well as the South China Sea and the entire Indo-Pacific region, more nor less volatile. Pointing at China and declaring them the sole aggressor, and that it is them violating Taiwanese airspace (which is their airspace, as there is one China), or attempting to manipulate Taiwanese politics to make it more favorable to China, distracts from the fact that they have a clear position on Taiwan, while the West’s is totally unclear.

Geraghty’s argument that Ocasio-Cortez’s position was strategic incomprehensibility, not ambiguity, applies to US-Taiwan policy as it is espoused by the Washington establishment, and her and Graham’s inability to provide a coherent answer doesn’t just reflect their being uninformed, but also the incoherence of US-Taiwan policy as a whole. Further, she clearly does not have a non-interventionist view towards Taiwan, so her views do not differ radically from the illiberal liberal class. She may be slightly less hawkish than John Bolton or Matt Pottinger, but she still, as do mostly all Democrats and their supporters, think that Taiwan should; be defended, even if this is limited to selling them arms and emphasizing deterrence from China attacking at all. Matt Duss, who served as foreign policy adviser to Bernie Sanders and advises Ocasio-Cortez, argues that maintaining the status quo in the Taiwan Strait is the least bad option. He is critical of how confrontational Washington has been, especially in the wake of Joe Biden’s various times declaring that the US would support Taiwan if it were invaded, however in elite circles, the prevailing opinion is still that Taiwan must be defended.

The assumed dichotomy is between those who wish to defend it and those who would abandon it, leaving it to the tyranny of China. This is a false dichotomy, as deeming the option that does not argue for the defense of Taiwan as abandonment taints that position. This is intentional. In an essay by Chinese scholars Yuan Zheng and Guan Chenglong, they analyze the US debate over Taiwan, and argue that there are three main factions, two of which can be subdivided based on the means and the end.[ix] In their analysis there are three ends, the abandonment of Taiwan, maintaining the status quo, and defending Taiwan, and the means to achieve these ends are strategic clarity, ambiguity, and non-intervention.[x] There is the Taiwan defense camp, which is the most hawkish, the deterring rebalancing camp, which is hawkish but not as hawkish as the defense camp, the traditional status quo camp, who hold to US-Taiwan policy as it is currently practiced, and there are the gradual and radical abandonment camps, who differ on the speed at which Taiwan must ultimately be shed from US foreign policy practice. Zheng and Chenglong, like other scholars and commentators in the face of opposing views on Taiwan, smear such views as “abandonment”[xi] This is gross and disingenuous, and is a humanitarian appeal, implying that the noble position to have is that Taiwan should be defended, or that at the very least, the status quo should be maintained, and that anyone who would deviate against this, even if they do not see Taiwan as vital to US interests and are advocating for the US national interest, not for the Chinese Communist Party or Xi Jinping. The scholar Charles L. Glaser, who is a Professor at George Washington University, who argued in an article in Foreign Affairs that the status quo in the Taiwan Strait is dangerous, is referred to as “a long-standing advocate of abandoning Taiwan”[xii] It can’t be that he just has a view that differs from the establishment thinking on Taiwan. It has to be that he is a nasty, devious actor who seeks to desert an ally. This labeling is nefarious and is intended to tar certain views as wholly negative and harmful to policy discourse, just like non-interventionists are often tarnished as isolationists, agents of whatever adversary is being fought at the time, and deserters who desire a decoupling from longstanding commitments. The word abandon implies a responsibility or duty that, if it is not being fulfilled, is being cast aside as unimportant despite a promise or commitment to it. Thus, giving the title of abandonment is intended not to analyze, but to demonize and ultimately, to ostracize those who differ on what US interests are.

A commitment being longstanding does not make it right, nor does it bolster the case for it. Contrary to what the Washington establishment likes to pretend, there being a consensus on a particular issue does not make it correct. As I mentioned in an essay last week, Robert Kagan, when pushed on whether the 2003 invasion of Iraq was justified, said that it was a consensus in Washington that Saddam Hussein was a dire threat to the US and its presence in the Middle East, despite this not being the case, and the war turning out to be a complete disaster.[xiii] Kagan appeals to the consensus as if that justifies the Iraq war, and myriad other US acts of aggression, like their war in Syria or Libya. Consensus, especially one that is bipartisan, is often used to bolster the correctness of a policy position. This is the case on China, as we saw in Trump’s first term. His more aggressive turn to China is one aspect of his foreign policy that was kept and even expanded by the Biden regime that followed him.[xiv]

Zheng and Chenglong argue that the Biden regime sparked a turn from strategic ambiguity towards strategic clarity, and this ignited a debate among the different factions.[xv] They also note that in Trump’s second term, the abandonment camp has risen in popularity and that the gradual abandonment camp, together with the status quo camp, have formed a temporary consensus, however, the problem that pervades their entire argument is the connotations sowed in certain viewpoints on Taiwan, as those who oppose defense of Taiwan apparently wish to abandon it, and that to not intervene is not advocacy for the outcome of whatever will occur in the face of non-intervention. If one concludes that Taiwan is not a vital US interest and that it is not worth fighting with China over, they are not necessarily siding with the Chinese or giving up, ceding, or being weaklings. While analyzing what the consensus view of US policy is necessary to understand how it has evolved, Zheng and Chenglong are going a step further and are implying that there is a right position to have on Taiwan through their naming of the factions and by proxy, the conclusions they come to and the policy implications it has.[xvi]

Ocasio-Cortez and Graham are not being lambasted for their lame answers, but for their inability to read verbatim from the establishment script on the issue of Taiwan. To the illiberal liberal class, there is a correct position to have, and this is not up for debate. If you find yourself on the wrong side of this issue you are a reckless abandoner. Reducing debates over any foreign policy issue is irresponsible and dangerous, but it is especially fatal with what will be the most consequential foreign policy crisis of my lifetime- a war with China over Taiwan. To believe that this is a war that the West will not win, and is not worth waging in the first place, is not borne out of a penchant for isolationism or abandonment, but of a desire to not live in a world ravaged by the devastating economic, environmental, and societal effects that such a war will bring, or, in a worst-case scenario, nuclear winter.

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[i] Tzu Sun et al., The Art of War, 29. Aufl, Oxford Paperbacks (Oxford Univ. Press, 1971).

[ii] Harry Saunders, “AOC, Trump, and a Week of Bad Answers on Taiwan,” Domino Theory, February 19, 2026, https://dominotheory.com/aoc-trump-and-a-week-of-bad-answers-on-taiwan/; The Editorial Board, “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Does Geopolitics – WSJ,” Wall Street Journal, February 16, 2026, https://www.wsj.com/opinion/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-taiwan-china-munich-security-conference-4c907430.

[iii] The Editorial Board, “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Does Geopolitics – WSJ.”

[iv] Julia Manchester, “Vance Calls Ocasio-Cortez’s Response to Taiwan Question in Munich ’embarrassing’,” Text, The Hill, February 17, 2026, https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5742481-vance-slams-aoc-foreign-policy/.

[v] Jim Geraghty, “Opinion | AOC Tries Strategic Incomprehensibility,” The Washington Post, February 16, 2026, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/02/16/ocasio-cortez-china-taiwan-munich/.

[vi] The Editorial Board, “Opinion | Darline Graham’s Taiwan Mistake,” Opinion, Wall Street Journal, August 20, 2026, https://www.wsj.com/opinion/darline-graham-taiwan-china-pacific-ralph-norman-758312b4.

[vii] Alec Hernandez et al., “‘Woefully Underprepared’: Graham Critics Seize on Her Foreign Policy Misstep – POLITICO,” August 19, 2026, https://www.politico.com/news/2026/08/19/darline-graham-taiwan-flub-south-carolina-senate-01042395.

[viii] Jonathan Fritz and Michael Clark, “The Trump Administration’s Taiwan Arms Freeze Is a Gift to Xi Jinping,” Center for American Progress, June 3, 2026, https://www.americanprogress.org/article/the-trump-administrations-taiwan-arms-freeze-is-a-gift-to-xi-jinping/.

[ix] Yuxuan Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy,” Substack, September 5, 2026, https://www.eastisread.com/p/surveying-the-us-debate-on-taiwan.

[x] Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy.”

[xi] Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy.”

[xii] Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy”; Charles L. Glaser, “Washington Is Avoiding the Tough Questions on Taiwan and China,” Foreign Affairs, April 28, 2021, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/asia/2021-04-28/washington-avoiding-tough-questions-taiwan-and-china.

[xiii] Robert Kagan and Martin Di Caro, “Robert Kagan: Sometimes US Intervention Is Worth Blowback,” Responsible Statecraft, August 4, 2026, https://responsiblestatecraft.org/robert-kagan-iran/.

[xiv] Robert Kagan and Martin Di Caro, “Robert Kagan.”

[xv] Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy.”

[xvi] Jia et al., “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy.”

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References

Alec Hernandez, Alex Gangitano, Mark Satter, and Connor O’Brien. “‘Woefully Underprepared’: Graham Critics Seize on Her Foreign Policy Misstep – POLITICO.” August 19, 2026. https://www.politico.com/news/2026/08/19/darline-graham-taiwan-flub-south-carolina-senate-01042395.

Geraghty, Jim. “Opinion | AOC Tries Strategic Incomprehensibility.” The Washington Post, February 16, 2026. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/02/16/ocasio-cortez-china-taiwan-munich/.

Glaser, Charles L. “Washington Is Avoiding the Tough Questions on Taiwan and China.” Foreign Affairs, April 28, 2021. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/asia/2021-04-28/washington-avoiding-tough-questions-taiwan-and-china.

Harry Saunders. “AOC, Trump, and a Week of Bad Answers on Taiwan.” Domino Theory, February 19, 2026. https://dominotheory.com/aoc-trump-and-a-week-of-bad-answers-on-taiwan/.

Jia, Yuxuan, Guan Chenglong, and Yuan Zheng. “Surveying The U.S. Debate on Taiwan Policy.” Substack, September 5, 2026. https://www.eastisread.com/p/surveying-the-us-debate-on-taiwan.

Jonathan Fritz and Michael Clark. “The Trump Administration’s Taiwan Arms Freeze Is a Gift to Xi Jinping.” Center for American Progress, June 3, 2026. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/the-trump-administrations-taiwan-arms-freeze-is-a-gift-to-xi-jinping/.

Manchester, Julia. “Vance Calls Ocasio-Cortez’s Response to Taiwan Question in Munich ’embarrassing’.” Text. The Hill, February 17, 2026. https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5742481-vance-slams-aoc-foreign-policy/.

Robert Kagan and Martin Di Caro. “Robert Kagan: Sometimes US Intervention Is Worth Blowback.” Responsible Statecraft, August 4, 2026. https://responsiblestatecraft.org/robert-kagan-iran/.

Sun, Tzu, Samuel B. Griffith, Liddell Hart, and Henry Basil. The Art of War. 29. Aufl. Oxford Paperbacks. Oxford Univ. Press, 1971.

The Editorial Board. “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Does Geopolitics – WSJ.” Wall Street Journal, February 16, 2026. https://www.wsj.com/opinion/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-taiwan-china-munich-security-conference-4c907430.

The Editorial Board. “Opinion | Darline Graham’s Taiwan Mistake.” Opinion. Wall Street Journal, August 20, 2026. https://www.wsj.com/opinion/darline-graham-taiwan-china-pacific-ralph-norman-758312b4.