Last year Beijing began issuing threats after Taiwan's President Lee Teng-hui called for relations between China and Taiwan to be conducted on a "state-to-state" basis, challenging the face-saving "One China" policy agreed upon by Beijing and Washington. While the House vote may be in part a bid to pile on election-year political pressure on the administration — and could augur badly for President Clinton's efforts to win legislative support this year for permanently normalized trade relations with China — the Taiwan Security Enhancement Act remains unlikely to win the two-thirds Senate majority needed to immunize it against a likely presidential veto. Still, the response to Lee's comments last year suggest that Beijing takes election-year rhetoric very seriously — and to make matters worse, Taiwan goes to the polls in March. Of course, Beijing might be less spooked by election-season grandstanding if it held elections of its own.
A Bit of Election-Year Bluster Bothers Beijing
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Foreign policy debates may have little impact on U.S. elections, but U.S. electioneering may well have consequences for Washington's foreign policy. House Republicans overwhelmingly passed legislation Wednesday calling for direct military ties between the U.S. and Taiwan and annual assessments of the island's security status that would ease arms-sales restrictions to Taipei. Beijing, naturally, reacted with alarm, and the White House made clear it would work the Senate to stop the bill from passing. "The White House reaction isn't surprising, since there's a longstanding arrangement with Beijing that they won't threaten Taiwan as long as the status quo is maintained and they're not put in an embarrassing situation," says TIME U.N. correspondent William Dowell. "But Beijing clearly sees this legislation as changing the status quo, and therefore requiring a response from them that can only inflame the situation."