What Taiwan is learning from the war in Ukraine

Ishaan Tharoor

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Some 5,000 miles separate Taipei and Kyiv, but in Washington, the two embattled capitals seem almost geopolitical neighbors. Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in 2022, and Ukraine’s subsequent struggle to repel the invaders and reclaim lost territory, have resonated in Taiwan, which sits in the looming shadow of China. The increasingly assertive Asian superpower scoffs at the self-ruling island’s sense of sovereignty and can’t countenance the success of Taiwan’s democracy. Chinese President Xi Jinping has yoked his political legitimacy to Taiwan’s eventual “reunification,” describing it as a “historical inevitability.”

The prospect of Xi following in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s footsteps and attempting a land grab across the strait seems more likely than it once did. And Taiwan, with new infusions of U.S. military aid, is preparing more vigorously to head off the threat. For the Taiwanese public, the Russian invasion of Ukraine “has brought some perspective, some reality” to the dangers at their own doorstep, Alexander Tah-ray Yui, Taiwan’s de facto ambassador in Washington, told me.