In an essay last week, Charles Glaser set out a case for abandoning any U.S. commitment to defending Taiwan, the small island democracy China routinely threatens with invasion. Central to Glaser’s argument is the idea that U.S. policymakers have not sufficiently debated whether the United States should “trim its East Asian commitments to reduce the odds of going to war with China.” But the idea the United States can casually shed its commitments to Taiwan is inconsistent with the values that should be central to U.S. foreign policy. It would cede authority over Taiwan to a totalitarian state committed to crushing free expression and driving U.S. influence from Asia for a purely imaginary gain.
