JOHN CULVER is a Nonresident Senior Fellow in the John L. Thornton China Center at Brookings. He served for 35 years as a Central Intelligence Agency officer, including as National Intelligence Officer for East Asia from 2015 to 2018.

Whether all this comes in time remains to be seen. Military analysts fear that China could invade Taiwan as early as 2027. If war comes, Taiwan’s hope and expectation is that the United States will enter the fray. Wargames point to costly fighting and losses if that happens, including the specter of potential escalation to nuclear war.

President Lai says Taiwan will continue to strengthen its defence as preparing for war is best way to avoid it

Taiwan has long been a tense flashpoint between Washington and Beijing. By law, the U.S. is required to help Taiwan defend itself. But there is now a debate about whether Taiwan is spending enough on defense,

Taiwan's President Lai Tsingde said Tuesday, May 20, that he seeks peace and dialogue with China, but stressed that the island nation must continue to strengthen its defenses and be prepared for possible war.

Taiwan wants peace and dialogue with China but the government must continue to strengthen the island's defences, President Lai Ching-te said on Tuesday as he completed one year in office.

China views democratically-governed Taiwan as its own territory and has stepped up military and political pressure to assert those claims, including increasing the intensity of war games, saying the island is one of its provinces with no right to be called a state.