Defense of Taiwan is essential to defeat China’s communist regime and liberate the Chinese people

Commentary

By Bill Gertz - The Washington Times - Thursday, July 2, 2026

OPINION:

The United States remains a bastion of freedom and democracy. But American leaders have failed for decades to understand and counter the most serious threat to our existence: the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the nation it rules, the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The growing threat posed by the CCP to the people of Taiwan can be traced to decades of failed policies by American elites. A free, democratic and sovereign Taiwan is a model and inspiration for all Chinese people. And the defense of Taiwan is essential for us to end and roll back the long march of Chinese communism around the world.

The U.S. approach toward the CCP has been a fiasco. Several times since the regime seized power in 1949, the United States rescued a failing and corrupt state that historians blame for the deaths of 65 million people.

From the 1970s, when Henry Kissinger played the China card against Moscow, to the failure of the George H.W. Bush administration to support thousands of pro-democracy Chinese protesters who were crushed beneath tank treads of the so-called People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in June 1989, to short-sighted trade and business deals that gutted America’s once-powerful economy, Communist China has continued a relentless advance with the backing of American elites.

President Trump’s first administration slowed but did not halt the decades-long appeasement toward Beijing.

The signs of a return to appeasement are unmistakable: They include a delay in sending $14 billion in urgently needed weapons to Taiwan and a renewed reluctance by those in power to tell the truth about the realities of the PRC and its drive for global supremacy.

During a meeting last year with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, aboard his militarized Boeing 747, I had a simple message: China is going to take over the world unless the United States prevents it. And if China does achieve world domination, it will be a terrible place, without freedom for our children and grandchildren.

The conquest of Taiwan is a critical first step in this process of CCP world domination, whether by force or subversion to neutralize an alternative model for the Chinese people, to command the center of the First Island Chain, and to capture intact Taiwan’s supremely strategic semiconductor industry.

As with the mass killing spree that followed Mao Zedong’s rise to power, the takeover of Taiwan can be expected to produce another round of mass death, in the hundreds of thousands. The reason is that communist doctrine views people as merely spiritless animals. People deemed by the communists to be on the wrong side of historical materialism can therefore be eliminated to pave the way for a never-to-be achieved communist utopia and new communist ideal man.

So what is to be done? A new strategic approach is urgently needed. As I have written in my two books on China “The China Threat” and “Deceiving the Sky” the threat is multipronged, extremely dangerous and metastasizing like the deadliest cancer. The danger we face is essentially ideological and enhanced through a combination of political, diplomatic, military, intelligence, economic, financial and informational power. And it must be countered on each of these planes.

A first step is to educate and remind the public of the fact that the American-led global system of governance and commerce has produced the most fantastic and extraordinary advancement of humanity in world history.

Next, Taiwan must step up its military readiness. Yes, Taiwan can effectively win against a more powerful PLA with superior and innovative weapons technology, such as its plan for 20,000-armed drones to defeat an assault.

However, Taiwan’s soft power can provide the people of China and Chinese around the world with the most vivid example of a free and open democratic system. Taiwan’s continued sovereignty will allow China’s 1.4 billion people to realize the true future of humankind, and not the dark vision of Chinese Communist leader Xi Jinping’s unachievable communist “dream.”

Taiwan’s government can also lead the world, with the joint efforts of Taiwanese, Chinese and other diaspora communities, to create a pro-democracy Pacific community, dedicated to promoting the values of freedom. Bringing together many peoples across the Pacific including those in North and South America this community of nations could become a potent force in bringing about the peaceful replacement of the despised communist system in China with a democratic alternative.

The United States could strengthen this pan-Pacific democratic community with the commitment that we will never abandon the people of Taiwan.

America urgently needs a new strategic approach to counter the CCP’s expansionist objectives. Taiwan must be at the center of that mission. First, to shore up its defenses, then to jointly form a powerful pan-Pacific coalition of democratic nations, to ultimately provide the Chinese people with a model for a better future, for themselves and for mankind.

• Bill Gertz is a national security correspondent for The Washington Times and a New York Times best-selling author. He hosts a monthly podcast called Victory Over Communism and his most recent book is “Deceiving the Sky: Inside Communist China’s Drive for Global Supremacy.”