Pointless Provocations Are Provocative

Hawks are blind to how the provocations they celebrate increase tensions and make conflict more rather than less likely.

Walter Russell Mead thinks Pelosi’s Taiwan visit was just great:

At home, nothing is more important than strengthening the American consensus about the need to counter China’s aggressive posture in the Pacific. By traveling to Taiwan, the House Speaker nailed her colors to the mast: The defense of Taiwan is a cause that center-left Democrats can’t ignore. This was an important signal to send, and Mrs. Pelosi should be commended for it.

Mead claims that the visit “had significant positive effects both at home and abroad,” and this is one of his examples of a positive effect. I don’t buy it, but the claim about the political impact in the U.S. is worth discussing a bit more. It’s not clear to me that the visit helped in strengthening an American consensus about countering China. If anything, it has opened up rifts among China hawks, many of whom don’t share Mead’s devil-may-care approach to antagonizing other major powers. The visit showed how some China hawks are willing to play with Taiwan’s security and prosperity for nothing more than a publicity stunt. It links China hawkery in people’s minds with short-sightedness and irresponsibility. Pelosi probably wanted her visit to set a precedent that would normalize similar trips by high-ranking officials in the future, but the lesson this administration is likely to draw from it is that it should not be allowed to happen again.