After weeks of mounting speculation, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is set to visit Taiwan this week on her trip through Asia, prompting a caustic response from officials in Beijing over fears it could triggers the worst cross-Strait political crisis in decades.

As the second in line for the presidential succession, Pelosi will be the highest ranking US official to visit the self-governing island – which Beijing considers part of its sovereign territory – since then House Speaker Newt Gingrich has returned in 1997. China has since become more assertive of Taiwan, particularly under Chinese President Xi Jinping, who has pledged to bring the independently ruled island back under Beijing’s control. .

The trip underscores fears in some circles in Washington that the “One China” policy – ​​launched in 1972 under then-President Richard Nixon, in which the United States recognizes only one government in China but maintains unofficial ties with Taiwan – be slowly shaken. and that this risks triggering a new political crisis with Beijing. Still, others in Washington, particularly China hawks in the Republican Party, have applauded Pelosi’s travel plans, saying US leaders should not give in to Chinese threats as they work to strengthen ties with Taiwan.

After weeks of mounting speculation, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is set to visit Taiwan this week on her trip through Asia, prompting a caustic response from officials in Beijing over fears it could triggers the worst cross-Strait political crisis in decades.

As the second in line for the presidential succession, Pelosi will be the highest ranking US official to visit the self-governing island – which Beijing considers part of its sovereign territory – since then House Speaker Newt Gingrich has returned in 1997. China has since become more assertive of Taiwan, particularly under Chinese President Xi Jinping, who has pledged to bring the independently ruled island back under Beijing’s control. .

The trip underscores fears in some circles in Washington that the “One China” policy – ​​launched in 1972 under then-President Richard Nixon, in which the United States recognizes only one government in China but maintains unofficial ties with Taiwan – be slowly shaken. and that this risks triggering a new political crisis with Beijing. Still, others in Washington, particularly China hawks in the Republican Party, have applauded Pelosi’s travel plans, saying US leaders should not give in to Chinese threats as they work to strengthen ties with Taiwan.

“Generally speaking, China thinks that the United States is digging its ‘A China‘ politics,” said Jacob Stokes, an expert at the Center for a New American Security. “At the same time, Taiwan is really looking for signals of international support.”

Reports of a possible visit by the speaker have been circulating for weeks, causing nervous twists in Washington, which finds itself caught between a desire to support the Democratic and pro-American government in Taiwan and not wanting to risk a conflagration with China. during the war. is raging in Ukraine.

Biden administration officials have in recent days warned Pelosi of potential diplomatic fallout from the trip, with an internal interagency battle exploding in public. US President Joe Biden said in July that US military officials believed it was “not a good idea” for Pelosi to travel to Taiwan. Within the Department of Defense, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, led the charge in communicating concerns about the trip. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said during a visit to Brazil last month that he spoke to Pelosi personally and gave the Speaker of the House his views on the security situation.

Still, administration officials have made it clear that they cannot stop Pelosi from traveling to Taiwan. “[T]The National Security Team hired her and her team and gave her extensive information, but it was clear from the start that they would make their own decision because Congress is an independent branch of government,” wrote a spokesperson for the United States National Security Council. on merit according to the basic rules set by the White House.

Pelosi’s visit comes at a particularly sensitive time for China, coinciding with the 95th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army on August 1 and ahead of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, to be held in November. when Xi is expected. to extend his term for an unprecedented third term.

In a Monday briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian warned that the Chinese military will “never sit idly by” and “take strong countermeasures to uphold sovereignty and justice.” ‘territorial integrity of China’. China sent a notice to airmen on Monday saying it would conduct snap military drills in the South China Sea, near where the USS Ronald Reagan carrier battle group is in place. This too has stolen four J-16 fighter jets in the Taiwan Air Defense Identification Zone on Monday.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday that China may respond to the visit with increased provocations, such as firing missiles into the Taiwan Strait, as it said. did during an eight-month crisis in the region more than a quarter-century ago, or a large-scale airborne incursion into the Taiwan Air Defense Identification Zone.

Senior US military officials said they had not sent additional ships and planes near Taiwan in recent days. The White House has insisted China’s hubbub is well out of reach for a relatively routine visit. “There’s no reason for the Chinese rhetoric,” Kirby told CNN on Monday. Kirby added, “It’s not uncommon for congressional leaders to visit Taiwan.”

Over the past eight years, the pace of visits to the United States has increased, starting with then-Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy, who visited the island in 2014 , followed by a series of Trump administration plans to get there, headlined by then-Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar’s Travel in August 2020. Under the Biden administration, delegations from Congress and former senior US officials have made routine visits to the island.

Bonnie Glaser, director of the Asia program at the German Marshall Fund think tank, said China has grown increasingly concerned that its red lines on Taiwan will not be taken seriously by the United States. Nonetheless, Glaser thought Pelosi’s visit was unlikely to trigger some sort of military crisis.

“Both sides want to avoid a crisis, but if there is a crisis, it is a crisis chosen by China,” she said. “There is no reason, from this administration’s perspective, why China should react so strongly to a congressman’s visit to Taiwan.”

Despite fears of increased military exercises, experts do not believe China is ready for a cross-strait invasion, at least not yet. “They’re not interested in launching an amphibious invasion,” said Lyle Morris, a senior policy analyst at the Rand Corporation and a former Defense Department official. “They’re just more interested in showing their strength and determination.”

From Beijing’s perspective, Xi faces domestic pressure to show resolve without escalating to the point of garnering more international sympathy and support for Taiwan, said Bonny Lin, director of the China Power Project at the Center for Studies. strategic and international. “It’s actually not a simple problem for China to handle.” Although Lin was also skeptical that Beijing would seek to launch an all-out attack on Taiwan, she speculated that a response could involve military activity “near or over” the island. “It is likely that Taipei will bear the brunt of any countermeasures,” she said.

Both sides fear disrupting the increasingly precarious status quo on Taiwan. In recent months, the White House has repeatedly been forced to backtrack on Biden’s impulsive claims that the United States would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion. (Officially, US policy allows for “strategic ambiguity” in the event of an attack.)

“This administration must be clearer, more coherent, more disciplined in its articulation of the ‘A China‘ politics and to make sure his actions match his words, even though, in my opinion, this visit does not go beyond our ‘A China‘ politics,” Glaser said.

The Democrats have grown increasingly belligerent toward China as Beijing has ramped up military activity in the region, with near-daily incursions into Taiwan’s Air Defense Identification Zone for the past two years. Others in Pelosi’s party have expressed doubts that a visit could be unnecessarily aggravating. “One of the key things here is not making Taiwan a football,” said a Democratic congressional aide, speaking on condition of anonymity. Foreign Police. “Let’s do things that defuse the tension as much as possible because Taiwan will be the main victim of any kind of escalation cycle.”

Some experts believe Pelosi has no choice but to leave, lest she be seen to fear threats from Chinese authorities. “It would be humiliating for her personally and it would be humiliating for Congress and the US government” if Pelosi didn’t make the trip, said Ian Easton, a researcher at the Project 2049 Institute, a Virginia-based think tank. Easton thinks it’s a big move. “When she leaves, I think it will be an example of United States solidarity and support for another democracy that is facing a very deep and very dangerous campaign of coercion.”