'There Will Always Be a Need to Defend Taiwan': Keith Krach on Countering Beijing's Aggression

In this special episode, we sat down with Keith Krach, former under secretary of state and 2022 Nobel peace prize nominee, to talk about Taiwan. Is the island going to war with China? And if it does, how would the conflict impact life here in America? Krach said, "There will always be a need to defend Taiwan. And the reason is, they are a role model of democracy in that region. As a matter of fact, they're a role model of democracy for the entire world. They also dispel Xi’s myth that the Chinese culture cannot survive a democracy and it needs an authoritarian government." Krach gives an example of what the United States and allies are doing to counter the China threat. "The United States is proposing partnering with Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan. So this is unified and rallying those allies, it's also leveraging that private sector, and it's based on these democratic trust principles. That's really, really an important thing. And if you think about it, this trusted technology, where the definition of trusted technology is that it meets those trust principles. So in other words, if there's a company that comes from a country that has a national intelligence act, that requires any company, state-owned, or otherwise, or a Chinese citizen, to turn over any data, any information, any proprietary technology upon request—the Chinese Communist Party or the PRC government or the PLA—or suffer the consequences, then that doesn't meet that criteria. So at the end of the day ... it is all about trust," said Krach. In the second half, we hear from real estate analyst Greg Isaacson. He touches on the effects of Shanghai's lockdown on real estate and business, and what the impacts of more capital flowing into China means going forward. Isaacson said, "If there's a wider financial and economic crisis in China as a result of the failure of these developers, then you couldn't see sort of a deflationary event in China, where the stock market could crash, property prices could crash. That could lead to less demand from China for overseas goods. And that could have global, macroeconomic implications." Have other topics you want us to cover? Drop us a line: chinainfocus@ntdtv.org And if you’d like to buy us a coffee: https://donorbox.org/china-in-focus Subscribe to our newsletter for more first-hand news from China. For more news and videos, please visit us on Gettr and Twitter.