以下摘錄一篇對拜登總統「美國會協防台灣」宣示的評論。摘譯重點如下：

1.     亞太地區中、美軍事力量的對比，中國逐漸取得優勢。

2.     拜登總統「協防台灣」的宣示，中國政府只會認為是色厲內恁的虛聲恫嚇。

3.     「協防台灣」相當於掀起第三次世界大戰。

4.     「協防台灣」是一場美國不需要打，也打不贏的仗。

Taiwan: Biden risks talking himself into a war he cannot win

The military balance is shifting China’s way, and half-abandoning a policy of strategic ambiguity won’t change that.

HUGH WHITE, 09/27/22

The more often US President Joe Biden appears to abandon strategic ambiguity by saying quite clearly that America would go to war with China to defend Taiwan, the more difficult it becomes to dismiss what he says as a presidential fumble. That was not at all difficult the first time, especially when the White House moved so swiftly to affirm the US policy had not changed. It was harder to do the second and third times, because with each recurrence it became less plausible that Biden would continue to be so muddled on an issue of such importance. But it also seemed unlikely that the President would deliberately set himself up to be humiliatingly corrected by his own officials, as he was on each occasion when the White House issued the same “clarification”.

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Yet one can see why they might do it, because they do have a problem. The old policy of strategic ambiguity was sufficient to deter Beijing back in the days when America’s military superiority was unchallenged. But the further the military balance has shifted China’s way, and the higher the costs and risks to Washington of defending Taiwan, the harder it has become to convince Beijing that America would intervene. That has made it more important to unambiguously declare America’s determination to do so, if China is to be deterred from attacking Taiwan.

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My hunch, however, is that nothing Washington is saying makes much difference to Beijing’s calculations about the risks of attacking Taiwan. The Biden administration’s ambiguous repudiation of strategic ambiguity will do little if anything to counterbalance the big, brutal fact – that as China has grown stronger, the cost to America of defending Taiwan has grown to far outweigh the imperatives for it to do so.

A war with China really would be World War Three. Biden has told the world that he is not willing to fight that war for Ukraine, so why would the Chinese believe that he will fight it for Taiwan? Until he can articulate an unambiguous answer to that question, the Chinese will continue to become harder and harder to deter. And the risk will grow that if or when the Chinese attack, Biden will find that he has talked himself and his country into a war they cannot win and do not need to fight.