Philippines pledges Taiwan support, risking China ire

The Philippines president said his country would likely get involved in any conflict involving Taiwan, comments that could draw Beijing’s ire.

The remarks come before he travels to Tokyo to discuss security cooperation; Japan’s own leader angered Beijing by saying that, if necessary, her country could help defend Taiwan, which China says is a renegade province.

Though Beijing has emerged as Asia’s preeminent military power — a former CIA analyst said it was “hard to point to an area” where China wasn’t dominant — an attempt to take the island isn’t guaranteed success.

A “failure of imagination led Russia to disaster in Ukraine. A similar failure in Beijing could lead China to disaster in Taiwan,” the Financial Times’ Gideon Rachman wrote.