Li Kexin, Minister, Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the United States of America, says

The day that a US Navy vessel arrives in Kaohsiung is the day that our People’s Liberation Army unifies Taiwan with military force[.]

Kaohsiung is a major seaport on the southwest coast of the Republic of China.  Since the PRC now is threatening to invade and conquer a sovereign nation that is an ally and friend of ours, it has become imperative that we do a number of things, including:

• send a USN combatant ship and a hospital ship to Kaohsiung for a friendly visit
• resume patrols in the Taiwan Strait between the PRC and the RoC
• upgrade the RoC’s Air Force with newer fighter and ground attack aircraft, and greater numbers of them
• sell to the RoC, and train their personnel in the use of, missile defense systems, including Patriot and THAAD
• broker deals between the RoC and Israel for the RoC’s acquisition of Iron Dome and Arrow rocket and missile defense systems (the latter to complement Patriot)
• increase our sea and air patrols of PRC-seized islands in the South China Sea, sailing as close as the waters will safely allow, and making low-level flights over the islands
• increase, in coordination with Japan, our sea and air patrols of East China Sea islands harassed by the PRC’s navy and air forces
• patrol the Sea of Japan and the Yellow Sea with missile defense capable naval shipping

This also is an attempt by the PRC to distract from its decision to not enforce in any serious manner the sanctions against northern Korea and its decision to not persuade its new BFF, Russia, to seriously enforce those sanctions.  We need to make appropriate responses against those PRC and Russian entities, both business and government, that are disregarding the sanctions’ requirements.

The PRC has been asking after our cauldrons since early in the Obama administration; it’s long past time to respond to the PRC’s Warring Nations mentality.  For our allies’ and friends’ safety, not only the RoC’s, and for our own safety.

Recall that the UN voted strongly to condemn the Trump administration’s decision to move our Embassy to Israel to Israel’s capital, Jerusalem.  In a Letter to the Editor of The Wall Street Journal, one letter writer objected to our response to the vote.

America should support other countries’ right to vote their conscience as the US does, whether or not we agree with them.

America does support other countries’ right to vote their conscience, whether or not we agree with them. It’s a two-way street, however. Others, including our letter-writer, need to support America’s right to act in accordance with our conscience—to object to those votes and their outcome, and to act accordingly.

No one—most especially America—moved to prevent those votes from occurring.  Others, though, including our letter-writer, are acting, it seems, to deny our right to respond.