Thread by @WilliamYang120

A profile on @bikhim: “For me, it’s more than a job. It’s about survival. It’s about survival for #Taiwan.” nytimes.com/2023/01/21/us/…

“She is among the most influential foreign ambassadors in Washington, but she’s technically not an ambassador. She works from a grand estate, but cannot live there. Simply flying her flag could cause a diplomatic incident.

She speaks almost daily with senior Biden administration officials and is wired into leaders of both parties in Congress.”

In an interview at Taiwan’s Twin Oaks estate, a sumptuous compound in the heart of Washington, Ms. Hsiao acknowledged her difficult balancing act. In a play on the “wolf warrior” label for China’s new breed of aggressive diplomats, she called herself a “cat warrior.”

“Cats can tread on tight ropes and, you know, balance themselves in very nimble and flexible ways,” she said.

“For years, U.S. officials prohibited Ms. Hsiao’s predecessors from visiting the White House and the State Department. Such guidelines have relaxed over time, and she now pays regular, if discreet, visits to the West Wing and Foggy Bottom.

She is an undisguised regular on Capitol Hill, as when she sat next to Kevin McCarthy, then the House Republican leader, last summer for a livestreamed discussion by his caucus’s China Task Force.”

Seated in an elegant reception hall at Twin Oaks, with a grand piano and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a rolling lawn, Ms. Hsiao described her position as “legally unofficial.”

For that, she blames Beijing. “The Taiwanese resent not only being bullied, but we resent being told that we cannot have any friends,” she said.

For that, she blames Beijing. “The Taiwanese resent not only being bullied, but we resent being told that we cannot have any friends,” she said.

“For years, executive branch officials were prohibited from visiting Twin Oaks under State Department guidelines that Mr. Biden relaxed. But senior officials are discouraged from attending events, like Taiwan’s national day, with any whiff of sovereignty.

Many other informal restrictions have fallen away. U.S. officials used to meet with Taiwanese counterparts in neutral locations like hotels or the American Institute in Taiwan’s Washington-area offices, across the Potomac River in Virginia.”

Others say it’s time to stop letting China dictate such details.
“People say, don’t put symbolism over substance. But the bottom line is, this is a fight over symbolism,” said Dan Blumenthal, a China expert with the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

“The Chinese are trying to wipe the idea that there is a government of Taiwan off the map, and they are doing that by going after the symbols of Taiwan’s existence and legitimacy.”

Ms. Hsiao admits being frustrated over the continued tiptoeing around her formal title and who can attend what meeting in which place. But she says she understands the U.S. position.

“We don’t at all blame the United States,” she added. “We blame the bully that’s threatening everyone, that is creating such conditions.”