Current Chinese military preparations, moreover, seem designed to be used in connection with such tactics. Any sound US policy must deal with these serious challenges, by steady and unflinching deterrence. It is the one that is largely missing from the current Clinton administration approach. The reason for this absence is worth noting, for it gets at what is fundamentally wrong with the administration's strategy. But that is not how the administration seems to understand it.
Engagement is the route to the first, deterrence, to their way of thinking, leads to the second.
Therefore deterrence is traded off in pursuit of engagement. Nowhere is this pattern clearer than in our dealings with Taiwan. However, when China confronts us, some in government still show a lamentable tendency to sign chits on Taiwan's future as a way of appeasing Beijing today. This practice has already gone too far, and should be stopped. Looking to the future, it is important that we be as realistic about Taiwan as about China.