00:00Ross, can you see the unilateral movement from China to reunify with Taiwan, creating that sort of a dangerous ripple effect?
00:11Is that something you sense being in Taipei?
00:14Well, whether or not there's a regional arms raise, I think, frankly, we're already there.
00:19We see that with commitments by Japan and South Korea for significant increases in defense spending.
00:26Part of that's in response to North Korea. Part of it's in response, frankly, to China.
00:31The Philippines is also dramatically increasing its defense budgets after decades of underinvestment.
00:37And here in Taiwan, there's a new proposal for a nearly 40 billion U.S. dollar supplemental defense budget, which is an enormous amount of money.
00:46So I think the key question is not really what would happen if and when China should use force or would that set off military spending increases?
00:58Because, again, I think we're already there. Really, the key question, and I think my colleagues know this, the key question is, should China use force?
01:07Would other countries militarily intervene? And that's what caused the controversy after Prime Minister Takahashi's remarks about three weeks ago in the Japanese parliament.
01:19And really, you know, in response to what Victor said about foreign leaders, foreign countries being willing to shed blood,
01:26the only thing we could really say about that question is it will be up to the leaders of those countries at the time that this contingency occurs.
01:35There's simply no way to predict whether or not the U.S. president or the Japan prime minister or the Australian prime minister at the time that such an event occurs,
01:44would they be willing to dispatch their military and engage in what would be a hot war with China?
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