Hegseth’s Shangri-La Speech Marks US Shift From ‘Strategic Ambiguity’ on Taiwan, Analysts Say

Jun 6, 2025 - 09:58 Updated: Jun 6, 2025 - 09:53

Hegseth’s Shangri-La Speech Marks US Shift From ‘Strategic Ambiguity’ on Taiwan, Analysts Say

News Analysis

Standing before defense chiefs from more than 40 nations at Asia’s premier security forum on May 31, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued what analysts say is the sternest warning Washington has ever leveled over the Taiwan Strait.

“Any attempt by Communist China to conquer Taiwan by force would result in devastating consequences for the Indo-Pacific and the world,” Hegseth said at the annual Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.

The speech, analysts say, marks a departure from Washington’s era of “strategic ambiguity” on Taiwan. By underscoring the gravity of any aggression, Washington aims to prevent miscalculation by Beijing, while also urging Taiwan and U.S. allies to strengthen their own defenses.

Hegseth called China’s threat “real and could be imminent,” pledging to preserve “peace through strength” and, if deterrence fails, to “fight and win decisively.”

“President Trump has also said that Communist China will not invade Taiwan on his watch,” the defense secretary added pointedly.

Miles Yu, director of the China Center at the Hudson Institute, told the BBC on June 2: “This is the clearest statement of America’s ‘rock-solid’ commitment to that region.”

Yu said Hegseth aimed to “cast away any kind of doubt” that the United States would defend the status quo—a turn from “ambiguity.”

He noted that the pledge rests on the Taiwan Relations Act, the 1979 U.S. law obliging Washington to provide Taipei with defensive arms and to view any non-peaceful move against the island as a grave concern.

That does not mean direct U.S. military intervention, he added, but it does mean America “is definitely going to get involved” if China attacks.

Hegseth’s framing also rebuts fears that “America First” equals isolationism, Yu said. The defense secretary devoted much of his speech to “alliance building,” saying that the contest is “not about China and the U.S.—it is about China versus the rest of the world.”

Beijing’s Muted Presence—and Growing Alarm

While Hegseth seized the spotlight, Beijing kept its own counsel.

Instead of sending Defense Minister Dong Jun, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) dispatched Rear Admiral Hu Gangfeng, vice president of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) National Defense University—the lowest-ranking Chinese delegation in the forum’s history.

The move, said Yu Tsung-chi, the former dean of the College of Political Warfare at Taiwan’s National Defense University, was designed to dodge a public clash that might expose turmoil inside China’s armed forces.

Two previous defense ministers were purged, and rumors now swirl around Dong, Yu told The Epoch Times.

“A high-level appearance risked uncomfortable questions,” he said. “Beijing opted to cool-handle the event and limit diplomatic fallout.”

Beijing nonetheless responded to Washington’s apparent shift in strategy.

The Chinese foreign and defense ministries condemned the speech as “deplorable,” “defamatory,” and reflective of a “Cold War mentality” that promotes bloc confrontation and sows discord in the region.

From Strategic Ambiguity to Clarity

Some U.S. strategists say such clarity is overdue.

Michael Schiffer, former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for East Asia, wrote in an editorial in the Financial Times in March that decades of U.S. strategic ambiguity have lost their punch as Beijing ramps up military intimidation, diplomatic isolation, and economic pressure on Taiwan.

“Ambiguity no longer deters aggression—it invites miscalculation,” he wrote.

Schiffer said that Beijing no longer takes Washington’s vague threats seriously, while Taipei grows increasingly anxious over the mixed signals.

He urged Washington to adopt a policy of “strategic clarity” and spell out consequences for Chinese aggression and to bolster Taiwan across diplomatic, economic, and informational fronts—without breaching the “One China” framework.

Bonnie Glaser, managing director of the German Marshall Fund’s Indo-Pacific program, told Newsweek that Hegseth “described Chinese coercion and aggression against Taiwan and the South China Sea more clearly than any prior U.S. defense secretary” by citing facts, not posturing, and she called Beijing’s decision to forgo the main podium “a mistake.”

Analyst: Taiwan Must Stand on Its Own Feet

For Taipei, Hegseth’s message is welcomed, but experts say the island still has work to do.

Su Tzu-yun, director of Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research (INDSR), told The Epoch Times that Hegseth has offered “the clearest assurance of U.S. support since the start of ‘Trump 2.0.’”

Even so, he said, Taiwan must raise its defense budget and steer more resources into asymmetric weapons—and do so more efficiently.

Su also noted Hegseth’s deliberate use of “Communist China,” a phrase that targets the regime rather than Chinese culture or people—an important nuance for foreign audiences.

Taiwan’s strategic weight is hard to overstate. The island currently produces more than 90 percent of the world’s leading-edge semiconductors, which power smartphones, cloud-computing servers, AI accelerators, and weapons systems.

Even after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company’s (TSMC) new Arizona fabs go online, over 70 percent of advanced chip capacity will remain in Taiwan, Shen Ming-shih, a research fellow at INDSR, told The Epoch Times.

“That makes the [Taiwan] Strait a core U.S. security interest,” Shen said.

Urging Allies to Boost Defense, Cut Reliance on China

Hegseth also pressed Asian democracies to boost defense spending rather than solely rely on U.S. protection.

He pointed to Europe, where 24 of NATO’s 32 members now meet the 2 percent guideline, and noted even Germany has pledged 5 percent.

As of last year, South Korea’s defense spending reached 2.6 percent of GDP, followed by Taiwan’s 1.8 percent, Japan’s 1.4 percent, Australia’s 1.9 percent, and the Philippines’ 1.3 percent, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

At the forum, EU foreign-policy chief Kaja Kallas called the deepening China-Russia partnership “the greatest challenge” to the rules-based order and urged solidarity between Indo-Pacific and Western nations.

Her remarks, Su said, show Brussels now accepts that China is “a key enabler” of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Hegseth warned that Asia’s economic dependence on China breeds vulnerability.

“Dependence on China only deepens their malign influence and complicates our defense decision space during times of tension,” he said—an implicit caution to governments that court Chinese trade while banking on U.S. security guarantees.

A Gathering Storm at the Strait

Hegseth’s warning comes as the PLA tightens its ring around Taiwan.

On May 28, Taipei’s defense ministry tracked 31 Chinese warplanes, nine naval vessels, and one coast-guard ship operating near the island; 22 aircraft crossed the median line into Taiwan’s air-defense identification zone, forcing Taiwanese jets to shadow them.

Meanwhile, Beijing is asserting territorial claims over nearly the entire South China Sea, including reefs that overlap the exclusive economic zones of Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Taiwan, and the Philippines.

“This is no longer an exercise but a configuration sized for combat,” Yu Tsung-chi said, aimed at keeping American, Japanese, and Philippine forces at bay.

U.S. Indo-Pacific Command has flagged the Chinese deployments in multiple alerts, he said, adding that Hegseth’s remarks “signal that Washington will not let Beijing seize Taiwan uncontested.”

Chen Wen-chia, an international studies professor at Taiwan’s Kainan University, told The Epoch Times that Hegseth’s speech delivered a collective-security message: “Japan, South Korea, Australia, and Southeast Asian democracies must raise defense spending and intensify joint exercises and cooperation” to counter Chinese aggression.”

Whether Beijing heeds the warning remains to be seen.

What is clear, analysts say, is that Washington has shed the comfort of ambiguity. By naming the stakes and urging allies to share the load, the United States has drawn a bright red line—one that both sides of the Taiwan Strait, and every capital in the Indo-Pacific, can now see in stark relief.

Cheng Mulan, Fei Zhen, and Luo Ya contributed to this report.