Mar 11, 2025

Jeffrey Sachs: "The United States is playing the Taiwan card"

The United States, of course, is playing the Taiwan card.  Taiwan is a part of China.  Interestingly, the Taiwanese say so, the Republic of Taiwan says so, the People's Republic of China says so - they disagree about who should run the place because they had a civil war going back to the 1940s.  But both of them said, "yes," this is one China.  And when we recognize China, the People's Republic of China, we adopt the One China policy.  

But what does the United States do?  It's sending billions of dollars of weapons to Taiwan now.  Can you imagine if China said, "We're going to arm the state of Tennessee?"  And the United States says, "No, please don't do that..."  "No, we're going to arm the state of Tennessee because they like us, maybe someday, who knows, they'll be an ally of ours and so forth, we have a really important company in Tennessee."  This is what we're doing.  It's crazy!  

By the way, it's crazy for Taiwan to follow into this.  My advice to Taiwan is, "Don't become the next Ukraine.  In other words, the next place of a war between superpowers that takes place on your territory."  By the way, I said to the Ukrainians, "Don't become the next Afghanistan."

I've seen this movie too often and I told the Ukrainians, "You will be destroyed.  Not by Russia, but by the United States.  They will tell you, 'Fight on, fight on, fight on!'"  And I often quote Henry Kissinger's quip when he said, "To be an enemy of the United States is dangerous, but to be a friend of the United States is fatal."  This is applying to Ukraine, but I say it to my friends in Taiwan: "Don't play games.  Don't play games.  Don't think the United States is going to be able to save you.  It's no way, but it could destroy you if a war breaks out.  And so don't take weapons from the U.S.  That's not how to get security.  That's how to end up in a war."

Jeffrey Sachs, "Harvard Economist Shocking Prediction for US China Relations in 2025," Cyrus Janssen, 5:10 mark, November 24, 2025





No comments: