A Bastion of Nothing
The distance between Formosa and the Philippines is about one hundred miles less than the distance between the Philippines and the nearest part of the Communist-held China coast, but that hardly justifies the claim that the island is strategically important. I admit that it looks as if it was strategically important, and that it would become so if, in the course of an inter-planetary conflict, it fell into the hands of Martian invaders who were able to deploy powerful naval and air forces. But the Chinese Communists possess neither. From a purely military point of view the situation in the Pacific would not be materially altered if they gained possession of Formosa (a thing which, in my guess, they are in the long run more likely to do by subversion than by carrying out a com- bined operation from bases a hundred miles away). There are, of course, other than purely military considerations involved in the Formosa question; the only point I want to make is that anyone who tells you that the island is a vital link in, the defences of the free world is talking through his hat.
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