Since Nixon, followed by Carter, began the process of normalizing relations with China in the late 70s, every president has upheld the One-China Policy:
China views Taiwan as a renegade province and, since 1979, the US has acknowledged Beijing's claim that Taiwan is part of China, with US-China relations governed by a set of protocols known as the "one China" policy.
www.cnn.com/...
Whether or not one is 100% on board with US-China relations since the late 1970s is another topic (I’m not in relation to Human Rights), however, since trump’s Friday call with Taiwan, it’s already hitting the fan:
President-elect Donald J. Trump spoke by telephone with Taiwan’s president on Friday, a striking break with nearly four decades of diplomatic practice that could precipitate a major rift with China even before Mr. Trump takes office.
… Mr. Trump’s motives in taking the call, which lasted more than 10 minutes, were not clear. In a Twitter message late Friday, he said Ms. Tsai “CALLED ME.”
But diplomats with ties to Taiwan said it was highly unlikely that the Taiwanese leader would have made the call without arranging it in advance. Ms. Tsai’s office confirmed that it had taken place, saying the two had discussed promoting economic development and “strengthening defense.” Taiwan’s Central News Agency hailed the call as “historic.”
…The White House was not told about Mr. Trump’s call until after it happened, according to a senior administration official. But afterward, the Chinese government contacted the White House to discuss the matter.
www.nytimes.com/...
China has already lodged a formal complaint with the White House:
On Saturday, China lodged a formal diplomatic protest over the 10-minute phone conversation, which marked the first time a U.S. president or president-elect knowingly spoke with Taiwan’s leadership since 1979.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/12/03/china_lodges_formal_complaint_over_trump_s_call_with_taiwan_president.html
Fallout: Trade War?
Evan Medeiros, the Asia director at the White House national security council, told the Financial Times: “The Chinese leadership will see this as a highly provocative action, of historic proportions.
“Regardless if it was deliberate or accidental, this phone call will fundamentally change China’s perceptions of Trump’s strategic intentions for the negative. With this kind of move, Trump is setting a foundation of enduring mistrust and strategic competition for US-China relations.”
… Beijing has been scrambling to understand what a Trump White House might mean for already fraught US-China relations since his election last month, with some predicting an unexpected rapprochement and others a trade war.
www.theguardian.com/...
Meanwhile, another wrinkle: trump representative made an inquiry in September about building hotels in Taiwan:
Weeks before President-elect Donald Trump’s controversial phone call with Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, a businesswoman claiming to be associated with his conglomerate made inquiries about a major investment in building luxury hotels as part of the island’s new airport development.
…In a separate development, Anne-Marie Donoghue, who describes herself as the global head of transient sales and Asia at Trump Hotels, was confirmed to have been in Taiwan in October.
… A spokeswoman for the Trump Organization, Amanda Miller, told the New York Times the company had “no plans for expansion into Taiwan”, and there had been no “authorised visits” to push a Trump development project. However, Miller did not dispute that Donoghue, a sales manager, had visited Taiwan in October.
www.theguardian.com/...
And the backlash begins:
“This may make for great reality TV,” one Democratic member of the Senate foreign relations committee said, “but it doesn’t make for great leadership in a divided world.”
The senator, Chris Coons of Delaware, said it was “concerning” that Trump’s way of governing might mirror the “shoot-from-the-hip style” in which he campaigned for the White House.
Trump, Coons said, had to decide whether he would continue to “[get] into Twitter fights or take unscheduled calls from foreign leaders in ways that break with decades of precedent”.
The Connecticut senator Chris Murphy, another Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee, criticized Trump in a series of tweets late on Friday:
What has happened in the last 48 hours is not a shift. These are major pivots in foreign policy w/out any plan. That's how wars start.
www.theguardian.com/...
To answer the headline question, the call appears to be strategic considering john bolton’s “playing the Taiwan card” comments back in January:
Trump has said little about Taiwan, but has surrounded himself with advocates of a tilt away from Beijing, including former U.N. ambassador John Bolton, who visited Trump Tower on Friday for undisclosed reasons. In January, Bolton, who has been considered for top posts in a Trump administration, argued for "playing the Taiwan card" to pressure mainland China to back off its increasingly aggressive moves in the Pacific region.
"The new U.S. administration could start with receiving Taiwanese diplomats officially at the State Department; upgrading the status of U.S. representation in Taipei from a private “institute” to an official diplomatic mission; inviting Taiwan’s president to travel officially to America; allowing the most senior U.S. officials to visit Taiwan to transact government business; and ultimately restoring full diplomatic recognition," Bolton wrote in a chest-beating op-ed for the Wall Street Journal.
www.politico.com/...
Underestimating The Complex Co-Dependent Relationship Between The US and China?
Has the trump team thought through how poking China will play out in relation to North Korea? In relation to Iran?
Will a trade war with China tank Wall Street – as discussed in this Bloomberg article less than a week ago? www.bloomberg.com/...
Will such a trade war with China cause the loss of millions of US jobs reliant on moving Chinese products through the US market— with no guarantee any jobs will come back from China. http://www.vox.com/world/2016/11/22/13676356/trump-trade-war-china
Stay tuned.