HALF a century ago, the United States asked itself a soul-searching question: ""Who lost China?''

This was after it had thrown its full support behind the Kuomintang (KMT) government in China's civil war only to see its
disastrous defeat by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Today, a similar question is being asked by some CCP officials after the re-election of the separatist-minded Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian.

But this time, the question is: ""Who lost Taiwan?'' To China, President Chen's re-election marks a watershed: For the first time in history, the Taiwanese independence movement enjoys majority support, albeit a very, very tiny one.

With his winning another four-year term and his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) enjoying majority support, however slender, the odds are stacked against any return to the core one-China belief.

In this sense, Taiwan is lost unless China uses force to bring it back into the fold. But even if it does so, it could, at best,
claim the territory but not the hearts of the Taiwanese.

Beijing now realises that there must be something fundamentally wrong in its approach towards Taiwan such that, despite generous political concession (from its own point of view) and attractive economic incentives offered in the last two decades, the island continues to drift further away politically.

Mr Li Jiaquan, a first-generation Taiwanese affairs expert in Beijing, laments that, for the quarter century since China
proclaimed its peaceful unification policy in 1979, its carrots have failed to woo Taiwanese hearts while its sticks have failed to discourage the separatists.

As the founder and longest-serving chief of the Taiwan Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (1984-93), he played an important role in formulating China's policy on Taiwan.

His prescription now is deep reflection (to find out what has gone wrong), firm determination (to defeat separatism), great
courage (to use force if necessary) and flexibility (to compromise if that is worthwhile).

Yet none of his reflections, or those by other scholars, touches on the crux of the problem the ""one country two systems''
unification model itself.

To Beijing, this formula is a very generous concession because it gives Taiwan de facto independence, if and only if the island upholds the ""one China'' principle and agrees that it is an inalienable part of China.

Yet more than 95 per cent of the Taiwanese reject the model outright because it relegates the Republic of China (ROC), the
official name of the island, to a provincial authority under the People's Republic of China (PRC).

Without parity, Taiwan is not going to have any unification with China at all.

Taiwan made several counter-proposals during the past two decades when the pro-unification KMT was still in power.

There was, for example, ""one China differently defined'', which starts with the very basic fact that there exist two authorities,
the PRC and the ROC, on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

This is the so-called 1992 consensus. However, Beijing rejected it because it could mean two Chinas.

Then KMT vice-chairman Lien Chan went one step further to propose a ""one China Confederation'' in 1999 in order to repair relations with Beijing after former president Lee Teng-hui expounded his ""two states theory''.

Again, Beijing rejected it on the grounds that members of a confederation are free to exit, there being no binding power on the participants to stick together.

All the KMT counter-proposals have two common features they do not dispute Beijing's sacred one-China principle and they seek to secure a position of equality for Taiwan vis-a-vis Beijing.

Since in none of these is Beijing regarded as the sole central authority, it rejects them all, leading to the current impasse.

But each time a counter-proposal is rejected, ill feelings towards a ""hegemonic China'' intensify while the determination to
break away hardens.

Now Beijing is reaping its own bitter harvest. With the DPP in power, not even lip service is being paid to the one-China
principle.

Article No. 1 of its manifesto states clearly that its goal is the establishment of a Republic of Taiwan, which has nothing to do
with China.

Ironically, while Beijing rejected the 1992 consensus proposed by the KMT, it is now urging the DPP to return to that as the
pre-condition for re-opening dialogue.But it is too late now. The DPP denies the very existence at all of the so-called consensus.

China's inflexibility has therefore contributed to the gradual drifting away of Taiwan.

Yet a more fundamental reason lies in the lack of appeal of China's political system. There is no denial of the fact that individuals in Taiwan enjoy a far greater degree of political freedom than their counterparts in China.

Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou, vice-chairman of the KMT, once said that there would not be unification unless the CCP reversed its erroneous verdict on the June 4 incident in 1989.

In that tragedy, the CCP viewed students demonstrating against rampant corruption as counter-revolutionaries and used tanks and troops against them.

Mayor Ma's statement highlights the gulf separating the two systems.

There is no compelling reason why a democratic Taiwan should associate itself with a repressive, authoritarian China.

Not all Chinese are unaware of this root cause but few dare to voice it.

A notable exception is Dr Lin Shang-li of Shanghai's Fudan University, a scholar who had the rare opportunity to give lectures on democracy to CCP Politburo members in Beijing.

At a recent symposium held by the East Asia Institute, a think-tank closely connected to the Shanghai municipal government, he said that whether with Hong Kong or Taiwan, success of the ""one country two systems'' model depended ultimately on the"" construction of the political system'' in the ""one country''. This was a euphemistic admission that the lack of political reform in China rendered the unification model useless.