“It simply isn’t true,” said a middle aged Taiwanese man who I met in Thailand when I asked him about the notion that most people in Taiwan support reunification. “We enjoy our life and our freedoms. This is our country.” He explained to me that there were many polls that had been conducted in Taiwan that clearly showed people’s resistance to any change in relations between Taiwan and the Mainland. We love China, his wife told me, but we do not want to go back.

On Friday, 100 Chinese tourists arrived in Taipei on the first regularly scheduled flight to Taiwan from the Mainland in nearly sixty years. In the past, passengers traveling between Taiwan and China had to make an inconvenient transit through another location such as Hong Kong or Japan; direct commercial flights were prohibited. Now, with regular charter flights scheduled, it will be less of a hassle for people to fly between Taiwan and China.

“It is great news for us!” one of my Chinese students said in class today, “but it doesn’t really have any effect on us because most of us don’t need to go to Taiwan.” For them, the excitement of these new flights are found in their political implications. My students see the flight as evidence of stronger ties between the two sides that will hopefully lead to reunification.

The Taiwanese government, however, seems to have a different view on the significance of these new flights. According to an article posted on BusinessWeek.com, Taiwan’s Premier Liu Chao-shiuan said that “weekend charter flights between Taiwan and China are not a step toward political integration between the two longtime rivals and only involve better transportation and economic links.” Liu also said that the recent discussions between China and Taiwan were not political in nature; he said that the agenda centered around economic issues. Thus, as my Taiwanese friend suggested, economic issues are bringing China and Taiwan closer together.

While it appears that for the moment, political reunification is not on the agenda, even the economic nature of these talks between Taiwan and the Mainland have many Taiwanese people worried. As my Taiwanese friend stated to me, many are afraid that in the end, it will be money not politics that bring the two sides together again. Taiwan, like other countries has relocated many of its ”labor-intensive industries” to China in order to take advantage of cheaper wages. Such moves have helped to boost Taiwan’s economy which has struggled in throughout the last 6-7 years.

“Taiwan needs China,” a Chinese friend told me this week. In reality, the remarkable growth in China’s economy dictates that in the future every country may “need” China. It is no wonder then, that Taiwan’s newly elected government is seeking to establish friendlier sides with the Mainland. Is reunification inevitable between the two sides as my Taiwanese friend suggested? Only time will tell but as Taiwan deepens its economic ties with China, one can only expect that the political ties will follow. Right now each side appears to be ‘daintily‘ avoiding the numerous political issues that confront this renewed friendship but the topic of reunification cannot be avoided forever. And what will happen when the topic is eventually revived? Many fear that China seeks to establish strong economic ties with Taiwan so that when the topic of reunification is seriously discussed again, Taiwan will have two options; reunite with the motherland or face a serious economic crisis. Thus, many Taiwanese fear that their country’s independence is being ’purchased’ by China through the strengthening of these economic ties.