When it comes to a prospective war with China in defense of Taiwan, the domestic political legacy of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq is clear. To persuade Americans to support that war, one that would likely cost thousands of U.S. military lives at the low end and more than, perhaps significantly more than, 10,000 lives at the high end, you must be persuasive on two points.

First, that winning that war is of critical interest to the public. Second, that Taiwan deserves that support. The first point should be obvious: The costs of war must be perceived as an acceptable cost for the benefit of victory. The second point is underlined by the continuing salience former President Donald Trump finds when he suggests that too many U.S. allies neglect their own defensive obligations. On the flip side, Ukraine’s courageous aggression in the face of Russian imperialism underlines why it deserves American support even amid European skimping on that support — don’t listen to those who claim Europe is doing its fair share for Ukraine.

I would argue that defending Taiwan is of critical interest to U.S. national security and the public. Allowing Taiwan to fall would precipitate the collapse of America’s Pacific alliance structure and all the benefits of trade, peace, and democracy that this alliance supports. It would encourage nations across the world to bow to Beijing’s argument that it, not Washington, will be the dominant power in the 21st century. Freedom and prosperity would wilt under the Chinese Communist Party flag. Still, I do not believe that Taiwan has yet shown itself to be fundamentally deserving of American military support in the event of a Chinese invasion. The reason: Considering the escalating and very significant annihilation threat it faces, Taiwan spends far too little on defense.

This bears note in light of a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Mark Montgomery and Brad Bowman on Wednesday. The writers, who are senior officials at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, observed, “The race to curry favor with Donald Trump is leading some Republican foreign-policy experts in disturbing directions.” Montgomery and Bowman highlight Elbridge Colby, author of the 2018 National Defense Strategy.

Colby is likely to hold a high-level national security portfolio if Trump returns to the White House. The writers reference several recent X posts by Colby to suggest he is “threatening to abandon Taiwan” if it does not increase defense spending. They argue this “is misguided and dangerous. It undermines American deterrence and increases the chances of Chinese aggression against the island, which could lead to a catastrophic war.”

I disagree with this interpretation of Colby’s argument. What Colby is actually saying is that Taiwan cannot expect American defense commitments absent a more serious appraisal of its own catastrophic security posture. Colby’s broader argument is that praising Taiwan’s democracy and conducting symbolic visits to the country does nothing to deter a Chinese attack (in a manner that Taiwan’s increased defense capabilities would) while doing much to aggravate Beijing.

This concern is entirely legitimate. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has an almost theological obsession with subjugating Taiwan under the CCP flag. China’s war planning against the United States regarding a Taiwan conflict is hypersensitive to U.S. popular concerns over foreign entanglements. China would aim to dilute American resolve to intervene in any Taiwan conflict at its earliest stage, predominantly through cyber attacks and messaging. To confront that threat, Taiwan’s survival must matter to Americans, and Americans must see that Taiwan is serious about its own defense.

That leads to Montgomery and Bowman’s second contention. Namely, that Taiwan is doing just about enough on defense already. As they put it, “Taiwan spends roughly 2.5% of its GDP on defense. That’s an impressive level compared with other democracies. … Out of the 32 NATO members, only Poland, Estonia, the U.S., Latvia, Greece, and Lithuania spend more than Taiwan on defense as a percentage of GDP. … Taiwan’s defense spending is far from ‘laggardly.'”

I strongly disagree with this argument.

First, Taiwan’s defense spending should not be compared to that of “other democracies” but that of other democracies facing the immense threat of near-term invasion. With that in mind, Estonia is the only U.S. ally facing an existential threat commensurate to that facing Taiwan. Even then, NATO and its Polish eastern flank bastion reduce Russia’s threat to Estonia significantly below that posed by China toward Taiwan.

The statistics also matter. At 4.1% of GDP, Poland spends far more than 2.5% of GDP on defense. Warsaw will spend 4.7% of GDP on defense in 2025 — nearly a whole percentage point higher than NATO’s second-highest GDP spender, the U.S. And unlike Taiwan, Poland spends on capabilities best suited to victory — more than 50% of the Polish defense budget goes to equipment, and the NATO target is 20%. Seeing as Taiwan and Poland have very similar total GDPs, Taiwan has no excuse not to match Poland’s expenditure. Indeed, with relative threat environments in mind, it should exceed what Poland spends!

Put simply, Poland exemplifies why Americans should support it and NATO. Poland’s defense policy sends the message: “We’ll fight forward and aggressively with you at zero hour.” Taiwan’s defense policy sends the message: “It’s America’s job to keep our nation alive.”

Bowman and Montgomery underestimate these concerns and call for the U.S. to do more in Taiwan’s defense. They argue that “U.S. lawmakers should enact a defense budget that meets the Indo-Pacific Command’s requirements related to a major war over Taiwan.” I agree with that call. The problem is that I do not believe that the call for increased U.S. commitments is popularly sustainable absent a more overt American confrontation of Taiwan over its lethargic defense spending. We also need to see more honesty about U.S. military overstretch. For example, the U.S. has no aircraft carriers operating in the Pacific. That’s because the carrier that was supposed to be in the Pacific has been diverted to the Middle East. Simply calling for an increased fleet size and defense budget are unserious rhetorical responses to the far harder short-term choices of balancing mission needs and mission means.

To be fair to Montgomery and Bowman, they do argue that Taiwan should spend more on defense. However, they believe these calls are “best delivered candidly and in private.”

I think that this private strategy is a provably failed one. That private argument has been made to Taiwan for at least a decade. I believe its failure to move the needle substantively is the same that explains why too many European nations continued to skimp on defense spending. Ultimately, it’s because these allies know that private conversations on defense spending suggest America is more concerned with offending allies than getting them to be warfighting-ready allies. This belief fosters their confidence that America will gallop to the rescue and bear the excess burden if the worst day arrives. This enables them to choose the political expediency of more popular domestic spending over the strategic interest of strengthened deterrence and more balanced alliance burden sharing. Germany offers a prize example in kind, now backtracking as it is on defense spending and support for Ukraine.

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The status quo is not sustainable.

Taiwan must spend a great deal more on defense. If not, it invites rapid defeat by China and increases the risk that the president, Congress, and the public will question the rationale for sacrificing thousands of lives to save a nation that seems ambivalent about saving itself.