“President-elect Donald J. Trump’s telephone call with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen on December 2, 2016, and subsequent Tweets, broke precedent. No previous U.S. president or president-elect is known to have spoken directly to a president of Taiwan, which officially calls itself the Republic of China (ROC), since the United States broke diplomatic relations with the ROC and established diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on January 1, 1979. The call has raised questions about whether Trump was simply taking ” a very modest step toward providing Taiwan with some measure of dignity, respect and reassurance ,” or whether the call may presage a drive for greater “officiality” in the unofficial U.S. relationship with Taiwan. Some analysts believe the latter could risk precipitating a crisis with the PRC, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan, an island democracy of 23.5 million people. The PRC has vowed to use force if necessary to prevent Taiwan’s “secession…”