TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Retired Admiral Philip Davidson, who once warned against a Chinese attack on Taiwan by 2027, visited President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) at the Presidential Office on Thursday (Feb. 2).

When he served as chief of the United States Indo-Pacific Command in 2021, he told a Senate hearing that China might start a military conflict with Taiwan by 2027. Even so, he emphasized the action would not necessarily entail a full-blown invasion, but could come in the form of a naval blockade.

Davidson arrived in Taiwan on Monday (Jan. 30) as part of a six-member delegation from the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR) to discuss regional security issues with government leaders and academics.

He told Tsai that he had witnessed the vitality of Taiwan’s civil society firsthand, and also understood how China was pressuring the country, according to a news release from the Presidential Office.

The president said Taiwan had the determination and the confidence it could defend itself, while continuing to deepen cooperation with the U.S. and with other nations that shared democratic ideals and values. She named supply chains, cybersecurity, science and technology, as domains where Taipei and Washington could still intensify cooperation.