Taiwanese President William Lai is struggling to contain both open hostility and private “wooing” by China. In late March, four Taiwanese soldiers, three of whom were part of a unit that provides security for Taiwan’s Presidential Office, were jailed for up to seven years after being convicted of selling pictures of sensitive information to China.

The verdicts came after last month’s speech in which Lai condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the harshest terms used by a Taiwanese leader in modern history. In his remarks, the president said Taiwan will not be “bullied or manipulated” and promised repercussions against those who make “expressions of loyalty to the enemy.”

Lai, aware of Beijing’s “carrot and stick” campaign, warned Taiwanese to be wary of China’s “United Front,” a political strategy employed by the CCP in which they – with plenty of smiles and often “investment” capital – enter international organizations and various influential groups and plant agents who then build alliances with targeted individuals, political parties and other interests. But Taiwan’s government is swimming upstream against a very strong flow of Chinese covert actions backed by huge sums of Chinese money. Last week, Presidential Office consultant Wu Shang-yu, along with two others from the president’s ruling party, were reportedly detained on suspicion of spying for the CCP.