For good reason, the Clinton administration’s foreign-policy record has not been recorded as one of the nation’s most stellar. For even better reasons, the president’s record on China is even more suspect. But Monday’s decision by the White House, against selling four Aegis-class destroyers to Taiwan but in favor of sending an advance missile-defense radar to Formosa, was a wise choice that continues a rational, sound policy toward China and its alienated kin.

The Aegis destroyer, manufactured both at Bath Iron Works and Ingalls Shipbuilding in Mississippi, is one of the most advanced combat systems in the world. Equipped with very sophisticated radars and combat-control systems, four of these ships, fully armed and under the command of a capable crew, would be a formidable defense against mainland China. They would also pose a significant offensive threat.

True, the idea that Taiwan would be stupid enough to launch an offensive campaign against China — with a population, military capacity and tactical nuclear weapons capacity that dwarfs Taiwan’s meager abilities — is laughable. But in the People’s Republic of China’s unrelenting desire to reunite Formosa with the mainland, an offensive capacity is a significant symbolic threat. By granting that ability to the island, the United States would, in effect, be sending a significant message to China that it does not support reunification.

Upsetting China to that degree would cause huge policy problems at the United Nations, with the constant crises on the Korean peninsula, with events throughout Southeast Asia, and even in dealing with Russia because, even though relations between China and Russia are not as tense as they were in the past, American foreign policy relies on a degree of animosity between those neighbors.

There is, as such, a big difference between helping Taiwan defend itself against the dozens of nuclear missiles China has pointed at the island, and giving it tools that would at best begin an arms race between China and Taiwan, and at worst begin a chain of events that would lead to needless standoffs and, perhaps, a shooting war. U.S. policy toward China and Taiwan has been relatively clear: Engage the mainland, work for economic, political and human rights reforms, defend Taiwan’s right to exist, but with an eye toward eventual reunification of the two nations. The Clinton Administration’s decision on the Aegis destroyers upholds that general precept. While BIW, and Maine, would have profited mightily from the new vessels, the world would have been a more dangerous place with them around.