A potential conflict between the United States and China over Taiwan would result in global catastrophe but is nevertheless becoming an increasingly likely scenario, according to former Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen.

"I'm worried that we're just drifting into war," Mullen said during a June 20 talk with the Council on Foreign Relations think tank.

"[Taiwan] is an island that is at the center of four of the five top economies in the world."

Mullen said that the United States' efforts to deter an escalation toward conflict in the Taiwan Strait had been "failing over many years."

Moreover, he said, given that Taiwan manufactures 90 percent of the world's advanced semiconductors, used in everything from pickup trucks to hypersonic missiles, a conflict for the island would "devastate the globe."