I think you have misunderstood that language from Pub 514.
This language is taken out of context, the full context being:
Taxes All Credited or All Deducted
In a given year, you must either claim a credit for all foreign taxes that qualify for the credit or claim a deduction for all of them. This rule is applied with the carryback and carryover procedure, as follows.
You cannot claim a credit carryback or carryover from a year in which you deducted qualified foreign taxes.
You cannot deduct unused foreign taxes in any year to which you carry them, even if you deduct qualified foreign taxes actually paid in that year.
You cannot claim a credit for unused foreign taxes in a year to which you carry them unless you also claim a credit for foreign taxes actually paid or accrued in that year.
You cannot carry back or carry over any unused foreign taxes to or from a year for which you elect not to be subject to the foreign tax credit limit. See Exemption from foreign tax credit limit under How To Figure the Credit, earlier.
What IRS is saying is not that you must claim some amount of FTC in the year in which you would also like to use carryovers, but rather that you cannot elect to DEDUCT foreign taxes in a year and also to use foreign tax credit carryovers in the same year. It is completely appropriate in a given tax year to not have any "new" foreign taxes paid/accrued for that year, and to use FTC carryovers from a prior year. What you can't do is deduct "new" taxes paid/accrued for the current year and ALSO use foreign tax CREDIT carryovers from a prior year.
