American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Chairman Raymond Burghardt told Taipei that despite enormous pressure from China, the US continues to give serious consideration to selling it advanced F-16 fighter aircraft.
“It is something that hasn’t been approved yet, but it also hasn’t been turned down,” he said following a three-day arms conference in Cambridge, Maryland.
The conference closed on Tuesday night with many of the senior participants privately expressing optimism that Taiwan’s request to buy the fighters would be approved by US President Barack Obama in the next two years.
Rupert Hammond-Chambers, president of the US-Taiwan Business Council, which organized the conference, also said the US National Security Council (NSC) was conducting a “broad and comprehensive review” of Taiwan’s defense needs.
Other US studies have recently concluded that Taiwan’s request to buy 66 of the fighters was justified and necessary to keep its air force as a credible deterrent to Chinese attack.
Asked if the US-Taiwan relationship was “on track,” Burghardt said it was “in good shape.”
He said the conference, conducted behind closed doors, had provided an opportunity for government representatives from the two sides to meet and discuss defense issues.
There was “lots of interaction and lots of talk,” he said.
Burghardt also said there were ongoing meetings, “some of them publicized and some of them not,” in which defense issues were discussed between the US and Taiwan.
Hammond-Chambers said the NSC review involved interagency coordination and covered Taiwan’s air force, navy and army.
It was a “serious reassessment” and that it would have an impact on future arms sales, he said.
In closing remarks, Hammond-Chambers strongly indicated that he thought the review would result in a green light for F-16 sales.
US officials at the conference said during the closed-door sessions that Taiwan continued to have “strategic meaning” and remained a “strategic asset” to the US.
Others at the conference said Taiwan should be seen in a regional context and not just as part of the US-China-Taiwan triangular relationship.
Meanwhile, Air Force spokesman Pan Kung-hsiao (潘恭孝) said in Taipei yesterday the government was allocating money for possible US help to ugrade its fleet of F-16A/Bs acquired in the 1990s.
Pan’s comments came amid media reports that the Obama administration had agreed to upgrade Taiwan’s fleet of 146 F-16A/Bs.
Pan said that while notification had yet to be given, the Air Force would ask the legislature to provide funding for the upgrade in 2012.
However, he said that acquisition of the more advanced F-16C/Ds remained the military’s top priority because that aircraft was better suited to Taiwan’s defense.
“Our primary interest remains the procurement of F-16C/Ds rather than the upgrade of F-16A/Bs,” he said.
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