Washington sources told the Taipei Times that Wang Yi (王毅), director of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, left Washington “disappointed” following a meeting with US Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg this week, during which he tried to persuade the US to end arms sales to Taiwan.
Two sources said Wang Yi argued that greatly improved relations across the Taiwan Strait meant that the chances of military confrontation were dramatically reduced and that Taiwan no longer needed to increase defenses, adding that if the US went ahead with the sales it would have a strong negative impact on China-US relations.
But the US side replied that China’s own military buildup and failure to reduce the large missile force Beijing has aimed at Taiwan did not give Washington much confidence in Wang’s argument.
One source said: “The US response was that: ‘We don’t arm Taiwan to turn it into an offensive threat, we arm Taiwan in response to the PLA force modernization and the threat it poses to Taiwan.’”
While the US did not reveal its plans for arms sales to Taiwan, it gave the clear impression that future sales were under serious consideration.
This meeting came as a new report from the Project 2049 Institute — a Washington-based think tank — said: “Over the next two to three months, senior non-Cabinet officials from Taiwan will come to the United States to discuss arms sales and a broad range of ties.”
The report says that while President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is publicly prioritizing the procurement of US F-16 C/D fighter aircraft, “some lend credibility to the notion that there exists a lack of consistency between what the KMT [Chinese Nationalist Party] advocates in public and in private.”
It also said: “The Taiwanese should prepare for senior level defense meetings with the United States, even if they have limited time to discuss budgetary issues.”
“The United States DOD [Department of Defense] and DOS [Department of State] should work towards arriving at a consensus by this summer regarding Taiwan’s specific defense needs. It must also ascertain what the KMT administration is actually willing to purchase,” it said. “Having learned from the mistakes of the [former US president George W.] Bush administration, the [US President Barack] Obama administration is unlikely to expend political capital offering expensive and comprehensive weapons packages to the Taiwanese only to subsequently witness them balk at actually procuring the systems.”
Rupert Hammond-Chambers, head of the US-Taiwan Business Council in Washington, stressed that the timeline for arms sales would be affected by other issues.
There will be no significant developments until the Senate confirms Kurt Campbell as the Obama administration’s new assistant secretary of state for East Asian affairs. That will probably happen in the next two weeks, and when it does he will run the weapons sales program and become the “key guy,” he said.
Through next month and August, Campbell and his team will assess where they stand with present programs and develop a recommendation on selling F-16s.
That recommendation will go to the State Department, the Pentagon and the White House in early September, but Obama is unlikely to make a decision and send it forward for Congressional approval until he returns from a planned trip to China, he said.
Insiders say the trip will probably take place in mid-November and the proposed arms sales will then go to Congress for approval in late November or early December.
Washington sources said that Taiwan would likely be offered the helicopters and the F-16s it wants, but that it was unlikely a submarine package would be worked out this year.
‘FORM OF PROTEST’: The German Institute Taipei said it was ‘shocked’ to see Nazi symbolism used in connection with political aims as it condemned the incident Sung Chien-liang (宋建樑), who led efforts to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-cheng (李坤城), was released on bail of NT$80,000 yesterday amid an outcry over a Nazi armband he wore to questioning the night before. Sung arrived at the New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning in a recall petition forgery case on Tuesday night wearing a red armband bearing a swastika, carrying a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and giving a Nazi salute. Sung left the building at 1:15am without the armband and apparently covering the book with a coat. This is a serious international scandal and Chinese
A US Marine Corps regiment equipped with Naval Strike Missiles (NSM) is set to participate in the upcoming Balikatan 25 exercise in the Luzon Strait, marking the system’s first-ever deployment in the Philippines. US and Philippine officials have separately confirmed that the Navy Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) — the mobile launch platform for the Naval Strike Missile — would take part in the joint exercise. The missiles are being deployed to “a strategic first island chain chokepoint” in the waters between Taiwan proper and the Philippines, US-based Naval News reported. “The Luzon Strait and Bashi Channel represent a critical access
COUNTERINTELLIGENCE TRAINING: The ministry said 87.5 percent of the apprehended Chinese agents were reported by service members they tried to lure into becoming spies Taiwanese organized crime, illegal money lenders, temples and civic groups are complicit in Beijing’s infiltration of the armed forces, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said in a report yesterday. Retired service members who had been turned to Beijing’s cause mainly relied on those channels to infiltrate the Taiwanese military, according to the report to be submitted to lawmakers ahead of tomorrow’s hearing on Chinese espionage in the military. Chinese intelligence typically used blackmail, Internet-based communications, bribery or debts to loan sharks to leverage active service personnel to do its bidding, it said. China’s main goals are to collect intelligence, and develop a
PERSONAL DATA: The implicated KMT members allegedly compiled their petitions by copying names from party lists without the consent of the people concerned Judicial authorities searched six locations yesterday and questioned six people, including one elderly Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) member and five KMT Youth League associates, about alleged signature forgery and fraud relating to their recall efforts against two Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators. After launching a probe into alleged signature forgery and related fraud in the KMT’s recall effort, prosecutors received a number of complaints, including about one petition that had 1,748 signatures of voters whose family members said they had already passed away, and also voters who said they did not approve the use of their name, Taipei Deputy Chief Prosecutor
RSS