Military experts on Tuesday expressed mixed views on the possibility of the US establishing a “contingency stockpile” of munitions and other defense articles in Taiwan based on a provision in this year’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which US President Joe Biden signed into law in December last year.
The act calls for the establishment of a contingency stockpile in Taiwan, similar to stockpiles in Thailand, South Korea and other major US allies. It also authorizes the US Department of State and the US Department of Defense to propose up to US$100 million each fiscal year through 2032 to maintain a stockpile in Taiwan, and allows the US Congress to review the annual budgets.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) this week weighed in on the issue, asking Minister of National Defense Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正) during a question-and-answer session at the legislature in Taipei whether he thinks the US would move parts of its stockpiles in other countries to Taiwan.
Photo: CNA
Chiu said Taiwan and the US are in talks about such a move, but no agreement had been reached.
Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the government-funded Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said that contingency stockpiles are an essential part of the US military’s strategy to respond to regional military conflicts.
The US stockpiles in Europe, the Middle East and Asia enable Washington to send its military relatively lightly equipped on reginal missions, greatly reducing response times, Su said.
The US military is familiar with stockpiling weaponry in Taiwan, as it operated depots at Ching Chuan Kang Air Base in Taichung and Tainan Air Base during the Vietnam War, he said.
If the US were to again establish a stockpile in Taiwan, it would have to build depots or rent existing ones, which it might have to fortify, Su added.
However, regardless of a stockpile or a permanent presence of US troops in Taiwan, Washington would come to the nation’s aid if it were to be attacked, he said.
If Washington establishes a stockpile in the nation, it would elevate Taiwan’s status to a “quasi-diplomatic ally” of the US, he said.
Asked whether a US stockpile in Taiwan would cross Beijing’s “red line,” Su said that Chinese incursions into the nation’s air defense identification zone and crossing’s of the Taiwan Strait’s median line have frequently crossed Taiwan’s red line.
Taiwan has the right to engage in self-defense under international law, Su added.
“If we don’t help ourselves, no one will,” he said.
Meanwhile, Chieh Chung (揭仲), an associate research fellow at the National Policy Foundation, a think tank affiliated with the KMT, criticized the defense minister’s statement at the legislature.
If Chiu spoke without prior authorization by the US, his statement might cause trouble for Washington, Chieh said.
It is premature to talk about a US contingency stockpile in Taiwan, because the US agencies involved in such a step have not proposed a related appropriations bill, Chieh said.
The White House is likely to adopt a reserved stance on the proposal, as it is concerned that it could negatively affect US-China relations, Chieh said, adding that Beijing would see it as crossing a red line.
It would take time to select suitable sites for a stockpile, build depots and transport the defense articles, he said.
Any change in the cross-strait situation might halt the establishment of a stockpile, he added.
Chieh said that Japan’s Okinawa, where the US operates several military bases, would be more suitable for a stockpile, as sending more weapons there would not affect cross-strait tensions, he said.
“Rather than talking about a contingency stockpile, we should urge the US to clear its backlog of munitions and launch platforms that it has promised to sell to Taiwan,” he said.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS