A prominent US China expert last week called on Taiwan to increase military spending to at least match the US as a percentage of GDP, saying that it would be “unrealistic” to reach 10 percent.
Oriana Skylar Mastro, a fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, made the remarks during a US Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Wednesday last week titled “Shared Threats: Indo-Pacific Alliances and Burden Sharing in Today’s Geopolitical Environment.”
Mastro called Taiwan a unique situation compared with other US allies and partners in the Asia-Pacific region, as it is the only one facing the acute threat of war with China.
Photo: AFP
“If Taiwan expects the US to help in a conflict, thereby risking major war with China, Taiwan does need to contribute more to deterring the war, and prevailing if that proves necessary,” she said.
The imbalance of power between Taiwan and China means that the former’s ability to “hold off” long enough for US forces to arrive is “the heart of deterrence,” Mastro said.
"Taipei will never be able to defend itself completely without US assistance," she added.
The strategy should be for Taiwan to withstand 30 days of an invasion while US forces arrive in the region, but the US should also take steps to convince Beijing that quick military action has no way of succeeding, she said.
"There is no scenario in which Taiwan wins a war against China without direct US military intervention," she added.
Within the next three to four years, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army is to tell Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) it is able to take Taiwan by force, Mastro said.
While Taiwan spending 10 percent of its GDP on military spending is likely unrealistic, especially given total government spending only stands at 13.7 percent, it must still increase military funding, she said.
“As a symbolic gesture, Taiwan should spend at least the same amount as the United States on defense — currently 3.4 percent of GDP,” Mastro said.
The money that Taiwan does spend on defense should go to buying “the right weapons,” focused on asymmetric warfare instead of traditional high-cost platforms such as submarines and F-35 jets, she said.
“Taiwan should persist in acquiring large quantities of anti-air, anti-armor and anti-ship missiles, weapons that provide more value in Taiwan’s defense scenario,” she said.
There is a “political need for Taipei to show seriousness about its defense if American lives are going to be sacrificed for its defense,” Mastro added.
Additional reporting by CNA
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS