More US Missiles To Taiwan – Beware the Military-Industrial Complex
This shit really needs to stop:
The US on Wednesday approved the sale of advanced air defence missiles to Taiwan despite rising trade tension between the two sides and continued opposition to the deal from Beijing.
The Department of Defence on Wednesday approved a $968m contract for Lockheed Martin to sell 253 Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missiles and related hardware to Taiwan for upgrading the island’s existing defence system. (FT)
Apparently earlier reports that the Obama Administration would scale the package back to exclude missiles in favor of helicopters, or something, were inaccurate.
Look, I just fail to see how this benefits the US all that much. China is pissed off and will retaliate somehow – I suggest they sell weapons to Texas. The US already has plenty of strategic allies in the Pacific (isn’t Japan enough?). Moreover, need I point out the karmic implications of being the world’s largest weapons salesman?
OK, scratch that, I don’t believe in karma. At the very least, however, there is some bad ju-ju associated with selling things that go boom.
No, scratch that. I don’t really know what ju-ju means. Sounds kinda cool, though.
The two most important words in that excerpt above are “Lockheed” and “Martin.” This is the weapons manufacturer that is profiting from all this, and in case you were not aware of the power of these firms in D.C., these guys spread money around Washington like a fundamentalist Christian politician at a whorehouse.
I’m sure Taiwan is happy with all this. They have been in very significant negotiations with the PRC in recent days, and a weapons sale like this would, I assume, operate as a nice bargaining chip for the Taiwanese.
Regardless, Taiwan will eventually take a deal something like Hong Kong and Macau, it’s just a matter of time. A lot of posturing and negotiation will go on until that day, but it certainly seems inevitable at this point.
It goes without saying that any hate mail from Taiwanese, or fundamentalist Christian politicians, is welcome and expected.
don’t forget about hate mail from whorehouses!
And after Taiwan transitions back into China, these weapons could be used against us in China’s Red Dawn invasion of the U.S.
You do realize that it is only a matter of time before some whacko freshman Congressman uses that argument?
China can whine all they want, but really, it hardly matters. What are they gonna do? Whine, that’s all.
For the US, it’s important for whatever deal Taiwan gets to be a fair one that can win the Taiwanese public’s support, and part of that formula is providing Taiwan viable and credible deterrence from Chinese threats. That’s how an end game occurs without an actual war, and that’s what the US wants to see.
I imagine, though, you’ll probably feel better knowing that this is likely the last real weapons sale to Taiwan for the foreseeable future. I just don’t see US will on this subject lasting a whole lot longer.
I definitely understand an argument that US weapons sales are an important part of the PRC-Taiwan negotiation process. However, I’m not sure whether those sales speed up that negotiation or slow it down. Moreover, if the result is simply to give Taiwan a better bargaining position at the expense of US-China relations, to me it’s not worth it.
I think this is political theater all around. You may laugh at this, but I think the Chinese probably are “whining” as A-gu says, just to keep up appearance.
Looking at the trend, there isn’t a question of whether Taiwan will be reintegrated back to mainland. The questions are when and how.
The mainland embrace is economic and not military. Some in Taiwan may cheer at the sale, but it changes their fate not one bit.
But at least the Taiwanese pols get to continue the feces fights in the legislative yuan for the foreseeable future.
Anyway I agree with Stan that it’s the military-industrial complex’s lobbying at work.
The US will sell as long as there is a Taiwan to ask — there is no forseable political option to break the status quo. Could anyone envision a horsetrade? Refusing the sale would piss off just about everybody with a vote and/or a cross.
It is sad though to see that much wealth being spent on bombs that likely will never detonate — perhaps better only than spending wealth on ones that will. Maybe the biggest losers are Taiwan’s tax payers.