首席御医txt下载 全集:US ties strained by Taiwan arms sales

来源：百度文库 编辑：九乡新闻网 时间：2024/04/28 16:32:53

US ties strained by Taiwan arms sales

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2011-9-23 14:09
F-16 of US



With the US flouting all objections to increase its arms trade with Taiwan, the Chinese mainland has strengthened its stance, warning on Thursday that bilateral military exchanges could be severely disrupted.


"Rather than working with China to consolidate and expand the positive growth of bilateral military ties, the US has again announced its plan to sell arms to Taiwan, which will create severe obstacles for normal military exchanges," Ministry of National Defense spokesman Geng Yansheng said on Thursday.


Geng's sharply worded comments came after the Obama administration finalized its latest package of weapons for Taiwan, worth $5.58 billion and including an upgrade of Taiwan's 145 F-16A/B fighter jets. The package is now pending approval by Congress.


The State Council Taiwan Affairs Office also issued a statement on Thursday, saying that the decision violated the principles of the three Sino-US joint communiqués and broke a US promise to support peaceful development across the Straits.


"We are strongly discontent and firmly oppose what the US side has decided to do," the statement said.


Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun summoned the US ambassador to China Gary Locke to lodge a protest on Wednesday, the Xinhua News Agency reported on Thursday.


This fresh arms sale announcement comes 20 months after a Pentagon decision in January last year to sell an arms package to Taiwan worth close to $6.4 billion.


That instance saw China cut off some military exchange programs with the US with relations only returning to normal this year.


The US deal, revealed on Wednesday, falls short of Taiwan's expectations but still showed that the White House favors more arms sales.


US officials said the F-16 A/B fighters would undergo a retrofit to bring them up to the same standards as the more advanced C/D models, according to the BBC.


David Finkelstein, director of China Studies at CNA, an independent research institute in the US, told the Global Times in an e-mail that this issue was subject to powerful domestic political forces in the US, with some in Congress calling for the sale of newer model F-16 C/Ds.


This is due to concerns over Chinese military modernization as well as the jobs that selling newer aircraft would create in the US in a difficult domestic economic environment, he said.


Major General Luo Yuan from the People's Liberation Army's Academy of Military Sciences told the Global Times that although the US had not sold advanced models of jet fighters to Taiwan, the upgrade process would help the island fit into the standard US air defense system, which would greatly improve its combat ability.


"But the improvement will not change the cross-Straits military balance. Also, continued arms sales could cause more countermeasures such as more deployment on the mainland," Luo said.


An opinion poll conducted by the Global Poll Center showed that 84 percent of almost 950 respondents were against the deal and that 70.5 percent of them supported the government taking every step to prevent future such deals.


"Other than military moves, China can exert economic and diplomatic pressure on the US," Luo said.


Gu Guoliang, a US expert with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times that the upgrade of Taiwan's weaponry will not achieve the military balance that the US has hoped for.


"The repeated oppositions and relevant measures have, to some extent, prevented the US from selling advanced weapons to Taiwan this time," Gu said.


He added that settling this issue once and for all would require time for US President Barack Obama as he wrestles an economic crisis and military pressure.


The arms sales announcement will nonetheless add to other recent irritants in the Sino-US relationship, after Washington's decision to challenge Chinese duties on US poultry products and accelerating momentum in the US Congress to pass legislation pressing China to loosen controls on its currency.


Tao Wenzhao, an expert on international studies with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times that the arms sales would see consequences as they are the prime driver affecting Sino-US military relations.


"The arms sale is against the cooperative trend between China and the US that has seen great development following Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit to the US. The sales also disrupt cross-Straits relations," Tao said.


Jean-Pierre Cabestan, a political science professor at Hong Kong Baptist University, said Beijing had learned its lessons from the 2010 break-off in military exchanges and was unlikely to react as strongly this time.


"They are going to react, to get angry, and the military may take measures to better counter these retrofitted F-16s, but they will not break military ties with the United States like they did before," he told AFP.


"Conflicts are not supposed to erode mutual interests. Therefore, it wouldn't be reasonable to expect China to harshly retaliate against the US," Tao said. (Global Times)
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