China Ticked Off Over Arms Sales To Taiwan

A package of arms will be sold to Taiwan in a move by the Obama administration that is expected to be met with an angry response from China, the Washington Times reports.

The  package will include offers of sales of UH-60 Black Hawk military helicopters and additional Patriot PAC-3 missile defenses, but not additional F-16 jets that the island's government has sought to modernize its air forces, according to congressional and administration officials, the Times reported.

Additionally, the Taiwanese military will be offered defense communications equipment, said officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

One official familiar with the discussions said the F-16 sale was rejected as "too provocative" to the Chinese, to whom we owe several trillion dollars in debt to finance bank bailouts. If China called in all its loans to the U.S., it could be bankrupted, officials suggested.

Worse yet, China, of course is in the middle of a military buildup that includes development of new advanced ballistic and cruise missiles that would be used to attack U.S. Navy warships if they were called on to defend Taiwan from a mainland attack, as the U.S. is obligated to do under the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act.

Chinese government spokesmen have said repeatedly that U.S. support for Taiwan remains the most significant cause of friction between Washington and Beijing. They've also announced theyare building and have fired an ICBM that could hit Washington, DC from Beijing.

It's nuclear tipped.

Moreover, China has deployed more than 1,000 missiles within striking distance of Taiwan and despite improved relations, China's government has refused requests by the Taipei government to withdraw some of the missiles as a goodwill gesture. China and the United States remain at odds over U.S. arms sales to the island nation that Beijing views as a breakaway province but the U.S. is bound by treaty to protect.

A Taiwan diplomatic source said the F-16s were needed to replace aging warplanes and because the production line for the jet could be closed soon.

The last major arms package offered to Taiwan was announced in October 2008 and triggered China's severing of military relations with the Pentagon, a centerpiece of Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates' policy of engagement with Beijing. Military ties have resumed gradually, the Times said, but "remain strained."

Officials confirmed the new arms package after it was first reported by the Associated Press. The Black Hawks were requested before the October arms sale package, which included Apache attack helicopters and Patriot PAC-3s that were part of a $6.5 billion deal.