Arms Sale to Taiwan Is a Melon-Cutting Performance of the American Parties

On Sept. 21, the U.S. government announced its arms sales to Taiwan totalling $5.852 billion. In response, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun summoned the U.S. ambassador to China, Gary Locke, and lodged a strong protest against this incident.

If we look back on the issue of arms sales to Taiwan, the answer was already clear when U.S. Vice President Joe Biden visited China, during which the U.S. Department of Defense made a change to the arms sales to Taiwan — upgrading the F-16 A/B fighters sold to Taiwan. Apparently, behind the U.S. government’s double-sided game were its domestic weapons manufacturers, most of whom are located in Texas. Just as expected by outsiders, the U.S. government made a commitment to arms sales to Taiwan.

Without a doubt, such behavior to deceive and fool the Chinese people is bound to arouse strong opposition from public opinion. America’s arms sales to Taiwan not only seriously violated the three joint communiqués signed by the two countries since the establishment of a bilateral relationship, especially the “August 17” communiqué principle. Such behavior has seriously harmed China’s core interests and Sino-U.S. bilateral trade contacts.

In fact, this is the second occurrence of arms sales to Taiwan in Obama’s two-year administration; why would the Obama administration use such sensitive tools as cross-straits relations so frequently? From a political view, this is a customary tactic of America’s politics, which reflects the ostrich policy applied by so-called democratic Western countries when dealing with foreign countries’ basic rights. This testifies to what some critics have claimed before, that leaders in those nation-states, including Obama, cannot lead the world since they’ll always stand in their own countries’ positions when dealing with world issues. This sharply points out the hypocrisy of countries like the U.S., who define themselves as world leaders. If we measure this from the economic side, such behavior by Obama is just to placate weapons manufacturers. This can hardly help America’s economy recover.

First of all, we can see that the situation across the Taiwan straits has always been a shady dealing of America’s domestic politics, reflecting America’s mindset of preventing and containing China. Needless to say, sticking to the stereotype of the Cold War mentality is a serious deviation from the realities of international relations and U.S.-China relations.

Second, from the view of America’s domestic politics, this is more like the employment and economic stimulus plan and the support for the “Buffett” tax measures put forward by Obama, which is also a political game to placate weapons manufacturers. According to the government financial budget in February, the expenses included in the federal budget plan for the 2012 fiscal year are close to $3.7 trillion, and the defense budget takes up $671 billion, including about a $118 billion “war budget,” which will be mainly used in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although under pressure to cut the financial deficit, the basic budget for national defense still reached $553 billion, which is an increase from the previous year. As a matter of fact, looking from the actual situation in the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Department of Defense certainly wants someone who can speak for them to stand out; this will not only help to strengthen the status of the Defense Department, but also secure, its future military expenses. Hence, the Department of Defense and weapons manufacturers have been actively pushing various arms sales plans.

Third, in Obama’s eyes, the current economic recovery is not satisfactory, which is the key to why he gambled on the arms sale in spite of China’s protest. For one thing, even though the arms sale plan is not big — it only costs over $5 billion — and cannot compete with the nearly $400 billion trade between the U.S. and China, since the current unemployment rate in the U.S. is about nine percent, it’s better to have one way than have no way to go. Although the U.S. faces some international political risk, this is outshone by its domestic political risk. Second, the arms sale is one of Obama’s export strategies. Since arms sales are included in high-tech sales, they have to be considered along with America’s strategic interests. Although there are some problems with arms sales to Taiwan, it’s much safer than selling high-tech weapons to the Chinese mainland. Furthermore, no matter whether it’s F-16 A or B fighters, their upgraded version or other more advanced weapons, Taiwan can't use any of them comfortably. For some of the weapons, Taiwan has to pay to even use them in the U.S., and this is one of the factors why America has been selling weapons to Taiwan unceasingly.

However, from the perspective of China’s strategy, America won’t contain itself in its arms sales in the short term because it’s a way to balance America’s domestic political power. Therefore, we should make some actual actions aside from diplomatic negotiations. The nature of interests gaming is a game of rules, behind which it is ultimately a contest of strength. For those stubborn “ostriches” in America, we need to implement a powerful counterattack. Actually, with the growth of China’s economic strength and the increase of its international status, promoting some counter-measures is necessary. Only fighting when it’s necessary will allow your opponent to know your actual strength.

Therefore, it’s better to say that the arms sale to Taiwan is a result of American politicians’ clownish performances than a problem of the reality U.S.-China relations. We should not only protest and negotiate, but also let the clowns have no stage and divert them out of their jobs so that U.S.-China relations can develop steadily.