Miscellaneous News

U.S. approves $95 mln boost to Taiwan's air defense system​

WASHINGTON, April 5 (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department has approved the potential sale to Taiwan of equipment, training and other items to support the Patriot Air Defense System in a deal valued at up to $95 million, the Pentagon said on Tuesday.

Chinese-claimed Taiwan has complained of increased military pressure by Beijing to try and force the democratically ruled island to accept its sovereignty.

The package would include training, planning, fielding, deployment, operation, maintenance and sustainment of the Patriot Air Defense System and associated equipment, the Pentagon said, in a notification to Congress.

"This proposed sale serves U.S. national, economic, and security interests by supporting the recipient's continuing efforts to modernize its armed forces and to maintain a credible defensive capability," it said.

"The proposed sale will help to sustain the recipient's missile density and ensure readiness for air operations. The recipient will use this capability as a deterrent to regional threats and to strengthen homeland defense."

The United States is bound by law to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself, despite the absence of formal diplomatic ties and the anger such weapons sales always generate in Beijing.

Taiwan's presidential office noted this was the third arms sale announced since President Joe Biden took office, and showed the "rock solid" nature of their relationship.

"Taiwan will continue to demonstrate its determination to defend itself, and continue to deepen cooperative partnerships with the United States and other like-minded countries," spokesperson Xavier Chang said in a statement.

Despite approval by the State Department, the notification does not indicate that a contract has been signed or that negotiations have concluded.

The Pentagon said Raytheon was the prime contractor for the possible sale. Taiwan's Defense Ministry said it expected the deal to "become effective" within the month.
The United States is Taiwan's main international arms supplier.

Phead128 said:

Of course US won't defend Taiwan. US refuses to even sell F-35s to Taiwan, why would US shed any blood for a nation it doesn't trust with it's fancy tech?

I think US will sanction the living shit out Taiwan though (e.g., the Xinjiang cotton ban treatment), even if means Apple needs to use Samsung/Intel technology instead of TSMC (sob, 5nm, sob). I'm pretty sure US sanctions on Taiwan will last forever, as they will try to economically cripple Taiwan so it foments dissent as they tried with Xinjiang.

I suggest China waits until WW3, when shit hits the fan, Koreans duking it out, Iranians vs. Israelis, Russians vs. Europeans, then strike Taiwan. Otherwise, you get ashes/rubble and economically crippled rump state if you attack prematurely. No rush. We can rebuild the world at the same time.

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The semiconductor market is already facing massive backlogs and shortages, how realistic is it for America to sanction the biggest producer? Would sanctions against Taiwan even make sense if the existing institutions are left untouched? Surely they would target mainland individuals or companies with close military ties.

I think as long as Taiwan's government is kept in place, America will be forced to accept the situation as it is with minimal sanctions. Maybe they can claim they forced China to not fully integrate Taiwan.

South Korea's president-elect seeks bigger U.S. deterrent​

Non-paywall source:

Appix said:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1511636756369932290

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"BREAKING: Eurozone annual producer inflation hits 31.4% in February, a record high."

31.4%???

MortyandRick said:

Are these state oil companies that dependent on the west and are they scared of sanctions?

Or are they still trying to win the hearts of Europe? Maybe they are getting bad advice as well cause I can tell you that Europe actions towards china will unlikely get better.

Seems like I did is taking advantage of the situation more so than china. Which is quite sad that china candy do better.

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The reason was already listed in the article, these companies knows that as major SOE’s their actions and choices can be interpreted as policy statements by Beijing, so of course they need to tread extra carefully.

They also know that as major SOE’s if they get sanctioned, China will have no choice but to reply with proportional counter-sanctions, and that is going to be costly.

While Eurotrash politicians have shown that they either don’t know or don’t care about the costs of such pointless political grandstand, Chinese leaders most certainly do.

Just because the EU is happy to needlessly nuke its own economy to make a stupid point doesn’t mean China should follow suit.

So the traditional big Chinese SOEs will keep dealings above board while special investment vehicles (SIV) are purpose built to help Russia fight western sanctions, just like what had been done with NK and Iran.

If the west wants to sanction those SIVs, China will just shrug it off, it’s not like western sanctions can do any actual harm to them. That way China can restrict itself to merely making some empty political protests in reply and its a win-win-win. The EU can say they stood up for their values, the Russians get the hard currency they need, China gets oil without needing to get into a needless full blown sanctions and trade war with the EU. Everyone goes away happy.

So long as Russia is supported economically, they will not be under much pressure to need to end this war quickly. Which is actually to both China’s and Russia’s macro level strategic benefit now.

The EU basically threw everything they had against Russia in the opening round of sanctions. They have already inflicted essentially all the pain they ever could on Russia. Whereas Russia bleeds them more each and every day the war drags on for the foreseeable future.

If I was Putin, I would purposefully reorient my entire war strategy to drag this out as long as possible if only to just to fuck with the EU (of course there will be many other benefits to doing so). Which, incidentally, looks to be exactly what Russia is going by withdrawing the Northern axis of advance and moving to a traditional continuous front steamroller slow grind.

The more the EU bleed economically, the more the masks slips from Eurotrash political leaders and the more rabidly they impotently bark at China. Which ironically, further vindicates those within China who argue that the EU is beyond saving and will always side with the US against China even if it goes against all of their own best interest to do so. So that makes China want to bleed the EU more, not less.

I would not be surprised if at the end of all this, the EU itself collapses as countries eventually seek to eject themselves from the economic self harm being done to them.

Tune out all the loud barking from the usual suspects and the silence from many important EU core member states is quite deafening actually.

As the economic pain mounts, expect them to start breaking their silence, and not in support of the warmongers seeking to fight Putin to the last Ukrainian.

All the latest war crimes and genocide media drive may well be aimed primarily at putting enough political pressure on that silent majority to stay silent rather than start voicing their doubts publicly.

War crime hypocrisy - remember: Kissinger, Albright Madeleine and some U.S. presidents are war criminals.

MortyandRick said:

Are these state oil companies that dependent on the west and are they scared of sanctions?

Or are they still trying to win the hearts of Europe? Maybe they are getting bad advice as well cause I can tell you that Europe actions towards china will unlikely get better.

Seems like I did is taking advantage of the situation more so than china. Which is quite sad that china candy do better.

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I expect this much after what happened with the Iranian oil sanctions. Remember India stopped buying and China had to divert purchases to the teapots. I think China needs to strengthen its oil sector to be more sanctions resistant.

Germany will have to deal with Indian power. Indian is i think the largest group of international students in Crimea as they are only mentioned. who dont like this 4D chess to see who can be twisted the most. basically every country will be impacted.