Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te urged the Trump administration to continue arms sales to the self-governing island in order to ensure “regional peace and security” in a Facebook post Sunday.
U.S. support is essential in pushing back against Beijing’s increasingly aggressive regional military footprint, Lai said.
“China has never abandoned its intention to annex Taiwan by force and continues to expand its military capabilities in an attempt to alter the regional and cross-strait status quo,” Lai said. U.S. arms sales and security cooperation “are not only necessary but also key elements in maintaining regional peace and stability,” he added.
Lai’s post follows President Donald Trump’s comments on Air Force One and in a Fox News interview Friday that he’s delaying approval of a $14 billion arms sale to Taiwan as a “negotiating chip” with Beijing. “I haven’t approved it yet. We’re going to see what happens. I may do it, I may not do it,” Trump told Fox News’ Bret Baier.
Trump spoke following a two-day summit with China’s leader Xi Jinping in Beijing that otherwise produced few substantive outcomes. Ending weapon sales to Taipei has been a longtime demand of Beijing, which claims the island as Chinese territory and has pressed its claim by ratcheting up military intimidation of Taiwan.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Trump’s comments didn’t signal a backpedal on U.S. ties to Taiwan. “The president was really clear about this — there’s no change in American policy on Taiwan,” Greer told ABC News on Sunday.
Trump said that he had discussed U.S. arms sales to Taiwan “in great detail” with Xi. That’s an apparent violation of a 1982 pledge former President Ronald Reagan made to the island that it wouldn’t consult with Beijing on those transactions. Withholding weapon sales to Taiwan would also violate the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act which commits the U.S. “provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character” to deter potential Chinese aggression. That pledge is “the most important deterrent against efforts to undermine regional peace and stability,” Lai said.
Trump suggested that weapon sales to Taiwan might embolden its government to declare formal independence — a potential trigger for conflict with Beijing.
“We’re not looking to have somebody say, ‘Let’s go independent, because the United States is backing us,’” Trump said. Xi reiterated China’s longtime warning that doing so risked conflict with Beijing in his meeting with Trump last week. “’Taiwan independence’ and cross-Strait peace are as irreconcilable as fire and water,” Xi said, per a Chinese Foreign Ministry readout.
Lai repeated Taiwan’s position that it is already “a sovereign and independent democratic nation” that Beijing has no legal claim to. And he warned of the consequences of a possible Chinese invasion attempt that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said was potentially “imminent” in a speech last year.
“Any act that undermines peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait is not only a blatant challenge to international rules and order but will also have a significant impact on Indo-Pacific security, global supply chains, and the world economy,” Lai said.
