Expert warns Pentagon report a front for further arms sales to Taiwan

Chinese military and international relations experts on Wednesday said that a recent Pentagon report playing down Taiwan's aerial combat capability was a front for more advanced arms sales to the island, which would seriously violate a Sino-U.S. agreement that Washington endorsed 28 years ago.

"Any further arms sales, especially if the U.S. sells F-16 fighters to Taiwan, would increase already strained tensions with China," Prof. Tan Kaijia with the National Defense University of the People's Liberation Army told Xinhua.

The report delivered by the Defense Intelligence Agency of the U.S. Department of Defense to the Congress has stressed that many of Taiwan's 400 active combat aircraft were not operationally capable due their age and maintenance problems.

It also specified that Taiwan's 60 U.S.-made F-5 fighters have reached the end of their operating life and some of the island's F-16 A/B jet fighters needed improvement to increase combat effectiveness.

The Pentagon's report came as Taiwan continued to voice its need for advanced U.S. weaponry such as 66 F-16 C/Ds, a substantial improvement model on Taiwan's current F-16 A/Bs. But the U.S. side excluded the fighters from the latest arms sale package.

According to media reports, Taiwan currently operates 60 U.S.-made F-5 fighters, 148 F-16 A/Bs, 56 French-made Mirage 2000-5 fighter jets and 126 locally produced Indigenous Defense Fighter (IDF) aircraft.

"If the U.S. equips Taiwan with new F-16s, replacing the second-generation F-5s, it would significantly increase the island's aerial combat effectiveness for F-16's compatibility to other U.S.-made weapon systems such as airborne early warning and control aircraft through Link-16 Multifunctional Information Distribution System," said Prof. Tan.

According to the Communique jointly issued by the Chinese and U.S. governments on Aug. 17, 1982, the U.S. side states that "its arms sales to Taiwan will not exceed, either in qualitative or in quantitative terms, the level of those supplied in recent years since the establishment of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China."

"Comprehensive performance of the F-16s is far beyond that of the F-5s and the qualitative parameters of the F-16 C/Ds also exceed those of the F-16 A/Bs," said Tan.

Selling such arms would "be an overt offense" against the Aug. 17 Communique, and promoting such a move by an elaborate report would not give any justification for the U.S. since the F-16 C/Ds would not be considered as a defensive weapon in any case, he said.

Guo Zhenyuan, a researcher with the prominent thinktank China Institute of International Studies, told Xinhua that previous U.S. arms sales to Taiwan were covered by the front of "providing Taiwan with arms of a defensive character" to ease the backlash to the bilateral relationship from the Chinese side.

"The U.S. side should know that the sooner it stops selling arms to Taiwan, the more willing China would be to work with it on global and regional issues," Prof. Jin Canrong with Renmin University of China said. Enditem

Source: Xinhua