Arms sales to Taiwan are in America's strategic national interest - and not just because they are a multibillion dollar annual subsidy to the U.S. defense industry - which they are. Rather arms sales should enable Taiwan to defend her own integrity against the mainland in the event the People's Republic (PRC) misreads the U.S. intention and willingness to fulfill the terms of the 1979 security commitment under the Taiwan Relations Act. That Congressional act and its successor instruments negotiated between the United States and Beijing guarantee that resolving the relation between Taiwan and China be achieved peacefully that neither side try to settle its claim on the other by force.

But there is another reason. Taiwan, in Henry Kissinger's terms, is a vital U.S. proxy in East Asia. China's expanding deployment of some 300 missiles in Fujian province, continuing buildup and sophistication of her submarine fleet and sophisticated Sovremenny-class destroyers through Russian purchases and maintenance of the world's largest land army indicate a preoccupation with might and force and perhaps intimidation beyond even Taiwan.

When such a military buildup by the PRC is coupled with its truculent behavior, strategists see warning signals, red flags, literally. For example, the United States has learned hard lessons about China's mercurial behavior in the collision of the U.S. EP3 surveillance plane and the Chinese F8 fighter jet on April 1, 2001, the outrageous reaction to the accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in May 1999, and the necessity for the United States to send 2 carrier battle groups into the Taiwan Straits after Taiwan's president Lee Tung-hui was allowed to visit his alma mater, Cornell University, in 1995.

Nor should U.S. arms sales be seen as an American attempt at hegemony over China. Nothing could be further from the truth. China is a vital economic partner to the United States, as it is to an expanding number of states around the world. Military confrontation is in no one's interest, but neither is the U.S. posture called "strategic ambiguity," which the China mainland seems eager to misread. America's strategy towards China must be clear, unambiguous, and ready to defend the interests of peace and stability, freedom and democracy in East Asia albeit not as a hegemony, but as a part of the region's strategic architecture.

The arms sales, which President Bush authorized in April 2001, were the largest sale of arms to Taiwan in a decade. Included in that package were eight diesel-powered submarines, 12 P-3C "sub-hunting" patrol aircraft and four Kidd-class destroyers. Missing from that package, and its most important centerpiece, was the Aegis battle-management system on the Arleigh Burke class destroyers. But more on that in a moment.

The arms sold in this package are deemed by Taiwan to be critical to its self-defense capability including repelling an invasion by China. However, Taiwan's export industry also is thought to be vulnerable to a Chinese naval blockade designed to force Taipei into a political settlement. The Kidd-class destroyers and diesel submarines, though not state-of-the-art, will help Taipei counter the threat of blockade from China's large and growing submarine fleet, currently the world's third largest submarine fleet.
But the submarine story is far from over. The United States itself does not build diesel subs. Some say this is because the U.S. Navy does not want them, and if they are not built in the U.S., Congress will not be tempted to buy them, opting instead for the far more expensive nuclear powered subs.

The existing plans for diesel submarines, however, belong to the Germans and the Dutch, who are unwilling to risk antagonizing the PRC, and thus refuse to license the building of the diesel submarines. Such roadblocks suggest Taiwan might consider building its own submarine fleet. In any event, U.S. officials in Taipei seemed confident the submarines would be built and made available to Taiwan. Other analysts were not so sure. The saga continues.

Sale of the Aegis-technology on the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers is still more tendentious. The AEGIS is the world's most advanced shipboard system for anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense. It provides warships with state-of-the-art air defense capabilities in a variety of theaters and on several fronts -- air, surface, subsurface, and strike.

Of course, the mainland objects strenuously, as expected, but in backing down, the United States is thwarting its own capability for a theater missile defense (TMD, also called Theater Ballistic Missile Defense or TMBD), which could be part of the Bush administration's national missile defense (NMD) plan.

Three points should be added about including Taiwan in the Theater Missile Defense proposal: 

1) Providing TMD to Taiwan has been debatable not only in the United States, but also in Taiwan, and even within the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, 

2) Some believe transferring TMD to Taiwan will encourage Taipei to resist coming to terms with Beijing, 

3) Selling TMD systems to Taiwan will provide the technological rationale for resurrecting U.S.-Taiwan military cooperation, seen by some U.S. analysts as anti-PRC and hence politically unacceptable.

At length we can say the Bush administration has made a strategic change of direction regarding the defense of Taiwan: selling arms to Taiwan is not only in Taiwan's interest, but also in America's strategic national interest. And U.S. policy will not to be dissuaded in its support of Taiwan by the PRC's bad behavior. Second, it is important the United States deliver in a timely manner the diesel submarines it has promised to Taiwan. And third, making the Aegis system available to Taiwan will enable Taiwan to be a front line of security and defense for the United States on the Pacific Rim, and it also will help ensure the PRC does not try to compel Taiwan militarily to capitulate to the mainland. Taiwan's defense is America's defense - now more than ever!