US Senator Josh Hawley on Tuesday proposed legislation that he said would “strengthen Taiwan’s defenses against a Chinese invasion” through training, equipment and other means of support provided by the US.
Taiwan is facing growing intimidation from Beijing and the threat of a Chinese invasion is “expected to reach especially dangerous levels by the latter half of the 2020s,” the proposed “arm Taiwan act of 2021” says.
Taiwan should speed up its deployment of cost-effective and resilient asymmetric defense capabilities to defend itself effectively, the bill says.
Photo: AFP
It stipulates that the US secretary of defense form a “Taiwan Security Assistance Initiative” to help Taiwan achieve this goal.
Under the bill, the US would allocate US$3 billion annually for such an initiative from 2023 through 2027 to provide assistance to the Taiwanese government, such as equipment, training and other support.
Such assistance would be based on Taiwan demonstrating its own commitment to and progress in building a credible asymmetric defense that matches US efforts, it says.
The proposed bill’s annual budget cannot be allocated unless Taiwan invests an equivalent amount in asymmetric defense capabilities during the same period, it says, specifying that Taiwan should commit to spend at least 3 percent of GDP on defense from 2023 to 2027.
Taiwan currently spends about 2.36 percent of GDP on defense, up from 1.84 percent in 2018 and 2.16 percent in 2019, government figures show.
The bill also urges the US government to encourage its allies and partners to “sell, lease or otherwise provide appropriate asymmetric defense capabilities to Taiwan.”
“The Arm Taiwan Act will ensure Taiwan has the asymmetric defenses it needs to deter a Chinese invasion — so long as Taiwan is prepared to make the difficult choices required to defend itself in the hard years ahead,” Hawley said in a statement.
“If China’s recent actions have shown the world anything, it’s that Beijing will stop at nothing in its quest to dominate the Indo-Pacific and then the world,” he said.
“We should do everything in our power to help Taiwan urgently strengthen its defenses,” Hawley wrote.
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