SinoDefence Forum

Aero_Wing_32

Sure, a good News before another/bigger one? Perhaps?!

Mr T

Quite possibly. Reuters is reporting that there may be notifications before Christmas.

We will have to see when it happens. I'm guessing that any notifications will be made public after Copenhagen has finished, possibly on 18th December given the time lag between Denmark and the US.

kliu0

And I thought I could get the news out before you guys

Seems nice but its still missing the main masterpiece, the F-16s.

Taipei times has a more in depth report on the signal for the potential arms sales.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/fron.../11/2003460681

The submarines are interesting, but then again it could just be an empty notification unless we see actual evidence that a US firm has found a foreign partner to build the submarines.

This is just a house-cleaning done by the Obama administration, pushing forward arms sales delayed/frozen by the Bush administration. Unless the Obama administration sells something new or symbolic, its a bit of a stumble in terms of Taiwan-US relations.

adeptitus

Is it just me, or has Taipei times web site gotten a lot slower this year? It took a long time to load the link from above post.

kliu0

It's not just you, I noticed as well that the website is really slow to load. I have no idea why. I first thought that it might be the long distance connection from Taiwan to Australia, but after coming back to Taiwan it is still very very slow. Do you use Taiwan News? The website used to be really reliable (loading wise), but now since around mid year, it got really slow or just wouldn't even load at all.

If Taiwan won't get the F-16s....why not use that money to buy some M1A2s then? The money is allocated annually and is put to waste, because the US won't sell the F-16s. I mean they could buy the tanks already, and wait until the US is willing to sell the F-16s then they allocate more money. It's so simple.

Aero_Wing_32

OMG, IF this news is confirmed , it s a terrible one for the taiwanese air defense...

French support is becoming the only chance is this intricate situation... if they only have the guts for this kind of deal.

(I copy the news below there, coz the TTimes site is really slow tonight. )

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/fron.../12/2003460729

Taipei Times - F-16 prospects looking bleaker

By William Lowther
STAFF REPORTER , WASHINGTON

It now appears increasingly unlikely that US President Barack Obama will agree to sell advanced F-16 C/D fighter aircraft to Taiwan.
During a congressional hearing on Wednesday, Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Defense Trade Robert Kovac told Reuters that Obama was moving toward selling Taiwan UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters and design work on diesel-electric submarines.

Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC-3) missiles were still under consideration, he said.

But he made no mention of the fighters, which are the most controversial item on Taipei’s list of desired weapons to defend itself from a Chinese attack.

Assistant US Secretary of State Philip Crowley was asked on Thursday if he could confirm Kovac’s remarks, which were made exclusively to Reuters during a break in his testimony.

“Well, I’m not going to get into any detail on any kind of arms list. We obviously have ongoing discussions with Taiwan. The United States makes available to Taiwan defense articles and services that are necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability,” Crowley said.

“And, you know, Taiwan has on an ongoing basis made requests of us, that we continue to evaluate them, and we’ve made no decisions,” he said.

A reporter asked Crowley if he had any comment on a Chinese statement that Beijing was opposed to selling any arms to Taiwan.

“On this particular issue, I doubt seriously that our position has changed and I doubt seriously that the Chinese position has changed,” Crowley said.

Later, at a State Department briefing on a wide range of issues, Crowley was asked: “Back to Taiwan, it seems like the F-16 C/Ds have been taken out of the shopping list.”

Crowley said firmly: “I’m not going down that shopping list.”

A number of Washington-based experts said later that they were fairly certain that Obama had decided not to sell the F-16s to Taiwan. They said they believed this was because such a sale would cause China to break off the military-to-military contacts it had recently re-established with the US, and that these contacts are a top priority for the Pentagon and Obama.

John Pike, head of the Global Security think tank in Washington, said that Obama was “kowtowing” to Beijing, but that it was also significant that Taipei had not raised a hue-and-cry about the F-16s even though it must have known for some time that it would not be getting them.

“They have not made a big issue out of this. They have just accepted it,” Pike said.

Earlier, at the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing involving Kovac, Representative Brad Sherman, a Democrat, said: “Taiwan has expressed an interest in purchasing F-16 aircraft. Given the violence done to the American economy by the illegal actions of China in so many economic spheres, for us to accede to Chinese concerns in not providing the F-16s to Taiwan seems to add not insult to injury but injury to injury.”

Kovac was asked during the hearing what effect the US sales of military aircraft, like F-22s to Japan and F-16s to Taiwan, would have on the security environment in the Pacific region.

“Well, in any export there is going to be a positive and negative effect — you increase your friends, decrease the enemy,” Kovac said. “And in each of those cases, when we receive the request, we look at it very seriously to balance both the national security and foreign policy of the US, of that country and the potential regional impacts.”

He was then asked: “So, if you had your druthers about this, you would say we need to move ahead and try to respond to Japan’s request for our F-22s and Taiwan for our F-16s?”

“Absolutely. The State Department isn’t in the trade advocacy business,” Kovac said.


Saturday, Dec 12, 2009

Semi-Lobster

Didn't AIDC say they had a 'backup plan' for an indigenous aircraft in case the F-16 did not go through?

Aero_Wing_32

Don't you think now, that any kind of warplanes sale to Taiwan (USA side) seems blocked for good! I mean, for years...

Totoro

Maybe it is for the better. The balance in the strait has already come to a point where spending large sums of money into modern fighter planes may not be the wisest investment, defence capability wise. Perhaps it'd be wiser to use those funds for additional radar and SAM networks, for which Taiwan already has enough know how to materialize as a domestic product, not so susceptible to various political pressure from mainland China.

Semi-Lobster

Indeed, I think we can expect attack helicopters and trainers but I don't see anything as advanced as the F-16 crossing over to the ROC anytime soon. This is going to be a real test for Ma and what he plans next or if he has long term contingency plans for defence that are not directly linked to the US. There still remains a serious hole in the ROCAF, something has to begin replacing, at the very least, the F-5E/Fs soon.

Aero_Wing_32

This aging fleet of F-5, useless for air combat, and considered to be dangerous by some observers, must be retired as soon as possible. They can perhaps be replaced by the Mirage 2000-9 fleet from the Arabian Emirates airforce. A plane that is pretty similar to F-16 C/D and excellent in term of performance, radar and avionic. This is the only opportunity, cheaper indeed! Of course this option is over, if France can t resist political pressure from China. In the 90s, french officials weren't afraid of PRC. But things have changed... Otherwise, the upgrade of the rest of the fleet seems quite vital now, without the "brand" new 60 F-16 C/D from the USA.

Mr T

AIDC's backup plan for a domestic replacement for the F-5s is new IDF block C/Ds. Given that the existing fleet is being upgraded it would be strange to stop Taiwan building new ones.

As for a future jet, Obama isn't going to block Taiwan getting any assistance from the US. He'd only do that if he supported China's stance on arms sales, in which case he wouldn't sell anything. It's a lot easier to allow US companies to sell parts for a Taiwanese plane than it is to sell a finished US product.

I'm not so sure it's F-16s this year or never. I expected it to be more like next year. I think the US will see how China reacts over the upcoming sales. And it's hard to know how it might respond to the reaction. If China doesn't do anything it might take it as a sign it can continue sales. If China reacts too hard the US might decide there's little to lose by selling F-16s. But even if the US says no to new F-16s (as opposed to upgrades to the existing fleet), Taiwan should invest in building a successor to the IDF.

Mr T

Military optimistic on US arms sales to Taiwan

I don't take that as meaning they'll never be sold.

Aero_Wing_32

But when, pal?? I seriously doubt warplanes would be sold to Taiwan under this Obama administration... besides he focuses now on the military ties between USA and PRC...

kliu0

Obama's "change" has hit Taiwan. I'm gonna be honest, I'm not looking forward to any arms sales from the Obama administration, its gonna be bad. If it was the other guy, Taiwan would've had F-16s by now already

This serves once again as a nice wake up call, to the Taiwan government. The F-16s won't be sold for quite a while....invest in something else - UAVs for the army, upgrades for the M60 tanks, buying new M1A2 tanks, more SAM sites? Something that the US is more willing to sell that is less sensitive and is needed by the Taiwanese military, as China really only cares about F-16 sales.

BTW, I was reading an article in the newspaper the other day. Taiwan tried to contact French military officials about procuring French tanks as they were lighter, and better suited Taiwan's terrain = no response from French officials.