SinoDefence Forum

adeptitus

I have a feeling that heads will roll for this...


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationwo...0,632695.story

U.S. mistakenly ships missile parts to Taiwan

Officials say the shipment of non-nuclear electrical fuses was a Department of Defense process error and that the components have since been returned.
By Ben DuBose, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
10:03 AM PDT, March 25, 2008

WASHINGTON -- U.S. officials said today that non-nuclear parts for an intercontinental ballistic missile were mistakenly shipped to Taiwan in 2006 and that an investigation had been started.

Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne said at a Pentagon news conference that the items sent to Taiwan were four electrical fuses for nose cone assemblies for ICBMs. Wynne said the fuses have been returned and are at a U.S. base.

"It could not be construed as being nuclear material," Wynne said. "It is a component for the fuse in the nose cone for a nuclear system. We are all taking this very seriously."

The government of China views Taiwan as a part of China and strongly opposes U.S. arms sales to Taiwan, making the matter particularly sensitive.

According to Wynne, the fuses were shipped between Air Force bases in 2005 before they were mistakenly sent to Taiwan the following year.

Officials in Taiwan notified the U.S. government of the error.

"Preliminary information indicates that a shipment took place in response to a Foreign Military Sales Order from Taiwan for helicopter batteries," Wynne said. "The Defense Logistics Agency mistakenly shipped these items instead of the requested batteries."

Ryan Henry, the second-ranking policy official in the office of Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, said both Gates and President Bush were told about the incident on Friday.

At the news conference, Wynne reiterated that the incident was merely a process error and was not indicative of a shift in policy.

"In an organization as large as the DOD, the largest and most complex in the world, there will be mistakes," he said. "But they cannot be tolerated in the arena of strategic systems, whether they are nuclear or only associated equipment. Our policy on Taiwan arms sales has not changed."

kw64

Here's the link to the very interesting news just came out several minutes ago:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/03/25/taiwan.missiles/index.html

Apparently nuclear warhead fuses and helicopter batteries look the "same" I guess

I wonder why Taiwan decided to wait 2 years before notifying U.S. that they got some highly classified materials. Could they have reverse engineered those warhead fuses?

TerraN_EmpirE

opps.....

Heh our bad.....

AssassinsMace

Even though personally I believe it was a simple mistake, I'm going to love reading all the conspiracy theories coming out of this one. Just like the Chinese embassy bombing in Yugoslavia... again I believed it was a simple error but surprisingly, not from the Chinese side, all the theories that it was intentional because China had that hulk of that F-117 shot down in its embassy or the Chinese were transmitting military intelligence to the Serbs was the real reason it was bombed. Making it look intentional is better than looking like you can make a mistake.

In this case, I find all the dates and times being a point of scrutiny. And does the Tibet situation play a role on why this information was release at this time in order to minimize the criticism from all circles? And it was the Taiwanese that had to inform the Pentagon that they had nuclear fuses missing from their inventory. Look at the long chain of mistakes they're definitely going to find out of this. Meaning the grander the conspiracies.

kliu0

Man, this is terrible. Imagine Taiwan ordering further weapons. They might give Taiwan all the wrong ones.

kliu0

They (US officials) examined it. It didn't seem that they had been tampered with. But hopefully Taiwan officials have taken a look at what the damn thing is and reverse engineered it. This with the rumored nuclear weapons of Taiwan will give Taiwan an edge, and will kill lots of commies if they ever invade Taiwan.

Finn McCool

Ha ha yeah I can imagine. Taiwan drives up to the international US weapons drive thru window, but the guy got Taiwan's order all wrong. Next time they'll go to Dassault-Burger, if you know what I mean.

Well as Assasin's Mace said, this will undoubtedly cause some conspiracies; I can imagine Iran accusing the US of transfering nuclear materials.

__________________
Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.
-Winston Churchill

Schumacher

The Taiwanese are likely more than capable to technically. It's no secret they had nuclear weapons programs few decades ago but is said to have been shutdown long ago.

optionsss

Personally, taiwan needs a more creditable defence than a rumored weapons program with a out-dated fuse.

alwaysfresh

Wow I wonder how Beijing is going to react. This cannot be acceptable action.

tphuang

beijing will react, but if it's an honest mistake, then they should just let this go. Especially with KMT in power now, I'm at least hoping for a period of calm in the area.

kliu0

It's not outdated fuse, its just old technology. I mean hell, if you put the fuse with all the other nuclear warhead components. There you have it = a nuke. Thats what Taiwan is hoping to achieve. Its the best deterrent and the best secret weapon. Imagine if China does invade, Taiwan drops a nuke = good bye hundreds of thousands of commie troops.

AssassinsMace

Hundreds of thousand of commie troops? How about bye bye Taiwan after that?

kliu0

why would it be bye bye Taiwan. I mean all amphibious invasions taken place in the history of this world have had a central landing area. If Taiwan drops a nuke on the invading force, it would take out the hundreds of thousands of troops. There would have to be much debate onto where it can be dropped so it can deal the max damage while maintaining minimal damage to the area. Anyway if Chinese troops do survive they will die of radiation, and fighter planes cant enter the area as it is highly radioactive and the EMP wave will take out all the electronics. Both sides will suffer, but the highest sufferer will be China. Its only a theory but yea....

AssassinsMace

And you would think Taiwan can take out every nuke China has? Taiwan is a small island. It doesn't take much. What? Is this the magic nuke theory? Since Taiwan will have zero population, who's the one that suffered more?