TAIPEI - Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou
and his Kuomintang (KMT) party faces a tough
battle for re-election in January 2012. Beijing
desperately wants him to win, and that Washington
favors him over his challenger, opposition leader
Tsai Ing-wen, isn't a secret either.
With
the timely authorization of an upgrade of the
Taiwan air force's F-16A/B fleet, the United
States could provide Ma, who is domestically
constantly criticized for letting the guard down
against China, with some political ammunition for
the home front. There are also reasons to believe
Beijing would tone down its rhetoric against
military support, and tolerance to some extent
even has been indicated by
China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) itself.
Few observers doubt that next year's
legislative and presidential elections on January
14 will be hotly contested. Countless recent
opinion polls have been showing KMT's Ma on par
with the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP)
Tsai.
This is immensely worrisome to
Beijing. President Hu Jintao, scheduled to retire
his party post in late 2012 and presidency in
early 2013, wants to make a peaceful breakthrough
on the Taiwan issue as his legacy, much like the
return of Hong Kong in 1997 is something for which
Deng Xiaoping will forever be remembered. And, it
can safely be assumed that the polls have also
been annoying Washington as memories of troubles
the previous DPP administration under Chen
Shui-bian brought to US-China relations have yet
to fully fade away.
What at least makes
Beijing bite its nails is weighty indicators that
Taiwan's voters have already made up their minds.
New developments that bombarded the island's TV
screens during May and the first half of June
failed to make public support tilt to either side.
While the imposition of the popular
"luxury tax", aimed at making housing affordable
to low-income earners, did not help Ma, neither
could Tsai's side take much advantage from either
a leaked World Health Organization (WHO) memo
proving that WHO officials refer to Taiwan as a
"province of China", or the biggest food safety
scandal ever to hit the island, after the
discovery of industrial plasticizer in beverages,
jams and other products, which threatened the
health of innumerable children.
For a
decade, Taipei has been requesting F-16C/Ds from
the US to upgrade its aging air force. Since
taking office in 2008, Ma, despite his hallmark
course of engagement with Beijing, has on numerous
occasions called on the US to authorize the deal.
A strong defense will give Taiwan leverage on the
cross-strait negotiation table, he repeatedly
says. But also domestically, a defense-related
breakthrough during the remainder of his term
would help Ma in numerous ways.
It would
take the wind out of the DPP's nagging allegations
that Ma's administration recklessly "sells out
Taiwan", and that he lets the military wither. It
would decisively counter the notion that after his
re-election, Beijing can force him into something
the majority of the Taiwanese clearly doesn't
want, namely starting talks on unification.
Perhaps most importantly, by persuading
the Barack Obama administration to give a nod to
F-16s, Ma could prove he's on the right terms with
both Washington and Beijing, something none of his
predecessors ever achieved. An F-16 breakthrough
at this stage would show to the Taiwanese public
that Ma has indeed mastered the balancing act
between US and China, and hardly any Taiwanese
would deny that the mastering of this very
balancing act is imperative to Taiwan's future.
Also according to opinion polls, US
weapons are what the public wants. All past
surveys show most Taiwanese believe that Taiwan
must not stop purchasing weapons from the US, and
intriguingly, shouldn't stop even if China were to
disarm unilaterally.
On the other side
stands Beijing. The Chinese leadership has all
along warned that it would consider F-16C/Ds for
Taiwan a "red line" that Washington mustn't cross.
Recently, however, Beijing became less ambiguous
about what lies beyond the line.
When, in
a late May visit to the United States, General
Chen Bingde, chief of the PLA's general staff, was
asked to what extent future arms sales to Taipei
would affect the Sino-US relationship, he said:
"As to how bad the impact of US arms sales to
Taiwan will be, it would depend on the nature of
the weapons sold to Taiwan."
At that time,
observers interpreted his statement likely
signaled that an F-16A/B upgrade was within the
red line, whereas sales of F-16C/Ds were not. When
in early June, the authoritative Defense News
reported that the Obama administration might allow
its military contractors to upgrade Taiwan's
F-16A/B either later this year or next year, it
seemed as if things at long last had started
moving.
Asia Times Online asked both
foreign and local experts to what extent an
F-16A/B upgrade later this year would increase
Ma's chances of re-election. They were also
questioned on whether Washington would contemplate
authorizing the upgrade to ensure Ma would stay in
power, and whether - for the same reason - Beijing
would accept the upgrade.
"Both brand-new
F-16s or upgrades of old ones would be to Ma's
benefit, but the F-16C/D sale would help him even
more,'' said Wang Jyh-perng, an associate research
fellow at the Association for Managing Defense and
Strategies, who has been involved in previous
weapon procurements for the Taiwanese military.
''There's no way Tsai could oppose the deal,"
Wang said that Beijing desperately wants
Ma to win while "the Obama administration
seemingly also hopes likewise." However, he said
he doubted that an urge to compromise would compel
Beijing to agree on the F-16 issue, and he pointed
to a discrepancy between Washington's and Taipei's
objectives.
"Regarding the deal, the
United States and Taiwan have different
interests,'' said Wang. ''To make maximum profit,
the US defense industry wants the upgrade first,
then sell F-16C/Ds later. But as Taiwan's defense
budget has its limitations, after the F-16A/B
upgrade, procurement of F-16C/Ds is not very
likely to happen."
Authorization of the
upgrade would likely happen shortly before the
Taiwan election rather than after, Wang said. "In
order to avoid messing up Ma's campaign, Beijing
would only protest a little."
Steve Tsang,
director of the University of Nottingham's China
Policy Institute, holds that a timely F-16 deal
should help Ma, but probably not much. "The Ma
team will make the most of it, but it will mainly
serve to reassure the voters that Ma is serious
about defending Taiwan", he said Tsang, adding
that voters are more concerned with livelihood
issues than defense. "The same old Clintonian
observation - it's the economy, stupid - now
applies to Taiwan's national level elections."
Tsang doubted Washington would upgrade the
F-16A/B fleet to influence the outcome of the
presidential election. While Beijing would like to
help Ma get re-elected, it wouldn't go so far as
far as to signal Washington that the upgrading
should proceed, he said.
"When it gets to
arms sale to Taiwan, Beijing takes a hardline
stance. I don't think domestic politics in China
will allow its top leader to take risk over this.
It will neither signal Washington what can be
sold, nor which weapon system should be upgraded,
and it will protest strongly for all major arms
packages," Tsang said.
Tsang concluded
that his assessment should not be taken as meaning
that the US will not sell or upgrade Taiwan's
defense capability. "The F-16 upgrade is simply
essential for Taiwan to maintain a basic credible
defense capability. It is in the USA's interest to
proceed."
Bonnie S Glaser, senior fellow
with the Center for Strategic and International
Studies Freeman Chair in China Studies, subscribes
to the notion that the US is unlikely to make
decisions that are blatantly aimed at boosting
Ma's re-election chances. At the same time,
however, she finds it reasonable that some in
Washington hold that Ma has pursued a policy of
easing tensions and reduced the risk of war, and
that he should be rewarded with further
improvements in US-Taiwan relations.
"Some
in Taiwan might argue that getting a US entry visa
waiver (for Taiwanese citizens) would help Ma's
re-election chances even more than purchasing US
weapons. There are also other issues on the agenda
such as a bilateral extradition agreement. The
upcoming elections in January may provide an
impetus and further momentum to make some
achievements on these issues that have been stuck
in the US bureaucracy,'' Glaser said.
Although the PLA's Chen Bingde did cause a
stir by stating that China's reaction will depend
on what weapons are sold, Glaser said she has
never heard anyone from Beijing making the
argument that China will tolerate a US arms sale
for the sake of helping Ma get re-elected.
"The Chinese always argue that arms sales
will have a very negative impact on US-China
relations, urging the US to return to its
commitments under the August 17, 1982 Communique
[in which the US declares its intent to gradually
decrease its sale of arms to Taiwan],'' Glaser
said. ''The F-16A/B upgrade is quite expensive,
and I think the Chinese are worried that a very
large package will trigger a negative domestic
response that will be difficult for the leadership
to manage. Of course, sale of the F16C/Ds would be
even more difficult.''
The question that
arises is what kind of negative domestic response
in China would be triggered by a DPP victory, and
how difficult it would be for the Chinese
leadership to manage the backlash.
Taiwanese scholars say Ma cannot hope to
benefit from weapon procurement as Taiwan's voters
generally don't give too much thought towards the
details of national security,
The number
of Taiwanese whose votes could possibly be
influenced by Ma reaching a breakthrough on F-16s
- or failing to do so - will hardly be significant
because the topic fails to polarize society
enough, according to Tsai Chia-hung of the
Election Study Center at Taiwan's National
Chengchi University, "On one hand, very few
Taiwanese would want to go to war for
independence,'' said Tsai. ''But on the other
hand, less than 30% of them would agree that
self-defense is not necessary.''
Wang
Yeh-lih, chairman of the Department of Political
Science of National Taiwan University, is in
agreement: "F-16s will not be an important issue
during the election campaigns, and neither will
the voters in Taiwan be interested in this
issue.''
Jens Kastner is a
Taipei-based journalist.
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2011 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights
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