Taiwan touts benefits to US of its weapons purchases

Taiwan will continue to buy arms from the United States with its purchases boosting employment in at least six US states and narrowing the bilateral trade gap, the government has told the United States, in rare public comment sure to anger China.

Taiwan’s military purchases “have boosted the local economy of and employment in states such as Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Utah, Ohio and Pennsylvania,” the government said as part of the public comment process for a US official probe into the causes of its trade deficits.

Companies like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Sikorsky and BAE Systems have benefited from Taiwan’s purchases of missile defence systems, attack helicopters, fighter jets, and other amphibious assault vehicles, it said. The island’s own efforts to build up an indigenous defence industry would not affect procurement from the US, it added.

Taiwan and the United States usually keep a low profile on their military exchanges because it angers Beijing, which has never renounced the use of force to bring the island under its control.

The United States is the island’s biggest political ally and is obligated under US law to help Taiwan defend itself.