After Months of Arguing, Taiwan Lawmakers Approve $25 Billion for U.S. Arms
With time running out, Taiwanese lawmakers approved funds for buying U.S. weapons, fearing they could lose support if they didn’t act now.
For months, Taiwanese lawmakers have been fighting over a proposal by President Lai Ching-te to spend $40 billion on arms, exposing divisions in the island between a Washington-aligned president and an opposition leader leaning to Beijing. Taiwan had been under pressure from the Trump administration to increase military spending.
On Friday, Taiwan’s legislature finally approved $25 billion in special funds to buy missiles and other weapons from the United States, ending the deadlock ahead of a summit between President Trump and his Chinese counterpart.
China asserts sovereignty over Taiwan and has threatened to claim it by force. The United States provides military and political backing to Taiwan, which many in Washington see as a democratic partner against Beijing.
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, appears likely to press Mr. Trump on Taiwan during their meeting next week. He has already warned that Mr. Trump should handle U.S. arms sales to the island with “extreme caution.”
The summit, and growing pressure to lock in orders of American weapons amid high demand, may have prompted Taiwan’s rival political parties to move toward compromise on Friday.
“The clock was ticking, as there were indications that unless the legislature passed the special defense budget Taiwan would have missed an opportunity to acquire these capabilities,” said David Sacks, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who had previously worked in the United States government dealing with Taiwan, including on arms sales.
Ahead of the summit in Beijing, Taiwan might also be trying to “buy good will with Trump,” signaling that the island is “stepping up and taking its defense seriously,” Mr. Sacks added.
The $25 billion approved by Taiwan’s legislature included money to cover an order of U.S.-made weapons that Washington approved late last year, and around $15 billion for proposed arms purchases that are awaiting approval from the Trump administration. The administration has held off on approving a latest package of arms sales to Taiwan to avoid upsetting Mr. Xi before the summit, U.S. officials said earlier this year.
Taiwan’s arms fund will go toward the purchase of mobile, surface-to-air missiles called Patriots; Hellfire air-to-ground precision missiles; systems to knock out airborne drones; and missiles for striking armored vehicles.
“The general direction of these projects is sound,” said Chieh Chung, an adjunct associate research fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a government-funded body in Taipei.
But the approved budget left out the government’s plans for spending on domestic weapons production. That makes it less clear how quickly Taiwan can build up its homegrown drones and munitions, Mr. Chieh said.
The months of sometimes bitter squabbling in the legislature had highlighted rifts in Taiwan over how to navigate Mr. Trump’s unpredictability and the risks posed by China. Both sides made concessions to reach the budget agreement.
Mr. Lai and his Democratic Progressive Party are deeply wary of China, regard Taiwan as a separate country and support sharper rises in military spending, while the Nationalist Party, Taiwan’s main opposition, has historically tried to keep close ties with both Washington and Beijing. Its chairwoman, Cheng Li-wun, has embraced China and held a friendly meeting with Mr. Xi in Beijing last month.
Mr. Lai had proposed spending $40 billion over eight years for weapons and military technology, in addition to Taiwan’s main annual military budget.
Taiwan’s two main opposition parties, which control a majority of seats in the legislature, had blocked the plan. They accused Mr. Lai of not sharing enough information, complained about a backlog of undelivered weapons from the United States and argued that the large spending on homegrown weapons production could become a fertile ground for corruption.
Ms. Cheng, the chairwoman of the Nationalist Party, eventually agreed to $11 billion in funding for arms sales that had already been approved by the Trump administration last year. But she insisted that additional funds could only be considered after Washington made firm offers of more weapons, which critics said would seriously slow Taiwan’s arms buildup.
Centrist Nationalist politicians appear to have pressed the party to come around to a more generous proposal. They warned that the party’s resistance to expanded military spending might hurt their hopes in local elections late this year, said Dennis Lu-Chung Weng, an associate professor at Sam Houston State University in Texas who is advising a potential Nationalist presidential candidate in 2028.
“That created real political pressure on the party,” he said.
Still, the governing Democratic Progressive Party was dissatisfied with the outcome of negotiations, because it left out spending for domestically made drones and other weapons. All 51 Democratic Progressive lawmakers abstained from the vote.
After the vote, Mr. Lai, the president, called the outcome a “significant step forward” in enhancing Taiwan’s defense. But he lamented the lack of funding for domestic weapons development.
“Any gap will compromise the integrity of the overall defensive system,” Mr. Lai wrote in a statement about the military funding.
Chris Buckley, the chief China correspondent for The Times, reports on China and Taiwan from Taipei, focused on politics, social change and security and military issues.
Amy Chang Chien is a reporter and researcher for The Times in Taipei, covering Taiwan and China.