"Will not change the military balance": the United States will supply Taiwan with HIMARS missile systems and Harpoon anti-ship missiles

Taiwan continues to arm itself against the backdrop of China's threat to seize the island. The United States is actively helping Taipei in this. According to the Ministry of National Defense of Taiwan, the army will enter service with MLRS HIMARS and anti-ship missiles Harpoon.

The military department of the Republic of China (Taiwan) signed an agreement to purchase a batch of American Lockheed Martin M142 HIMARS missile systems and Boeing Harpoon Coastal Defense Systems (HCDS) mobile coastal anti-ship missile systems. The delivery of weapons will take place under the American program of intergovernmental foreign military sales Foreign Military Sales (FMS).

According to the contracts, the delivery of MLRS should go through 2027, anti-ship missile launchers - by 2028. Taipei did not disclose the number of weapons purchased. However, in October last year, the US State Department notified Congress of the decision to supply Taiwan with 100 coastal defense systems, which include 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, as well as related equipment.

According to open sources, Taiwan will receive 11 M142 combat vehicles of the Lockheed Martin HIMARS ground-based missile system with 64 M57 ATACMS tactical missiles with monoblock warheads and 25 batteries of the HCDS coastal missile system, including 100 mobile launchers, 25 mobile radar posts and 400 anti-ship missiles Boeing RGM-84L-4 Harpoon Block II.

In the United States, the new contract has traditionally been called "consistent with the national interests and security of the United States," and also said that the supply of weapons "supports" Taiwan's efforts to modernize the armed forces and maintain defensive capabilities. At the same time, Washington stressed that the supply of weapons will not change the military balance in the region. In China, most likely, they do not think so.

Comments

[tralflot1832]

And until 2027, what will Taiwan do. They boldly predict a second presidential term for Biden!

[Uncle lee]

the contract has traditionally been called "consistent with the national interests and security of the United States"

Won how Taiwan looks after safety!

[Orange bigg]

And what do you want? Taiwan is primarily about chips; it is a strategic resource. The war for chips is about the conflict between China and the United States. An interesting translation of Steve Blank's article about Huawei, TSMC, actions of Washington and Beijing. Explains the essence of the conflict between China and the United States in Taiwan.

Controlling the production of chips in the XNUMXst century may well be tantamount to controlling the supply of oil in the XNUMXth century. The country that regulates this process can stifle the military and economic power of other states.

The United States recently demonstrated this by barring Chinese giant Huawei from outsourcing chip designs to TSMC, a Taiwanese chip factory.

... There are two types of companies in the chip industry.

Companies such as Intel, Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron design and manufacture their products (microprocessors and memory chips) in their own factories. There are also foundries that make chips designed by commercial and military customers - TSMC in Taiwan is the largest in the world.

Chips manufactured by TSMC are present in almost everything: smartphones (for example, Apple iPhones), high-performance computing platforms, PCs, tablets, servers, base stations and game consoles, IoT devices, digital consumer electronics, cars and almost all weapons systems. built in the twenty-first century. About 60% of the chips produced by TSMC are made for American companies.

The Chinese government is likely mulling its response to the United States restricting access to Taiwan's most advanced chip factories for Huawei. This answer depends on what China wants to achieve. Priorities might look something like this:

Bring back the status quo - restore Huawei's access to TSMC factories to ensure stable supply of chips;
Prevent strengthening constraints;
Take revenge - persuade TSMC / Taiwan to provide China with unique access to TSMC products;
Kicking the table - making sure that TSMC factories cannot be used by anyone.
China's options for action
So how will China achieve these goals?

China may wish to avoid any escalation of the conflict by accepting the US restrictions as they are and making the US promise that they will not go any further. This return to the status quo with the restoration of Huawei's access to the TSMC foundry may simply require negotiating some kind of trade deal or agreeing to restrict the sale of Huawei's networking equipment (34% of the corporation's revenue). Such a deal would allow Huawei Consumer and Huawei Enterprise (66% of revenue) to survive and thrive. However, this requires concessions from the Chinese - and they may have decided that the Rubicon was crossed.

If China does not negotiate and decides to retaliate, the danger could be that the United States will further hike the rate by barring TSMC from working with a large number of Chinese firms and / or banning the sale of equipment used to make chips to any company in China. This escalation could lead China to realize that US action is not a dispute over Huawei, but a salvo in a larger economic war.

If it comes down to it, China's plans will focus not on how to negotiate with the US, but on how to get TSMC to comply with its demands. And since TSMC is located in Taiwan, the province of China, according to the latter, the story can acquire interesting new details.

The most obvious option is simply to carry out a plan that the Chinese government has been threatening since 1949: to reunite China by force, suppressing objections from Taiwan's “rebellious province”.

https://vc.ru/u/177297-voximplant/136397-voyna-za-chipy-stiv-blank-o-konflikte-kitaya-i-ssha

[tralflot1832]

The author is an American, he tells what should China do? The Chinese have read and will answer with the Chinese kavarstvo. In one region of Taiwan interesting Taiwanese won the elections. They have the slogan: Money now, and politics later. Something like this.

[Orange bigg]

The fight around Taiwan is serious and for a long time. So far, too much is tied to Taiwan for one or the other side to yield.

[tralflot1832]

I agree, but China, unlike the United States, opens up a market for Taiwanese goods without restrictions.

[Uncle lee]

Quote: OrangeBigg

the essence of the conflict

Good analytics.

[xorek]

Quote: Uncle Lee

the contract has traditionally been called "consistent with the national interests and security of the United States"

Won how Taiwan looks after safety!

Taiwan is a Chinese territory, according to international law .. And the United States is again prying into their own business, they would only unleash a war somewhere far from their borders, that's the whole point of it ..

[Charik]

Taipei does not disclose information about the number of weapons purchased, or the delivery of MLRS should be completed by 2027, anti-ship missile launchers by 2028. And then: According to available information from open sources (Taipei does not disclose information).

[knn54]

According to international law, support for separatists.
For RK (Taiwan), not a UN member, has no diplomatic relations with the Yankees.
The republic is officially recognized by less than 20 countries, including the Vatican.

[Sofa warrior]

The Republic of China as a state is more years old than the PRC. If Taiwan were bigger, and the PRC was smaller, it would be in the same generally recognized status as the Republic of Korea. And so the Kyrgyz Republic (Taiwan) is doing well and without official recognition. Especially when compared with the DPRK, where the population is the same.

[APASUS]

The distance between mainland China and Taiwan is such that it allows you to destroy everything in Taiwan without even leaving the PLA ships in the world.

[Reserve buildbat]

Interesting ... 100 launchers and 400 harpoons. The launchers there, as far as I remember, are 4-pipe. That is, there are no plans to recharge? Or will there be additional agreements and missile deliveries?

[ivpe211]

it is interesting that the range of these missiles is exactly the same distance to China.