U.S. Arms Sales to Taiwan

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Taiwan, also referred to as the Republic of China, became the seat for the Chinese nationalists following their defeat by Mao Zedong's Communists on the mainland in 1949 and the corresponding establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC) there. Taiwan has official has full diplomatic relations with fewer than 20 countries worldwide, and lost its United Nations (UN) seat to the PRC in 1971. Since 1949, Beijing has maintained that Taiwan is simply a part of mainland China under its "one China" policy, while Taiwan has claimed independence to varying degrees under different governments.

U.S. arms sales to Taiwan are governed in large part by the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 that Congress passed shortly after the Carter administration ended official relations with Taiwan. Under that Act, the United States "will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and defense services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability." While officially recognizing China and having formal diplomatic relations with Beijing, every presidential administration has since maintained unofficial relations with Taiwan and notified Congress of arms sales to it.

Arms sales to Taiwan have traditionally been controversial to U.S.-Chinese relations, and in recent years U.S. rhetoric  about the dangers China poses has intensified and the possibility of conflict over Taiwan has become more prevalent in the public discourse.

​Experts to contact:  Michael Klare (see also Committee for a SANE U.S.-China Policy), A. Trevor Thrall, Jordan B. Cohen (emerging expert)
Select Timeline, especially as relates to U.S. arms sales to Taiwan and political tensions (see official notifications in the "Additional Resources" section further below)

2021

On December 8, during a Senate hearing, U.S. State and Defense Department officials testified about ongoing efforts to provide military equipment to Taiwan, claiming a focus on asymmetric capabilities and Ely Ratner, the assistant secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific security affairs, saying "bolstering Taiwan’s self-defenses is an urgent task" (see testimony).

On November 15, U.S. President Biden and Chinese President Xi held a virtual meeting, during which Biden reiterated the longstanding U.S. position against a "unilateral" change in Taiwan's status and Xi cautioned the United States against supporting Taiwanese independence, suggesting that would be "playing with fire" (according to state media Global Times).

On November 2, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) introduced the Arm Taiwan Act of 2021. The proposed legislation (full text) would establish a new "Taiwan Security Assistance Initiative" which would deliver $3 billion in security assistance to Taiwan per year in support of "asymmetric" Taiwanese defenses. The legislation would also make said assistance conditional on Taiwan spending at least 3% of its national GDP on defense. An anonymous Taiwanese lawmaker told Newsweek that the legislation "could plug a 'most dangerous' gap" in the island nation's defenses.

Over the weekend of October 1, China flew an estimated 80 planes through Taiwanese airspace, once again breaking its largest sortie record. On October 7, the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. Marines and special operations forces were deployed to Taiwan, where they had been training Taiwanese ground and naval forces for approximately a year. The day after the story broke, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry reiterated China’s promise to “take all necessary measures to protect its sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

On September 15, President Biden and prime ministers Boris Johnson (UK) and Scott Morrison (Australia) jointly announced the formation of AUKUS, a trilateral security partnership that includes controversial provisions to facilitate the development of Australian nuclear submarines. The Chinese foreign ministry called the alliance “extremely irresponsible” and a product of “obsolete cold war zero sum mentality and narrow-minded geopolitical concepts.”

On August 4, Congress received its first Taiwan arms sale notification from the Biden administration. 

On June 15, a record-breaking 28 Chinese aircraft flew through Taiwanese airspace. 

2017-2020 (Trump administration)

By the end of 2020, the Trump administration had formally notified Congress of more than $18 billion in potential FMS purchases by Taiwan, with the $8 billion notification in 2019 for F-16s being the largest notification by far. 

On September 17 2020, amid escalating anti-China rhetoric from the Trump administration, the New York Times reported that the Trump administration was orchestrating “the sale of seven large packages of weapons to Taiwan, including long-range missiles that would allow Taiwanese jets to hit distant Chinese targets in the event of a conflict.” The State Department provided notifications to Congress for three of the seven sales on October 12. The next day, China’s foreign ministry promised to take all “legitimate and necessary” steps in response to the planned Taiwan arms sales. On October 26, Congress received the fourth arms sale notification. Arms sales notifications in 2020 totaled more than $5.8 billion. The Security Assistance Monitor estimates that Taiwan was the second-highest recipient of offers for U.S. arms sales in 2019 and the fifth-highest recipient in 2020.

On August 20, 2019, after months of anticipation, the Trump administration formally notified Congress of the possible sale of 66 F-16 fighter aircraft to Taiwan for $8 billion, drawing greater attention to U.S.-Taiwan arms sales. During the weeks of October 12 and September 14, major US media reports indicated that additional significant arms sales were under consideration, some of which were notified on October 21, October 26, and November 3 (see Reuters and NYT, for examples; lists of official notifications are below).

At the time of the F-16 notification in 2019, cross-strait relations appeared particularly tense. Tsai Ing-Wen, president of Taiwan since 2016, had publicly criticized the "one country, two systems" consensus viewed by Beijing as assurance that Taiwan will not seek full independence. Xi Jinping, president of China since 2012, retaliated against Tsai's pro-independence tendencies by pressuring countries to sever relations with Taiwan and placing financial strains on Chinese investment and tourism spending in Taiwan.

Obama administration and longer timeframe

According to the Congressional Research Service, the Obama administration (2009-2017) notified Congress of more than $14 billion in Foreign Military Sales (FMS) and licensed another $6.2 billion in Direct Commercial Sales (DCS) to Taiwan.

From 1979 to 2020, 77% of major conventional arms imported by Taiwan were of U.S. origin, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)’s arms transfers database. ​
Foreign Military Sales (FMS) Notifications​ * * because data on direct commercial sales (DCS) is less readily available, it is not included here; for more on DCS sales to India, see the Security Assistance Monitor arms sales database.
Additional Resources

U.S. Defense and State Departments Congress​
Other pages​ or publications