Greater China Jun 22, 2011

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/MF22Ad01.html

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.

(Copyright 2011 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)