Washington's policy of strangling China, US militarisation of Taiwan

Less than 150 miles from China's south-eastern coast lies Taiwan, a mountainous and volcanic island which is about a third the size of Cuba. Yet with 23 million people, Taiwan has twice the population of its Caribbean counterpart. From the 1950s until the present moment, Taiwan has been a crucial piece in the Pentagon's chess game of hemming China in along its coast, and limiting Beijing's oxygen supply.

China constitutes America's principal rival in the international arena today. Washington has increasingly surrounded its Chinese adversary with bases, troops and territories controlled by the United States in east Asia and the Pacific – such as the US client allies of Japan, South Korea and the Philippines, along with other islands dominated by US military power like Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and indeed Taiwan.

To Beijing, Taiwan is of high importance. Its close proximity to the Chinese mainland is similar again to that of Cuba in relation to America. It is normal that a major power like China is concerned regarding what unfolds inside or near its boundaries. Taiwan is a relatively prosperous and diverse area, one which the Chinese government would wish dearly to have under its auspices, therefore dislodging it from US control. In January 2019, president Xi Jinping said that Taiwan “must and will be reunited” with China, but such an outcome seems a slim possibility in the foreseeable future. 

Taiwan is positioned within 500 miles of two of China's most affluent and influential places, Shanghai and Hong Kong, both of which are situated in south-eastern China.

The Financial Times erroneously describes Taiwan as a “de facto independent island” (3). For over 60 years, Washington has utilised Taiwan as a proxy region dating to the two-term presidency of General Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961). Between 1957 and 1958, the Eisenhower administration began shipping MGM-1 Matador cruise missiles to Taiwan in great secrecy, soon furnished with nuclear warheads, all virtually unknown to the Taiwanese and Chinese populaces.

From January 1958, these Matador missiles on Taiwan were being armed with Mark 5 nuclear bombs with a destructive force ranging from 6 to 120 kilotons, up to eight times more powerful than the Hiroshima atomic weapon.

By the end of Eisenhower's tenure in 1961, there were around a dozen Matador nuclear-armed missiles on Taiwan, within reach not only of Shanghai and Hong Kong but also Guangzhou, a city then with over a million inhabitants, and which is today China's fifth most populated urban centre. Hong Kong would surely not have been on the target list, as at the time it was a British dependency; but Guangzhou, like Shanghai, is positioned less than 500 miles from Taiwan. 

The range of a Matador cruise missile consisted of a maximum 600 miles, and it was a weapon which flew at almost the speed of sound, meaning – in the event of a planned US nuclear assault – Shanghai and Guangzhou would presumably have been among the first Chinese cities to face destruction, due to the ongoing presence of nuclear missiles in Taiwan.

The Matador was the first American surface-to-surface cruise missile ever built. US nuclear weapons pointed towards China remained on Taiwanese soil for over 15 years, through the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations, before they were at last removed in 1975. (4)

President Eisenhower, as early as December 1954, had dispatched the planet's largest ship to the Taiwan Strait, the U.S.S. Midway, America's 300-plus metre long, nuclear-armed aircraft carrier – as a response to a conflict which broke out between US-backed groups and Beijing's forces, called “the First Taiwan Strait crisis” (September 1954 to May 1955), also known as the First Quemoy crisis, among other names. This was all occurring astride China's south-eastern frontiers, and nowhere near US shorelines.

During the skirmishes, in which nearly a thousand Chinese were killed, the Eisenhower government threatened to attack China with nuclear bombs as “a last resort”. This was communicated to Mao Zedong in separate statements and moves.

In the opinion of Eisenhower's Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, these nuclear threats upon China led to “the negotiated resolution of the crisis” (5). As tensions were rising, on 12 September 1954 the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, a senior military body advising the president, recommended the nuclear option against China. (6)

The Chinese nation was previously the subject of US nuclear attack warnings, as Eisenhower sent secret atomic threats to Beijing in order “to maintain a settlement in Korea in 1953”, at the Korean War's conclusion. (7)

In the mid-1950s, China lacked a primary deterrent to US nuclear strikes, as Beijing did not develop atomic weapons until October 1964. US government threats to unleash nuclear warfare on China during the First Taiwan Strait Crisis, may have been the spark that finally ignited Mao Zedong's decision, in January 1955, to begin his country's nuclear weapons program, with China facing possible annihilation.

Even then, the CIA knew six months in advance – by April 1964 – that the Chinese were soon to test their first atomic bomb, thanks to the spy activities carried out by a CIA-trained Tibetan guerrilla, unnamed; who decades later was interviewed by US journalist Thomas Laird, corroborating the story. CIA sources highlight that this Tibetan guerrilla's covert operations comprised “some of the most valuable intelligence of the entire Cold War”. (8)

Sailing around Taiwanese shores, the U.S.S. Midway was carrying Mark 8 nuclear bombs, one of which has a yield of 25 to 30 kilotons, more powerful than either the Hiroshima (15 kilotons) or Nagasaki bombs (21 kilotons).

The U.S.S. Midway had a prior history of holding stashes of nuclear weapons aboard; and in late 1952, she was cruising through Mediterranean waters with Mark 7 nuclear bombs on her deck, ranging in firepower from 8 kilotons to 61 kilotons. 

Across the decades, successive US governments have sold tens of billions worth of military hardware to Taiwan. In 1993 for instance, president Bill Clinton dispatched 200 Patriot missiles and related equipment to Taiwan (9). This on its own was a serious provocation of Beijing, and one can imagine the reaction were the Chinese government to send sophisticated missile systems to Cuba. It is merely the tip of the iceberg, however.

During two terms in office ending in 2001, Clinton sold an array of war materiel to Taiwan, including torpedoes, other missile types, helicopters, tanks and warships, worth billions of dollars. 

In more recent times, selling of arms to Taiwan under president Barack Obama was considerable too, including 60 Black Hawk helicopters at a total price of $3 billion in 2010. Another 114 Patriot missile systems were shipped there by the Obama administration, costing almost $3 billion. Obama furthermore sold Taiwan high-tech guided missiles, Assault Amphibious Vehicles (AAVs), Browning Machine Guns, along with the continuation of a pilot training program and logistics support to Taiwanese forces, among other things. 

Supplies of US military equipment to Taiwan are increasing under president Donald Trump. His cabinet has sold 66 F-16 fighter aircraft to the island, at a significant $8 billion. Trump has moreover sent tanks to Taiwan, along with a collection of expensive missiles and torpedoes accompanied with spare parts for other equipment. Taiwan was also compelled in recent months to buy billions of dollars worth of US beef, corn and soybeans. This is the “de facto independent island” that the Financial Times informs its readers about.

Taiwan continues to be governed by a US-friendly outfit, led by Tsai Ing-wen, who received much of her third level education in New York and London. President Tsai pursues close relations with the Americans, and late last year she called for a "bilateral trade agreement" between Taiwan and America. She has met numerous US officials, including John McCain, who she can be seen smiling with in images shot during the summer of 2016.

Notes:

5 Daniel Ellsberg, The Doomsday Machine, (Bloomsbury Publishing; UK ed. edition, 7 Dec. 2017)

6 Bruce A. Elleman, High Seas Buffer: The Taiwan Patrol Force, 1950-1979, (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 7 Aug. 2012) p. 39

7 Daniel Ellsberg, The Doomsday Machine, (Bloomsbury Publishing; UK ed. edition, 7 Dec. 2017)

8 Thomas Laird, Into Tibet, The CIA’s First Atomic Spy and His Secret Expedition to Lhasa (Grove Press; First Trade Paper edition, 13 Mar. 2003) preface, XV

9 Tyler Marshall, “Taiwan Test-Fires 3 U.S. Patriot Missiles”, Los Angeles Times, 21 June 2001, https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2001-jun-21-mn-12882-story.html

10 Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, The World Disorder: US Hegemony, Proxy Wars, Terrorism and Humanitarian Catastrophes (Springer; 1st ed. 2019 edition, 4 Feb. 2019) p. 202