Why is it a big deal that Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen will lay over in Los Angeles before heading to Paraguay? The Taiwan Travel Act allows Taiwan officials to enter the country and meet US officials and Taiwan expatriates, to the annoyance of China atimes.com/article/taiwan…
While in LA, Tsai delivered speech at RR Library and met with key lawmakers: Cory Gardner, chair of Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia; Ed Royce, outgoing chair, House Foreign Affairs Committee; Brad Sherman, Subcommittee on Asia-Pacific
Unlike her predecessor Ma Ying-jeou, Tsai goes out of way to publicize her itinerary to let people know she's making use of the Taiwan Travel Act. Brad Sherman sponsored the act which passed House & Senate unanimously in Feb and became law in March 2018
Trump also signed today McCain's National Defense Authorization Act that strengthens Taiwan's armed forces and expands security cooperation w/Taiwan. The Act allows providing Taiwan w/"defensive weapons" and makes possible military exercises and training taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3506331
All this while Trump bars the sale of F-35 stealth jets for 90 days to Turkey. Turkey is a key parts manufacturer but its role in the F-35 program is being assessed after it purchased Russian S-400 surface-to-air missiles with some anti-stealth capability
Providing Taiwan with F-35 fighter jets would be the next logical step but not clear if NDAA clears the way for that. That would be the 'envelope China' strategy to go along with Quad 4 Diamond (US-Japan-India-Oz) to frustrate China's military expansion
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