Date unknown, sometime during summer, Trump refused to approve $400 million in military aid to Taiwan. It included munitions, drones, and other lethal aid.
This comes as Trump seeks more to extract from America’s allies than aid them out of shared interests and values. This is seen in his scheme to sell weapons to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which then provides them to Ukraine, as opposed to utilizing lend-lease and the Presidential Drawdown Authority. Taiwan has about $400 million remaining in drawdown authority; $1 billion for it is replenished at the end of the fiscal year, which is in September.
Sometime this week, the Trump administration notified Congress of a $500 million arms sale to Taiwan.
Trump has called for Taiwan to spend a whopping ten percent of its GDP on defense. Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te will accelerate defense expenditures to five percent of GDP by 2030. While Trump has repeatedly claimed that China will not invade Taiwan under his watch, his antipathy toward the small island democracy makes it more likely; he falsely accused Taiwan of “stealing” from America’s semiconductor industry and discouraged Lai from visiting the United States. A meeting between American and Taiwanese defense officials was also cancelled.
Trump is likely using his mistreatment of Taipei to gain favor and leverage with Chinese dictator Xi Jinping, just as he views Ukraine as something of a bargaining chip in his relationship with Putin. While it may appear to be an execution of realism, the international relations theory which emphasizes power as a currency on the global chess board, it is largely a personalist foreign policy—Trump’s admiration for autocrats.
