Nervous

The Taiwanese are nervous that the Chinese continue to build up their forces with an eye to capturing Taiwan.

And they are nervous that America won't sell Taiwan new fighters to gain favor with China and in annoyance that Taiwan hasn't acted on a 2001 offer of submarines, air defense missiles, and ASW aircraft.

Instead of being nervous and just publicly worrying, the Taiwanese should focus on defending themselves. They can afford it. Indeed, how can they afford not to?

As for the F-16s the Taiwanese want, I can understand why we may be balking. Without sufficient ammunition, hardened shelters, runway repair capability, and anti-missile defenses, those new planes could be put out of action by those hundreds of Chinese missiles (700+ and counting) pointed at Taiwan. Take out the runways and air defenses with GPS-guided missiles and then strafe the planes on the ground. Obsolete Chinese planes have the advantage over advanced Taiwanese planes if the Chinese planes are flying and the Taiwanese planes can't fly.

We may simply not want Taiwan to waste limited defense money on weapons that are lower down on the priority list to improve Taiwanese defenses. I suppose we could be really opposed to the sale for practical reasons yet are trying to get some points with China to use against North Korea by just saying we are doing it for China's sake. Hard to say. But I find it hard to believe we'd undermine Taiwanese defensive capabilities, so payback for not buying the 2001 package is far fetched.

But whatever is going on, I would be nervous if I was Taiwanese.