While many Taiwanese still see the United States as the ultimate guarantor of Taiwanese independence, they see China as increasingly capable of grabbing the island before the U.S. can intervene. So while the Taiwanese don't have to be strong enough to defeat a Chinese invasion, they do have to be strong enough to hold the Chinese back until American reinforcements can show up.
Thus about half the $6.5 billion package is for PAC-3 Patriot anti-missile missiles. These can knock down many of the 1,300 Chinese ballistic missiles aimed at the island. Taiwanese military planners have put themselves in the position of their Chinese counterparts, and noted that this many missiles could severely damage Taiwanese defenses, and do it very quickly. The other big weapon systems are AH-64D Apache helicopter gunships, Harpoon anti-ship missiles and Javelin anti-tank missiles. There is also half a billion dollars in upgrades, and spare parts, for existing warplanes.
The Chinese were very open, and loud, in their displeasure over this sale. Now their opportunity to grab Taiwan quickly is slipping away again.
This decision to buy time is a positive sign for Taiwan given what I read in the past that the Taiwanese assumed that Taiwan would need to fight only four days on their own before our help arrived.
My assumption about Chinese plans all along has been that China is attempting to buy time themselves to conquer Taiwan by improving their own forces relative to Taiwan to conquer the island fast and improve their own forces relative to America to keep our forces at bay long enough to conquer Taiwan:
With some luck, Chinese forces will be sitting in control of Taiwan, with the substantial forces on Qemoy and Matsu (I think a quarter of the Taiwanese army is on these two islands; though I read they have decided wisely to pull most back to the mainland at some point) left to surrender after seeing the defeat of the main Taiwanese defenses. American and Japanese forces gathering to intervene will now face not an intervention but a counter-attack with no Taiwanese military units to rescue.
Keep in mind that Taiwan is "buying" time. They have not actually bought it yet. China knows that the correlation of forces will swing against China once those weapons arrive and are integrated into Taiwan's military. So China will need to either counter those weapons with more of their own, or invade before the weapons arrive.
Of course, some who dismiss any Chinese threat to invade Taiwan say that even if China gains the ability to invade Taiwan, the Chinese would not risk their economic growth by initiating a war.
China, however, is feeling the effects of the current financial panic:
"The contagion is spreading. China will not be importing gasoline in October, for the second successive month as domestic stockpiles mount," said John Kilduff at MF Global.
So if China faces economic turmoil, the brake on invasion that economic stability supposedly provides disappears. And with regime legitimacy riding on economic growth that no longer takes place, Peking may go to plan B on legitimacy by relying on old fashioned nationalism to rally the population, with Taiwan as the unfortunate target.
And in good times, I'd be worried that China doesn't need gasoline imports since that may mean they could withstand for a while the loss of energy imports by sea should they initiate a war to take Taiwan. During an American presidential election season, when our reaction time won't be as fast, my worry is enhanced even more.
The question is, will Taiwan take delivery of that time they want to buy in time to do them any good?
