Taiwan must rely on itself for defence and is likely to keep increasing spending and modernising its military given the threat it faces from China, Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung said on Friday, responding to criticism from Donald Trump.
U.S. former President Trump, the Republican candidate in a rematch with President Joe Biden, said in an interview published this week that โTaiwan should pay us for defenceโ, adding that the island had taken American semiconductor business.
The United States is the most important international backer and arms supplier of Taiwan, which China claims as its own. Despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties, Washington is bound by law to provide the means for the islandโs defence.
But Taiwan must rely for defence on itself as it has no formal defence pact with the United States, as Asian neighbours Japan and South Korea do, since Washington terminated a previous treaty with Taipei in 1979 when it switched diplomatic recognition to Beijing.
Biden angered China in 2022 by saying U.S forces would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion, a deviation from a long-held U.S. position of โstrategic ambiguityโ.
Asked about Trumpโs comments, Lin told foreign reporters in Taipei that โwe pay great attention toโ them, and Taiwan-U.S. relations are built on the bipartisan support Taiwan enjoys in the United States.
โI think everyone has a consensus on the main point, which is the China threat,โ said Lin, who took up his post on May 20 as part of the cabinet of newly elected President Lai Ching-te.
โIn fact on national defence, we must rely on ourselves โ this is the precondition. Since the start of Taiwanโs democratisation over the past 30 years, we have stood alone against Chinaโs threat.โ
In the past eight years, Taiwanโs defence spending has doubled to now stand at 2.5% of GDP, Lin said. โI expect this will continue to rise.โ
All countries must โwork hardโ, though, he added, since Chinaโs defence spending is also rising.
But Taiwan is also reforming its military, Lin said, pointing to efforts such as extending conscription to a year from four months.
Taiwan has made defence modernisation a priority, including developing its own submarines, and the government has said many times that Taiwan must rely on itself for defence especially in view of the islandโs diplomatic isolation.
โPORCUPINEโ STRATEGY
Successive U.S. administrations have pushed Taiwan to modernise its military to become a โporcupineโ that is hard for China to attack, advocating the sale of inexpensive, mobile, and survivable โ or โasymmetricโ โ weapons that could outlast any initial assault by Chinaโs larger military.
That strategy has also been championed by Taiwanโs government since the ruling Democratic Progressive Party won office in 2016.
China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, and has rebuffed repeated offers of talks from Lai, who Beijing calls a โseparatistโ. He rejects Chinaโs sovereignty claims, saying only Taiwanโs people can decide their future.
Lin said Taiwan needed to pay attention to, but not be constrained by, Chinaโs centennial goals, including the building of a world-class military by 2049, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Peopleโs Republic of China.
โWe must be prepared to face a possible Chinese invasion, but we must be united,โ he said.
โWe hope that every day when Xi Jinping gets up in the morning, that even though he has a timetable for the future that he says โnot today'โ for attacking Taiwan, Lin added, referring to Chinaโs president.