US army stations special forces 'permanently' near mainland China's coast, begins training Taiwan's troops

John Feng
Newsweek
Thu, 08 Feb 2024 15:07 UTC

© Taiwan Military News Agency

A Taiwanese soldier takes part in a military exercise on January 31, 2024, in eastern Taitung county. U.S. Army special forces are reportedly training Taiwanese soldiers on the outlying islands of Penghu and Kinmen.

Specialists from the U.S. Army are training Taiwanese soldiers in what is described as a permanent arrangement rather than on a rotational basis, including on an island just six miles from the Chinese coast, according to a local newspaper.

Taiwan's United Daily News (UDN) reported on Sunday that the training regimens were being planned and supervised by the 1st Special Forces Group, an airborne unit, under the provisions of last year's National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which was signed into law in December 2022.

China claims Taiwan as its own, but the Communist Party in Beijing has never ruled the island since seizing power in 1949.

Comment: And, up until very recently, the US officially acknowledged Taiwan as a part of the 'One China policy'.

Taipei rejects the sovereignty claims and for decades has relied on the United States for weapons and training, as well as international support, despite Washington's decision to break off formal diplomatic relations in 1979.

Comment: The following gives an idea of the proximity to mainland China:

That U.S. service members were training Taiwan's armed forces became a years long open secret that was not officially acknowledged until 2021, when President Tsai Ing-wen said a few American instructors were on the island for occasional training programs. The NDAA for 2023, however, opened the door to more robust cooperation between the two security partners.

Taiwan's defense ministry didn't comment on the report, but said all foreign military exchanges are conducted according to an annual plan.

U.S. Defense Department spokesperson Lt. Col. Martin Meiners had no comment on specific training, but said: "I would highlight that our support for, and defense relationship with, Taiwan remains aligned against the current threat posed by the People's Republic of China."

The UDN newspaper said Army Green Berets of the 1st Special Forces Group are this year permanently stationed at two bases of the 101st Amphibious Reconnaissance Battalion, a Taiwanese army special operations force.

The instructors were sent to the Penghu or Pescadores islands closer to Taiwan proper, but also to Kinmen, a group of islands visible from the port city of Xiamen in eastern China, on the Chinese side of the Taiwan Strait, the report said.

The 1st Battalion of the Pacific-oriented 1st Special Forces Group is forward deployed on the Japanese island of Okinawa. The rest are stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state.

According to UDN, American service members were also present at a military base in Taoyuan, in northern Taiwan, to provide specialist training on drone equipment that Taipei hopes to procure for its Airborne Special Service Company, an elite special forces unit roughly analogous to the Army's Delta Force.

The U.S. has had no official military footprint in Taiwan for over four decades. Until recently, the permanent presence of American forces on the island was considered a possible trigger for a cross-strait shooting war.

Comment: And the ailing US hegemon seems intent on provoking China, seemingly in the hope that the resulting chaos will benefit it somehow - as it's doing in the Middle East.

On paper, U.S.-Taiwan military exchanges, which have been indirectly acknowledged in the past, are managed by the American Institute in Taiwan, the de facto U.S. embassy in Taipei.

"Our commitment to Taiwan is rock-solid and contributes to the maintenance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and within the region," Meiners said.

Comment: As Putin said in his interview with Tucker Carlson:

"The West is afraid of a strong China more than it fears a strong Russia because Russia has 150 million people, and China has a 1.5 billion population, and its economy is growing by leaps and bounds — over five percent a year, it used to be even more. But that's enough for China. As Bismark once put it, potentials are most important. China's potential is enormous — it is the biggest economy in the world today in terms of purchasing power parity and the size of the economy. It has already overtaken the United States, quite a long time ago, and it is growing at a rapid clip.

[...]

We have heard those boogeyman stories before. It is a boogeyman story. We are neighbours with China. You cannot choose neighbours, just as you cannot choose close relatives. We share a border of 1000 kilometers with them. This is number one.

Second, we have a centuries-long history of coexistence, we are used to it.

Third, China's foreign policy philosophy is not aggressive, its idea is to always look for compromise, and we can see that.

The next point is as follows. We are always told the same boogeyman story, and here it goes again, though in a euphemistic form, but it is still the same bogeyman story: the cooperation with China keeps increasing. The pace at which China's cooperation with Europe is growing is higher and greater than that of the growth of Chinese-Russian cooperation. Ask Europeans: aren't they afraid? They might be, I do not know, but they are still trying to access China's market at all costs, especially now that they are facing economic problems. Chinese businesses are also exploring the European market.

Do Chinese businesses have small presence in the United States? Yes, the political decisions are such that they are trying to limit their cooperation with China.

It is to your own detriment, Mr Tucker, that you are limiting cooperation with China, you are hurting yourself. It is a delicate matter, and there are no silver bullet solutions, just as it is with the dollar.

See also: China's coast guard blasts Philippine boats with water cannons for 2nd day in South China Sea dispute