The situation over Taiwan remains “extremely dangerous,” said Lyle Goldstein, who is head of the Asia Program at the Defense Priorities think tank in Washington, D.C., and director of the China Initiative at Brown University.
China’s rapid military buildup has already moved the needle in its favor if the U.S. and China ever come to blows over Taiwan, Goldstein told Newsweek, adding that further weapons sales should be on the table in the interest of peace.
“Arms sales have been on the agenda since the third communiqué in the 1980s,” he said, referring to a 1982 agreement in which the U.S. pledged to gradually reduce the arms sale. The communique did not designate a timeline and was contingent on China’s pursuit of a peaceful resolution to the dispute with Taiwan.
“I do think it’s a legitimate area to discuss, and Trump, again, probably upset the apple cart in Washington when he said he was thinking this over,” Goldstein said.
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