20050625

Raytheon to supply new radar system

PENTAGON OFFER: The contract from the US Air Force will provide Taiwan with early warning surveillance radar for its air and missile defense

AGENCIES , WASHINGTON

The US Defense Department said on Thursday that it would supply Taiwan with key elements of a missile and air defense capability, a move aimed at defusing the threat from China.

Raytheon Co won a US Air Force contract worth up to US$752 million to supply the Early Warning Surveillance Radar by September 2009, the Pentagon said.

The system will let Taiwan's air force detect and track long- and short-range ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, enemy aircraft and surface ships with "no doubt" reliability, said Raytheon, based in Waltham, Massachusetts.

The system includes an ultra-high frequency "phased array" radar that will be integrated with Taiwanese-supplied beacons that identify aircraft as friends or foes as well as two missile warning centers, a Defense Department contract announcement said.

Raytheon began exploratory talks with Taiwan on the project in 1996, said Dan Martin, vice president, Surveillance and Sensor Systems, Integrated Defense Systems, Raytheon's "joint battlespace integration" company.

Such a system represents an important step toward identifying any inbound threats, said James Mulvenon of the Center for Research and Analysis, a Washington group that consults for US intelligence agencies.

Eventually, it could be mated with Patriot Advanced Capability 3 anti-missile batteries the US has also offered to sell Taiwan.

"The surveillance radar is the first step in the chain of engagement," Martin said. "We're proud to be selected ... to provide Taiwan with an early warning capability that will be a key element of its integrated air and missile defense system."

Mulvenon said Beijing would be particularly upset because missiles were at the forefront of its strategy for coercing Taiwan.

"This raises the possibility that Taiwan will actually be able to defend itself against those missiles," Mulvenon said.

Japanese demand sanctions for N Korean abductions

AP , TOKYO

"We have a legitimate weapon, a sanction, and many [in the] Japanese public support it. Mr. Koizumi, please listen to our desperate plea."

Takuya Yokoto, the brother of a kidnapping victim

Frustrated families and their supporters began a sit-in protest near Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's office yesterday, and are demanding economic sanctions against North Korea to pressure the communist regime to account for their loved ones abducted by Northern agents decades ago.

Holding placards and wearing their trademark blue ribbon-shaped pins, about 100 families and their supporters sat outside parliamentary buildings under the scorching sun, urging Koizumi and his lawmakers to use sanctions to pressure the communist regime.

North Korea has admitted to kidnapping 13 Japanese to train its spies, allowing five to return home while claiming the rest died.

But Tokyo believes that some could still be alive in the North and has criticized Pyongyang for not fully accounting for them.

Their families have been increasingly frustrated, especially after the North sent in November what it said were the ashes of Megumi Yokota, the highest profile kidnap victim, but an analysis here showed they belonged to several unrelated people.

Pyongyang said the remains of the other seven were either washed away in floods or were missing.

Yokota was kidnapped on her way home from school as a 13-year-old junior high school student in 1978.

North Korea criticized Japan's test results on the remains and other records Pyongyang provided, and bilateral talks on the abduction issue has stalled since.

With portraits of their relatives abducted by North Korea, families stage a sit-in protest outside parliamentary buildings in Tokyo yesterday. About 100 families are urging Prime Minister Juinichiro Koizumi to use economic sanctions to pressure the communist regime to account for their loved ones abducted by Northern agents decades ago.

"We've waited for all these years, as the prime minister favors dialogue rather than pressure. But we can't even have a dialogue [with the North]," said her younger brother, Takuya, who is urging Koizumi to take a more decisive step.

"We have a legitimate weapon, a sanction, and many [in the] Japanese public support it. Mr. Koizumi, please listen to our desperate plea," he said.

Despite growing public support for the sanctions, Koizumi has been reluctant to take the step, largely due to its possible impact on the six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons. The talks have stalled since last June.

Koizumi said in a statement yesterday that he understands the families' hardships but at present does not plan to impose sanctions on North Korea.

"We are not in a situation where we could just impose sanctions and settle the issue," he told reporters.

"We have to respect views of the other countries [in the six-way talks] and cooperate," he added.

"Communique" in diplomatic terms simply means an official announcement. It usually follows an officially hosted visit. Communiques record the date, venue, events and agreements between the host and visitors.

The highly touted Shanghai Communique of Feb. 28, 1972 was an announcement following the conclusion of then US president Richard Nixon's visit to China. A communique is just that, an official announcement, which does not have the force and enforceability of a treaty.

Recently, two defeated pan-blue camp candidates visited China and signed some accords to which no one attaches significance. Their sole purpose was to undermine President Chen shui-bian's steady progress in the reform of political, economic, educational, constitutional and social programs.

They knew that whatever they signed and announced as a communique meant nothing, as long as Chen adhered to his principles, and the people of Taiwan insisted on their freedom in a democratic society.

Just imagine if Al Gore had gone to Russia or Cuba to sign an agreement after losing in a close contest to George W. Bush in 2000. It would be even worse if he chose to go to North Korea or Iran. But the results of his visit would become communiques.

So, what is a communique worth? Nothing! After all, it is simply an agreed upon text between the host and visiting dignitaries. It does not require the consent of either nation's congress or parliament, or reflect the view of the people.

In dealing with China, other countries have used words such as "respects and fully understands," "takes note," and "admits," but rarely "recognizes." Even if the word "recognize" were used in a communique it means practically nothing as it neither binds other countries, nor has the enforce-ability of a treaty. Anything could be said to gain economic access to, or aid from, China.

In fact, any favorable statement can be extracted from poor countries, or from disgruntled politicians, provided China offers them enough money or favors.

Unlike a treaty, a communique is not ratified by referendum, congress, parliament, or a legislative body independent of the administration per the specifications of a constitutional process.

Furthermore, treaties are enforceable internationally, but not communiques. Even so, the Shanghai Communique was carefully worded from the US point of view.

With regard to Taiwan, the communique states in section 12: "The United States acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China. The United States Government does not challenge that position."

The word "acknowledges" was deliberately used as opposed to "recognizes." In other words, the US will not argue with what China has said, but has itself never recognized Taiwan as a part of China.

The content and language of the Shanghai Communique was never rectified by the US Congress. But the recognition of China, which does not include Taiwan or the Pescadores, was ratified by Congress and took effect on Jan. 1, 1979.

At the same time, the 96th Congress enacted public laws 96-8, known as the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), which took effect on the same day. TRA Section 3314 (2) defines the term "Taiwan" to include the islands of Formosa and the Pescadores, but made no mention of Kinmen and Matsu, the two islands just off the Chinese coast.

The TRA took effect on Jan. 1, 1979, but it was not incorporated into the US Code until April 10, 1979. The new Chapter 48 of the US Code Title 22 is a set of laws that governs US relations with Taiwan through the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT).

The goal of the TRA is to maintain the status quo as it existed prior to Jan. 1, 1979. It has done an extraordinary job of separating the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. The stability of the Taiwan Strait benefits not only Taiwan, but also its immediate neighbors, South Korea and Japan, as well as the entire international community.

The Taipei Flight Information Region handles some 1,000 flights daily from various nations. More than 500 vessels navigate their way through the Taiwan Strait every day.

Every US president since Jimmy Carter has obeyed the laws specified by the TRA, no matter what they said after each visit to China. These so-called "officially unofficial relations" persist to this day, to the extent that they obligated President to send aircraft carriers toward Taiwan when China's carried out provocative missile tests near Taiwan in 1996.

Why would a US President say one thing while visiting China and something entirely different later on? Easy -- whatever the President's own view of China, it is his or her duty to carry out the laws of the land, and that includes the Taiwan Relations Act.

Taiwan experts such as Harvey Feldman (a key architect of the TRA) and John Tkacik Jr. (the author of the book Taiwan Dependence: The Strategic Dimension of Cross-Strait Trade and Investment) are the people in the know. They have stated clearly and repeatedly that the US never recognized Taiwan as a part of China. The US acknowledged what China said but never recognized it.

By now, it should be known throughout the world that Taiwan is an independent country in every sense of the word with its own defined territory, democratic system of government, passport, currency, arms forces and all the other trappings of a sovereign nation.

Best of all, it is a modern and democratic country and its people enjoy a wide spectrum of freedoms that even US citizens would envy. The Taiwanese press and mass media enjoy more liberty than their US counterparts, and freely criticize President Chen with impunity, on a daily basis.

The separate visits to China by the two disgruntled pan-blue politicians were a blatant display of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" psychology. Public dissatisfaction of their actions was evident in polls conducted after the visits, and culminated in the failure of the KMT and PFP to win a pan-blue majority in the National Assembly.

The 23 million people of Taiwan should not allow a few politicians who visit China to decide their fate. A communique works only if the people of Taiwan back it. Since Taiwan is already a full-fledged democracy, only the Taiwanese people have the right to decide their own future.

Now, referendums is are part of the newly amended Constitution. The people of Taiwan should take advantage of that change to decide their future for themselves -- after all, the principle of self-determination is clearly embedded in the charter of the United Nations.

Lin Yu-chong is a professor of physiology at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu.