China Sanctions US Companies

China is upset the US is providing military equipment to China. In response, China Sanctions Boeing, Other U.S. Companies

The Chinese government imposed sanctions on 20 U.S. defense companies and 10 of their executives on Friday in retaliation for the Trump administration’s approval of a large package of weapons for sale to Taiwan.

The targets include Northrop Grumman, Boeing’s St. Louis-based defense unit and Palmer Luckey, founder of Anduril Industries. Preparing for a potential conflict with China has been a major focus for Luckey and his startup, which owns three of the sanctioned companies.

Beijing said it would freeze the assets of the sanctioned entities, ban them from Chinese transactions and prohibit the executives from entering mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau.

The move is largely symbolic because U.S. defense contractors generally do little business in China. It emphasizes Beijing’s claim over Taiwan, the democratically ruled island that it has vowed to take by force if necessary.

In announcing the sanctions, China’s Foreign Ministry said that the U.S. weapons approval “interferes in China’s internal affairs, and seriously undermines China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

The U.S. has sold Taiwan arms for years. Last week, Washington approved a $11.1 billion package that includes Himars missile launchers and howitzers designed to help Taiwan slow a Chinese attack.

The Trump administration’s approval of the sales addressed concerns among U.S. lawmakers who worried about President Trump’s deepening ties with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The two are scheduled to meet in April.

The U.S. is committed to providing Taiwan with defensive weaponry under the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, and every administration since then has complied.

China Developing Options to Threaten Taiwan With ‘Brute Force’

Things are heating up in relations with China. Also note China Developing Options to Threaten Taiwan With ‘Brute Force,’ Pentagon Says

China is making steady progress on developing more sophisticated weapons and expanding its armed force’s ability to operate away from the mainland, including against Taiwan, according to the Pentagon’s latest assessment of Beijing’s military strength.

Beijing was still uncertain as of last year that it could invade and take over Taiwan, despite the Chinese military’s determination to have the capabilities to seize the island forcibly by 2027, the report said.

The “PLA continues to refine multiple military options to force Taiwan unification by brute force,” the report said, referring to the People’s Liberation Army, the formal name of China’s military. But China’s leaders “remain unsure of the PLA’s readiness to successfully seize Taiwan,” it said.

Chinese forces conducted exercises in 2024 to test “essential components” of an amphibious invasion, a firepower strike and a maritime blockade against Taiwan, the report said.

China has significantly stepped up its probing of Taiwan’s air and maritime boundaries since 2023, the report said, with activity within Taiwan’s air defense identification zone increasing more than 60%, from 1,703 incidents that year to 2,771 last year, the report said. China’s warships also stepped up their operations in the Taiwan Strait.

Beijing claims Taiwan as its own territory and has said it would seize the island by force if necessary.

The decades-old U.S. position on China’s sovereignty claim over Taiwan has been to maintain what officials call strategic ambiguity. The idea is to leave China guessing whether the U.S. would directly intervene in a clash, and at the same time restrain Taiwan from declaring outright independence and triggering a Chinese attack.

“China’s historic military buildup has made the U.S. homeland increasingly vulnerable,” the latest report said. At 100 pages, it is about half as long as the China report released by the Biden administration last year.

“There seems to be less detail on military hardware than in past years, and a surprising emphasis on improved U.S.-China relations and mil-to-mil cooperation,” said Tom Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who closely tracks China’s missile developments.

The report said: “The PLA continues to make steady progress toward its 2027 goals, whereby the PLA must be able to achieve ‘strategic decisive victory’ over Taiwan, ‘strategic counterbalance’ against the United States in the nuclear and other strategic domains, and ‘strategic deterrence and control’ against other regional countries.”

“The report clarifies publicly for the first time that the PLAN intends to operate NINE aircraft carriers by 2035…which would put its carrier fleet just behind that of the United States,” Ryan Fedasiuk of the American Enterprise Institute posted on X. PLAN refers to the People’s Liberation Army Navy, the formal name of China’s naval forces.

The U.S. Navy has 11 aircraft carriers.

Strategic uncertainty is no longer working. A war with China is increasingly likely.

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