{"id":605730,"date":"2026-05-22T03:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=605730"},"modified":"2026-05-22T03:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T03:00:00","slug":"pentagon-delegations-beijing-visit-held-up-over-gargantuan-us-arms-package-for-taiwan-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=605730","title":{"rendered":"Pentagon Delegation&#8217;s Beijing Visit Held Up Over Gargantuan US Arms Package For Taiwan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"field field--name-title field--type-string field--label-hidden\">Pentagon Delegation&#8217;s Beijing Visit Held Up Over Gargantuan US Arms Package For Taiwan<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item\">\n<p>China is using a Pentagon itinerary as structural leverage, and Taiwan remains front and center as the key geopolitical snag in bettering communications and relations between Beijing and Washington.<\/p>\n<p>According to a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/aecf40c9-fb61-4958-ae6b-14a471cad680?syn-25a6b1a6=1\"><em>Financial Times<\/em><\/a> report published Thursday, <strong>China is actively holding up a proposed visit by Elbridge Colby<\/strong>, <strong>the Pentagon&#8217;s under-secretary of defense for policy<\/strong>. The move is a transparent effort to pressure President Trump over a <strong>looming $14 billion weapons package for Taiwan<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><a data-image-external-href=\"\" data-image-href=\"\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/colby.jpg?itok=PCcOakjQ\" data-link-option=\"0\" href=\"https:\/\/cms.zerohedge.com\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/colby.jpg?itok=PCcOakjQ\"><\/a><\/p>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"caption caption-img inline-images image-style-inline-images\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" data-entity-type=\"file\" data-entity-uuid=\"293a12a8-0b19-491c-abdd-0549d6ac9af6\" data-responsive-image-style=\"inline_images\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.zerohedge.com\/s3fs-public\/styles\/inline_image_mobile\/public\/inline-images\/colby.jpg?itok=PCcOakjQ\" width=\"500\" \/><figcaption><em>Elbridge Colby, left.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>While Colby had been actively discussing a summer trip to Beijing with Chinese officials, China has effectively frozen the process and logistics. Sources familiar with the talks report that Beijing has signaled it &#8220;<strong>cannot approve a visit until Trump decides how he will proceed with the arms package<\/strong>.<strong>&#8220;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Trump admin officials have been quick to point out that Trump has approved &#8220;the sale of more weapons to Taiwan than any other US president.&#8221; And so it appears that such bravado should come with a cost, in Beijing&#8217;s apparent thinking.<\/p>\n<p>And yet, Trump has repeatedly publicly touted his personal relationship with Chinese President Xi Jinping as &#8220;amazing&#8221; &#8211; though his recent Beijing trip did nothing to ultimately produce a breakthrough.<\/p>\n<p>Trump, upon returning from his trip earlier this month, stated that he <strong>&#8220;has not decided whether to proceed with the major weapons sale,&#8221;<\/strong> injecting a fresh wave of strategic ambiguity over US support for the self-ruled island.<\/p>\n<p>He also in an interview with Fox News&#8217; Bret Baier had stated that he doesn&#8217;t want &#8220;to travel 9,500 miles to fight a war&#8221; over Taiwan.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not looking to have somebody to go independent and, you know, we&#8217;re supposed to travel 9,500 miles to fight a war,&#8221; Trump told Baier. <strong>&#8220;I&#8217;m not looking for that. I want them to cool down. I want China to cool down.&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Taiwan remains critically important to Washington because it is not only a semiconductor production supernode, but also a geopolitical fortress against China and a potential flashpoint in US-China relations. But China hawks have questioned Trump&#8217;s resolve and where he stands, related to the scenario of potential direct Chinse aggression against Taiwan.<\/p>\n<p><em>Trump&#8217;s rhetoric on Taiwan before and after his summit with President Xi has raised eyebrows in Washington&#8230;<\/em><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\" xml:lang=\"en\">Absolute betrayal. When asked about consulting Taiwan on weapons deals, Donald Trump completely dismisses them as a mere problem.<\/p>\n<p>He immediately pivots to showering Chinese President Xi with massive praise. Washington will casually throw any ally under the bus for leverage. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/JVhLGAydVl\">pic.twitter.com\/JVhLGAydVl<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Furkan G\u00f6z\u00fckara (@FurkanGozukara) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FurkanGozukara\/status\/2057103614003294475?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">May 20, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Geopolitical risk analyst\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/ianbremmer\/status\/2055997120931369330?s=20\">Ian Bremmer<\/a>\u00a0has also lately weighed in. He has speculated:\u00a0&#8220;<strong>This is Trump&#8217;s perspective: the only thing that matters about Taiwan is the chips. Very different from the view of U.S. allies in the region: Japan, South Korea, and Australia.&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>      <span class=\"field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden\"><a title=\"View user profile.\" href=\"https:\/\/cms.zerohedge.com\/users\/tyler-durden\" lang=\"\" class=\"username\" xml:lang=\"\">Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span><br \/>\n<span class=\"field field--name-created field--type-created field--label-hidden\">Thu, 05\/21\/2026 &#8211; 23:00<\/span><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.zerohedge.com\/s3fs-public\/styles\/inline_image_mobile\/public\/inline-images\/colby.jpg?itok=PCcOakjQ\" title=\"Pentagon Delegation's Beijing Visit Held Up Over Gargantuan US Arms Package For Taiwan\" \/><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pentagon Delegation&#8217;s Beijing Visit Held Up Over Gargantuan US Arms Package For Taiwan China is using a Pentagon itinerary as structural leverage, and Taiwan remains front and center as the key geopolitical snag in bettering communications and relations between Beijing and Washington. According to a Financial Times report published Thursday, China is actively holding up&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=605730\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Pentagon Delegation&#8217;s Beijing Visit Held Up Over Gargantuan US Arms Package For Taiwan<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":605715,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[20,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-605730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economic-empowerment","category-national-security","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=605730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/605715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=605730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=605730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=605730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}