{"id":327265,"date":"2026-05-23T04:50:25","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T04:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=327265"},"modified":"2026-05-24T08:04:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T08:04:14","slug":"us-arms-sales-to-taiwan-on-pause-due-to-iran-war-says-acting-navy-chief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=327265","title":{"rendered":"US arms sales to Taiwan on \u2018pause\u2019 due to Iran war, says acting navy chief"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alastair McCready \u2013 The Guardian May 22, 2026<\/strong><\/h1>\n

US arms sales to Taiwan have been \u201cpaused\u201d to ensure the US military has enough munitions for its Iran operations, according to Washington\u2019s acting navy secretary, in the latest blow to Taipei after a series of comments by Donald Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When asked at a congressional hearing on Thursday about a $14bn (\u00a310.4bn) weapons package awaiting Trump\u2019s signoff for months, Hung Cao said: \u201cRight now we\u2019re doing a pause in order to make sure we have the munitions we need for Epic Fury [the Iran war] \u2013 which we have plenty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cao added: \u201cWe\u2019re just making sure we have everything, then the foreign military sales will continue when the administration deems necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the US senator Mitch McConnell asked whether he expected the arms sales to Taiwan<\/a> to be approved eventually, Cao said the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth, the Pentagon chief, would make that decision. \u201cYeah, that\u2019s what\u2019s really distressing,\u201d McConnell said.<\/p>\n

Concerns are growing over reports that the US has significantly depleted its missile stockpiles since launching its increasingly intractable war against Iran on 28 February, which has since settled into a fragile ceasefire.<\/p>\n

Responding to Cao\u2019s remarks, Taiwan\u2019s presidential office spokesperson, Karen Kuo, said on Friday that Taipei had received \u201cno information indicating that the US intends to make any adjustments to this arms sale\u201d.<\/p>\n

But the announcement will be unwelcome news for Taipei, coming a week after Trump met his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, in Beijing for a summit<\/a> in which Washington\u2019s multibillion-dollar weapons packages to Taiwan were high on the agenda.<\/p>\n

Beijing has repeatedly said it \u201cresolutely opposes\u201d Washington\u2019s arms sales to the island democracy, which it regards as a breakaway province, despite never having ruled it, and has not renounced the use of force to take.<\/p>\n

During Trump\u2019s visit, Xi issued a stark statement asserting that the US and China \u201cwill collide or even conflict\u201d<\/a> if the Taiwan issue \u201cis not handled well\u201d.<\/p>\n

Washington maintains an ambiguous stance on whether it would defend Taiwan in an invasion scenario. But under the decades-old Taiwan Relations Act, it is required to provide Taipei with sufficient military equipment to defend itself.<\/p>\n

While Trump said he made no commitments about Taiwan during his meeting with Xi, he has made several statements in the week since that have cast doubt over the future of Washington\u2019s enduring support for Taipei.<\/p>\n

In an interview with Fox News while still in Beijing, the US leader described the weapons packages as a \u201cvery good negotiating chip\u201d, suggesting he was prepared to break with Washington\u2019s policy that it would not consult China<\/a> on the matter.<\/p>\n

Trump also told reporters onboard Air Force One when returning from the Chinese capital that he discussed Taiwan in \u201cgreat detail\u201d with Xi and would soon \u201cmake a determination\u201d on pending weapons packages.<\/p>\n

The US leader, however, has also said he plans to speak with Taiwan\u2019s president, Lai Ching-te<\/a> \u2013 a bold move that Taipei has said it is open to, but which would surely provoke a robust response from Beijing.<\/p>\n

No sitting US president has spoken to Taiwan\u2019s leader since 1979, when Washington shifted diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. Trump did, however, speak to the then Taiwan president, Tsai Ing-wen, when he was US president-elect in late 2016<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The U.S. expended so many air defense missiles fending-off Iranian strikes during Operation Fury that the US has been forced to temporarily suspend arms sales to Taiwan <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":298870,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[78,58,51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-327265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-china","category-Current_Affairs","category-Iran"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=327265"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":327268,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327265\/revisions\/327268"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/298870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=327265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=327265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=327265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}