Taiwan, in Aftermath of Trump-Xi Summit and Trump Campaign Visit to Alaska, Pledges Massive Investment in LNG Pipeline

Free Taiwan is appealing to President Trump with a deal that competes with the good will he believes he’s struck up with Communist China’s President Xi Jinping in their recent White House summit.Just as South Korea is showing grave doubts about investing in a pipeline in Alaska for transporting liquefied natural gas for export, Taiwan has indicated it’s willing to invest $4.4 billion in the project.That’s less than 10 percent of the $54 billion that Mr. Trump has said South Korea would pay to build the pipeline from Alaska’s north slope south to the Gulf of Alaska, but it might erase South Korean doubts about the viability of a high-risk project that’s been talked about for decades.The deal is not signed yet, but Taiwan’s foreign ministry promised “specific investment,” including “equity stakes and related terms” to be “determined through subsequent negotiations.”That assurance came after Mr. Trump, stumping in Alaska on behalf of Senator Dan Sullivan’s bid for reelection, said that Taiwan had “just agreed to buy 30 percent of the gas coming off the pipeline for the next 20 years” for a grand total of $70-80 billion. It was, he said, “one of the biggest commitments in history for anything.”Supporting the president’s hyperbole, the Taiwan finance ministry said Taiwan’s CPC Corp has agreed to buy 6 million tons of LNG annually, according to the Taipei Times. Also, the CPC would help on a project that’s been stymied for years by the extreme hazards of constructing a pipeline winding 807 miles through dangerous snow-and-ice covered terrain.Taiwan appears to be jumping in on the LNG project as one of many signs of the eagerness of Taiwan leaders to get on Mr. Trump’s good side while he dangles the bait of $14 billion in sales to Taiwan of military equipment that congress has already approved. He’s made clear he’s holding his decision as a bargaining chip to win concessions from Mr. Xi — and maybe deals with Taiwan too.Just this week, Taiwan’s foreign minister, Lin Chia-lung, was in Phoenix for the opening of a glittering new “economic and cultural office” in a state in which the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the world’s largest manufacturer of memory chips, has built an enormous plant.The cultural office is the equivalent of a consulate in the unique relationship developed between Taiwan and Washington after President Carter broke off diplomatic relations and transferred formal recognition to Beijing in 1978. The unveiling of the office “symbolizes the Taiwan-US economic and trade partnership moving towards a new milestone,” said the Taiwan Institute, the term that Taiwan uses in place of an embassy.Mr. Lin did not go to Washington, said Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, knowing that a visit there “could have risked a blow-up with Beijing” after Mr. Xi had used his summit with Mr. Trump “to press the US to harden its line on Taiwan.”The Arizona visit, though, underlined the power of TSMC’s massive investment. The company is planning to pour another $100 billion into semiconductor-manufacturing facilities in Arizona on top of more than $160 billion that it’s already plunged into the state.The TSMC CEO, C.C. Wei, said TSMC is also looking into “potentially extending its US manufacturing footprint beyond Arizona to satisfy surging demand from customers for artificial intelligence chips.” Providing the company can count on enough water supply, he said, “Texas is the one.”The opening of the Taiwan office in Phoenix coincided with the first American visit of the former Taiwan president, Tsai Ing-wen, since she stepped down in 2024.Ms. Tsai could not visit America as president since Washington and Taipei do not have diplomatic relations, but she made up for lost time in a speech at Stanford, meetings with Taiwan residents and a long conversation with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whose visit to Taipei more than four years ago triggered outrage and reprisals by Beijing.In a speech at Stanford, Ms. Tsai said, “Deeper cooperation with Taiwan therefore strengthens not only Taiwan’s own security, but also the stability of the Indo-Pacific and the resilience of the wider democratic community.” Ms. Pelosi, after her talk with Ms. Tsai, was optimistic. “The bond between the United States and Taiwan is strong,” she posted, “and Congress’ commitment to the Taiwanese people and their freedom remains steadfast.”Bureaucrats from Beijing and Taipei will be rubbing shoulders next week at a meeting in Hong Kong of finance ministers from APEC, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation group. China’s finance minister will give the keynote speech; Taiwan’s finance minister, Chuang Tsui-yun, said he’ll be there.

Taiwan, in Aftermath of Trump-Xi Summit and Trump Campaign Visit to Alaska, Pledges Massive Investment in LNG Pipeline

Taiwan, in Aftermath of Trump-Xi Summit and Trump Campaign Visit to Alaska, Pledges Massive Investment in LNG Pipeline

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