Behind closed doors in Anchorage, Washington juggles Taiwan’s survival with Trump’s China gamble.
Senior U.S. and Taiwanese defense officials slipped quietly into Alaska last week, the Financial Times reports, for talks that reveal Washington’s delicate—and dangerous—balancing act. On one side, Taiwan’s growing need for security as China intensifies daily air and naval maneuvers. On the other, Donald Trump’s determination to keep the path open for a summit with Xi Jinping and the promise of trade concessions.
The meeting brought together Jed Royal, the Pentagon’s acting Indo-Pacific chief, and Hsu Szu-chien, then Taiwan’s deputy national security adviser. Though far less visible than the session originally planned for Washington—which was to include Taiwan’s defense minister Wellington Koo—the Anchorage talks still signaled quiet U.S. resolve. In some circles, the very fact they happened is a message: if Beijing stalls on trade, Washington could escalate support for Taipei’s defense.
The downgrade from Washington to Anchorage underscored the tension in U.S. strategy. Hosting Taiwan’s defense minister in the U.S. capital risked angering Beijing and jeopardizing a potential Trump-Xi summit. Alaska was the compromise—symbolic distance from Washington, but still U.S. soil.
For Taipei, the talks were urgent. President Lai Ching-te’s government is pushing a record 23% rise in defense spending, seeking to boost the budget above 3.3% of GDP. Timing was key: Taipei needed U.S. backing as it finalized special submissions for arms purchases, while Trump’s Pentagon shaped its new defense strategy.
Yet the meeting also highlights Taiwan’s new dilemma. Tsai Ing-wen, Lai’s predecessor, enjoyed strong bipartisan U.S. support across Trump’s first administration and Joe Biden’s presidency. Today, Taipei faces a colder landscape. Trump is personally ambivalent, weighing Taiwan’s security against his pursuit of trade breakthroughs with China. American officials, sources say, have even been instructed to avoid fresh punitive measures against Beijing to keep negotiations alive.
The stakes are existential for Taiwan. While its military scrambles for modernization, opposition Kuomintang lawmakers who control the legislature could block budget increases. Beijing, meanwhile, ratchets up its presence in the Taiwan Strait, testing the island’s defenses and Washington’s resolve.
The Pentagon and Taiwan’s government declined public comment on Anchorage. But the optics are clear: Taiwan’s security is being quietly bartered in the shadows of Trump’s China strategy. Anchorage may be thousands of miles from the Taiwan Strait—but last week, it became the frontline of a global balancing act.
