National Security

EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Mike Gallagher To Warn Of ‘Maximum Danger’ To Taiwan As Xi Threatens ‘All Measures’

(Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) (Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)

Michael Ginsberg Congressional Correspondent
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Republican Wisconsin Rep. Mike Gallagher will deliver a speech Tuesday calling on the U.S. to step up military spending and place long range missiles around the Pacific Rim to prevent a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

Gallagher, one of the GOP’s most prominent China hawks, has praised the island democracy’s heightened defense spending. During the speech at the Heritage Foundation, a copy of which was obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller, he plans to highlight concerns that China will invade the island “within the next five years” and call on the U.S. to boost its military budget. Chinese leader Xi Jinping threatened Sunday “to take all necessary measures” to “reunify” Taiwan with mainland China, according to a Reuters translation.

“When it comes to Taiwan, we have entered the window of maximum danger, or the ‘Davidson Window,’ which is a reference to former Indo-Pacific Commander Phil Davidson’s assessment that China may make a move on Taiwan within the next five years,” Gallagher’s speech reads. “Divesting of hard power within the Davidson Window is dangerous, yet the Biden Administration insists on doing just that.”

Congress has yet to pass a National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023, although it is expected to do so after the November midterms. A House Appropriations subcommittee passed a $762 billion Pentagon budget in June, while the Senate Armed Services Committee is expected to pass a package worth $847 billion. President Joe Biden requested an $813 billion budget in March.

Gallagher plans to criticize Biden’s proposed budget for allocating huge sums to technology research and development (R&D) projects that will not be battlefield ready before 2030. As an alternative, Gallagher will reiterate his call for the Defense Department to replenish munitions stockpiles that have been depleted in order to provide aid to Ukraine.

Congress allocated $1.2 billion in September to replace more than 8,500 Javelin missiles, 1,400 Stinger missiles, 126 M-777 howitzers and 16 HIMARS launchers. Overall, Congress has spent $15.2 billion on Ukraine aid and Pentagon funding since Russia invaded the country in February.

BORYSPIL, UKRAINE – JANUARY 25: Ground personnel unload weapons, including Javelin anti-tank missiles, and other military hardware delivered on a National Airlines plane by the United States military at Boryspil Airport near Kyiv on January 25, 2022 in Boryspil, Ukraine. The shipment comes as tensions between the NATO military alliance and Russia are intensifying due to Russia’s move of tens of thousands of troops as well as heavy weapons to the Ukrainian border, causing international fears of a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine. The U.S., Great Britain and other NATO countries have sent arms in recent days to Ukraine in a bid to deter an invasion. (Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

According to Gallagher’s speech, the federal government can afford these moves by “reducing the size of DoD’s civilian workforce, the joint staff, the office of the secretary of defense, the overall number of flag and general officers and the fast-growing DEI bureaucracy.”

After replenishing stockpiles, the U.S. should place surface to surface missiles on Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, the Mariana Islands, Alaska, Hawaii and Australia, the congressman plans to argue. Missiles placed there will help “sink PLA ships and amphibious landing craft at port, in the Strait and on Taiwan’s beaches,” per Gallagher’s speech (RELATED: China Is About To Exploit Serious Weaknesses In US Military Might, Analyst Warns)

During his Sunday address to the Communist Party’s 20th People’s Conference, Xi claimed that China hopes “reunification” between itself and Taiwan is “peaceful.” He added, however, that China has “no commitment to renounce the use of force,” and that “the historical wheels of the rejuvenation of the nationalities are rolling forward.” China has flown more than 1,400 sorties into Taiwanese defense space since President Joe Biden took office. The People’s Liberation Army threatened war on social media when Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in August.

Gallagher plans to offer a firm response to Xi’s provocations: “We must not gamble the fate of the Free World on Xi’s restraint nor on our own utopian delusions that somehow we’ve evolved beyond wars of territorial expansion. We must put American hard power in Xi’s path before it’s too late.”