TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The House Armed Services Committee on Monday (June 12) released a draft of Congress's defense bill for fiscal year 2024 that calls for Washington and Taipei to jointly produce weapons to solve the problem of delayed arms deliveries to Taiwan and to enhance the country's ability to replenish its own inventories.

The House Armed Services Committee will begin discussions this week on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). On Monday, the committee released the contents of the Chairman's Mark of the NDAA.

In this version, Congress reaffirmed that the Taiwan Relations Act and the Six Assurances are the foundation of U.S.-Taiwan relations. It asserted that Taiwan’s future should be determined through peaceful means and any attempts to affect Taiwan's future by non-peaceful means, including boycotts and embargoes, would be of "grave concern" to the U.S.

The bill pointed out that China's increasingly aggressive behavior against Taiwan is contrary to U.S. expectations for a peaceful settlement of Taiwan's future. It said the Taiwan Relations Act requires that Taiwan is able to maintain its ability to resist the use of force or other forms of coercion that would endanger the security of the people of Taiwan or its social and economic institutions.

In terms of assisting Taiwan in maintaining its self-defense capabilities, the bill calls on Congress to support Taiwan in obtaining defense articles and services through foreign military sales, direct commercial sales, and "industrial cooperation," with emphasis placed on bolstering asymmetric capabilities. Industrial cooperation appears to be a reference to a plan by the Biden administration for the U.S. and Taiwan to jointly produce U.S-designed weapons that was reported by Nikkei Asia in October last year.

According to one of the sources cited in the report, this could either take the form of U.S. contractors supplying Taiwanese firms with their technology, or American manufacturers making them in the U.S. with components made in Taiwan. Another source was quoted as saying that the decision process is "going to take some time to really shake out" and will probably run well into 2023.

Since the U.S. severed diplomatic relations with Taiwan in 1979, Taiwan has gradually built its own defense industry, with two major defense firms, the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology and the Aerospace Industrial Development Corporation, at least half a dozen shipyards, and three major shipbuilders, and 200 small and medium-sized businesses. Taiwan is able to produce fighter jets, trainer aircraft, UAVs, small arms and ammunition, armored vehicles, surface ships, and is working on developing its own submarine, expected to be completed in 2025.