Pentagon nominee says Taiwan must spend 10% of GDP on defense

Taiwan must sharply increase its defense spending, but weapons will continue to flow to Taipei from the U.S., a Pentagon official slated for a key defense policy post told a Senate committee Tuesday.

John Noh, the nominee for assistant defense secretary for Indo-Pacific security affairs, said he supports President Trump’s call last year for Taiwan to spend 10% of its gross domestic product on defense.

“I strongly believe that Taiwan needs to do its part and to pay, and increase its defense spending,” Mr. Noh told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Mr. Noh said the island democracy faces “an existential threat” from China’s People’s Liberation Army and as a result “Taiwan should spend upwards of 10% of its GDP on defense. I strongly support that.”

Taiwan government officials have said increasing defense spending to 10% of GDP is not financially possible. The government spent about 2.45% of its GDP on defense in 2025 and plans to spend 3.32% in 2026.

Mr. Trump last month held up a $400 million U.S. arms package to Taiwan as he negotiated trade and tariffs with China and sought a summit in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping next year.

Asked about the halt in arms shipments, Mr. Noh, a former staff member on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, said if confirmed, he would provide his best advice and recommendations for finding creative ways to speed up weapons deliveries to Taiwan.

“But Taiwan absolutely needs to do its part and spend more and increase its defense spending and acquire the kind of asymmetric capabilities that would be most relevant for an invasion scenario,” he said.

From 2015 to 2025, Congress has been notified of more than $28 billion in foreign military sales to Taiwan.

Congress has complained that much of the arms and equipment has been delayed through slow production and long delivery times.

China has called Taiwan its territory and denounced U.S. arms sales as undermining security.

U.S. policy on China and Taiwan calls for providing defensive weaponry in direct relationship to the threats posed to the island. Taiwan needs to adopt significant military reforms in training, force mobilization, civil-military integration, hardening its infrastructure and boosting cyber security, Mr. Noh said.

“So in addition to the weapons portion, there are also a lot of things Taiwan can and must do urgently to prepare for a potential invasion scenario,” Mr. Noh said.

U.S. military commanders have said China’s military has been ordered to prepare for military action to take over Taiwan by 2027.

China is also engaged in aggressive military activities in the South China Sea against Philippines, a U.S. defense treaty ally, which is a flashpoint for an unintended military escalation.

Mr. Noh said China’s large-scale military buildup of conventional and nuclear forces, bolstered by cyber warfare and space warfare capabilities, is alarming and unprecedented in speed and scale.

“It’s the most rapid military buildup and the largest since World War II,” he said.

The military expansion is an enormous concern, and to address the threat the Pentagon is working to move advanced military forces west of the international dateline to deter a conflict with China and be ready to fight a war if needed, he said.

The Pentagon is conducting a review of the Biden administration program to build nuclear submarines with Australia and Britain to see if the program fits with the Trump administration defense program, Mr. Noh said.

In written responses to questions from the committee, Mr. Noh said he is fully committed to the administration’s America First and peace-through-strength policy.

“The most significant challenge I would face, if confirmed, is addressing the military threat posed by China,” he said. “China is undergoing an unprecedented and historic military buildup, and the United States faces a perilous moment in which peace cannot be assumed.”

China’s expanding economy and rapid military buildup are fundamentally altering the balance of power in the region.

At the same time, military aggression in the South China Sea and coercive operations against Taiwan by Chinese forces are raising major worries among regional states, he said.

To counter the Chinese military threat, the Pentagon is investing in long-range precision strike weapons that present asymmetric threats to China’s naval forces.

Military forces are also being restructured so that weapons and platforms needed in combat will survive during conflict.

“The highest priority military capabilities for Indo-Pacific deterrence must be those that enable a credible denial defense within the first island chain, including advanced submarine forces; long-range, mobile, precision strike systems; integrated air and missile defense networks; and resilient command and control architectures that can operate effectively within contested environments,” Mr. Noh said.

Priority weapons are new submarines and long-range missiles.

Key gaps in defense and military capabilities include defense industry problems in producing critical munitions and weapons at scale and speed needed for both homeland defense and denying Chinese military activities near its coasts.

“I believe we face particular shortfalls in our ability to manufacture sufficient quantities of long-range precision strike and air defense munitions, maintain and repair forward-deployed naval and air assets within contested areas, and produce advanced submarines and other high-end platforms at the rate necessary to meet both our own operational requirements as well as those of regional allies and partners,” Mr. Noh said.