Time: 10:42am

Date: October 10, 2008

Location: Taipei City, Taiwan, Down the Road from the Presidential Building

The Scene: The question in Taipei on everybody's mind here this morning was, are the fighter jets going to flyover the festivities of "Double Ten" Day?  We had been told "no" by numerous sources, including the local morning papers, which had stated that President Ma Ying-jeou had decided, just this past week, to not include any sort of "Military" presence. Not even the major networks had a clue, a cluster of international senior producers asking my opinion earlier in the day as to what exactly was going to happen.  As I was preparing to interview a 15 year old Taiwanese young man about being Taiwanese, a formation of fighter jets arrived on the scene, just like that.  If I wouldn't have had my camera ready, I would have missed it.  The inclusion of these U.S. built fighter jets is an interesting demonstration of military might which may very well seriously offend China.  President Ma Ying-jeou is trying to cover his bases here, playing to both the KMT by not including an "official" military parade, here specifically, to the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, as well as to Washington.  While the current proposed $6.5B U.S. - Taiwan Arms Package does include spare parts for these planes, it does not include any actual new jets.  Could Taiwan be trying to say something?