The military yesterday began three days of drills as concerns rose over potential cuts to the defense budget due to legislative wrangling.
The drills began in the north with tank maneuvering at a base in Hsinchu County featuring outmoded CM-11 tanks, which are gradually being replaced by newly purchased M1A2T Abrams from the US.
The replacement marks a huge upgrade despite some complaints over the weight of the new vehicles and their likely effectiveness at preventing a possible Chinese landing.
Photo: CNA
Soldiers arrived on armored personnel carriers, while Apache and Sikorsky S-70 helicopters whirled overhead, providing reconnaissance and covering fire.
With the equipment the military currently operates, a communication officer on the ground can coordinate airborne attacks, Army Captain Chuang Yuan-cheng (莊沅澂) said of the 542 Armored Brigade in Hsinchu County.
Today, the army is to show off its Patriot III anti-missile system aimed at countering one of China’s most potent weapons. Tomorrow, anti-submarine exercises are to be held off the Port of Kaohsiung, considered China’s best conduit for resupplying its troops should it establish a beachhead in the heavily defended region.
Photo: I-Hwa Cheng, AFP
The annual drills are held in the run-up to the Lunar New Year holiday to reassure the population of the military’s ability to meet China’s threats and to boost recruitment.
Taiwan has a backlog of orders from the US for about US$20 billion in weapons systems, while it upgrades its F-16 jets and develops its own submarines. It has also extended compulsory military service to one year.
However, the government has warned that new legal amendments being considered could force a 28 percent cut in the defense budget by altering the way funds are distributed between the central and local governments.
Photo: CNA
That in turn could reduce the willingness of the US and its allies such as Japan and the Philippines to assist Taiwan in the event of an armed clash with China, National Security Council Secretary-General Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) told legislators last month.
The legislation is being pushed by the main opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), which has joined with the Taiwan People’s Party to oppose the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s legislative agenda.
Taiwan annually spends about 2.4 percent of its GDP, or about US$20 billion, on the military.
Photo: CNA
China has responded furiously to all US arms sales to Taiwan, saying that unification is inevitable and warning that Washington is “playing with fire.”
However, neither military intimidation, economic coercion nor appeals to their common Chinese ancestry seem to be working on Taiwanese, the vast majority of whom favor the current status of de facto independence.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS