The US defense company Raytheon has been given a US$1.1 billion contract to supply a new Patriot Air and Missile Defense System to Taiwan.
Former US president George W. Bush approved the sale last year and it took 14 months to reach this stage.
The contract comes just as US President Barack Obama is expected to inform Congress that he has approved a new arms package for Taiwan. That announcement could come at any time.
Raytheon president Daniel Smith said on Wednesday night in Washington: “The Patriot system is a vital element to providing superior integrated air and missile defense capabilities for the protection of Taiwan. Raytheon has provided advanced technology, innovation and support for Taiwan for more than 40 years, and we are honored to continue that partnership today and in the future.”
The contract, issued by the US Army Aviation and Missile Command, is in two parts. The first, for US$965.6 million, covers the missile launchers or “ground-system hardware,” while the second, for US$134.4 million, is for spare parts. The actual missiles will be covered in yet another contract to be issued shortly.
Raytheon has annual sales of US$23 billion.
While details of the Patriot system remain highly classified, the version now being sold to Taiwan is known to be more advanced, more accurate and more reliable than the older system now in use.
It is designed to intercept and destroy incoming ballistic missiles. China has more than 1,000 such missiles aimed at Taiwan.
Beijing strongly objected to the sale when it was first announced and is expected to raise further objections now that it is definitely going ahead.
The new arms package to be announced soon is expected to include UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters and more “advanced capability” Patriot missiles, known as PAC-3 missiles.
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
RSS