A photo caption on a US Navy Web site has raised the question of whether the Republic of China Navy participated in an international military exercise this week, or if there was simply a mix-up by the US Navy.
Defense circles have been buzzing after it was noticed that the caption said Taiwanese warships were present in the Rim of the Pacific Exercise (RIMPAC), a biennial drill and the world’s largest international maritime exercise.
If true, Taiwan’s participation could signal a major change in Taiwan-US military exchanges. Despite being a key naval presence in the region, Taiwanese forces have never officially participated in RIMPAC, which was first held 39 years ago.
The US Navy-led exercise is expected to involve as many as 32 ships, five submarines, more than 170 aircraft and 20,000 personnel from 14 countries by the time it concludes on Sunday in the waters near Hawaii.
Spanning 40 days — the lengthiest in recent years — the exercise irked Beijing, with the state-run Global Times writing that the maneuvers would “exert negative influence” on Sino-US military relations.
A People’s Liberation Army general told the paper that at one point, the drill was very close to Chinese territorial waters.
While the US Navy site (www.navy.mil/view_single.asp?id=89349) did not say where Taiwanese ships apparently joined the naval formation, the photograph, dated last Saturday, shows more than a score of warships led by a US aircraft carrier.
“The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan leads a formation of ships from Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, France, Canada, Australia and the US during Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) 2010,” the photo caption said.
A US Navy officer told the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) that it could just be another case of the US government mistaking Thailand for Taiwan. It could be that the photographer mistakenly wrote Taiwan rather than Thailand, the paper cited the officer as saying.
Thailand was listed as an official participant in the exercise; Taiwan was not.
A Taiwanese military spokesperson told the Liberty Times that Taiwan had not taken part in the exercise.
This would not be first time that an error appeared on the US Navy Web site. Hong Kong’s Wen Wei Po wrote on Wednesday that a number of RIMPAC picture captions erroneously stated that a number of vessels had passed by the Yellow Sea, near Beijing. Those errors have since been retracted.
Such discrepancies did not stop legislators in Taipei from asking about the significance of the picture and caption, which at press time were still on the Web site.
The caption could show which countries the US considers as Pacific Rim allies and could mean that Taiwan was still important, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲) said.
“[US] military officers don’t make this kind of mistake,” he said, adding that it would be understandable if defense officials declined to comment because of the sensitivity of the military exercise.
The US Navy has not responded to queries by the Taipei Times as of press time last night.
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