China is boosting its combat capabilities to the point at which it could mount a full cross-strait attack in 2020, according to a new report from the Ministry of National Defense (MND).
The report added that Chinese leaders have not given up the option of mounting a military invasion of Taiwan to unify it with “the Chinese motherland.”
The report was sent to the legislature yesterday.
Minister of National Defense Yen Ming (嚴明) is scheduled to formally deliver it today in a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee.
China has been developing and deploying various new high-end weapons, as well as advanced cyberattack and defense technologies, as it builds up its combat capabilities to reach an invasion level by 2020, the report said.
The high-end weapons include various types of reconnaissance satellites, the newest type of stealth combat aircraft, various types of unmanned aircraft systems, new ballistic missiles, new aircraft carriers, as well as research and engineering for new nuclear-powered submarines, the report said.
It also said that the ground forces of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) are deploying new types of attack helicopters (WZ-10s and WZ-19s), a new design of Type 99G battle tanks weighing 55 tonnes and a new type of light tank that weighs 30 tonnes and offers improved mobile flexibility.
The Chinese military threat has not diminished and China remains the greatest source of armed conflict for the Republic of China (ROC), the report said.
It quotes Chinese leaders on the reasons for Beijing’s increase in defense spending and boosting its military capability — that they are needed to guard against “splittist factions” making moves to interfere with the peace development across the Taiwan Strait.
By conducting combined forces training with amphibious landing exercises, expanding its naval fleet’s far-sea patrol missions, rotating troop units at positions directly across the Strait and elevating its military strength and combat ability, China will be capable of mounting a full-scale military attack on Taiwan by 2020, under the guise of “subduing Taiwan independence factions and unifying the Motherland,” the report said.
It also pointed out that neighboring countries are boosting their military capabilities and defense spending in response to China’s moves, although this has a trickle-down effect of constricting the ROC’s security operations zone.
In the face of a military imbalance skewed in China’s favor, Taiwan’s military is adhering to a concept of innovative, asymmetric warfare, in line with national defense policies, the report said.
To maintain adequate defense capabilities, Taiwan is developing its own weaponry even as it continues trying to buy arms from other countries, it said.
To better control military movements around Taiwan’s territorial space, the military is strengthening its air and sea reconnaissance capabilities and early-warning systems by deploying P-3C marine patrol aircraft, unmanned aircraft systems and integrating the helicopter fleets of the three branches of the military, the report added.
On the issue of China’s cyberthreat, the report said the military must strengthen its national information security mechanism, establish critical infrastructure protection, support the information security industry and cultivate cybersecurity personnel.
The military has estimated that between next year and 2019, the number of military personnel would be reduced to between 170,000 and 190,000, the report said.
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
FIRST TRIAL: Ko’s lawyers sought reduced bail and other concessions, as did other defendants, but the bail judge denied their requests, citing the severity of the sentences Former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was yesterday sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Taipei prosecutors in December last year asked the Taipei District Court for a combined 28-year, six-month sentence for the four cases against Ko, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The cases were linked to the Core Pacific City (京華城購物中心) redevelopment project and the mismanagement of political donations. Other defendants convicted on separate charges included Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇), who was handed a 15-year, six-month sentence; Core Pacific
J-6 REMODEL: The converted drones are part of Beijing’s expanding mix of airpower weapons, including bombers with stand-off missiles and UAV swarms, the report said China has stationed obsolete supersonic fighters converted to attack drones at six air bases close to the Taiwan Strait, a report published this month by the Arlington, Virginia-based Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies said. Satellite imagery of the airfields from the institute’s “China Airpower Tracker” shows what appear to be lines of stubby, swept-winged aircraft matching the shape of J-6 fighters that first flew with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Air Force in the 1960s. Since their conversion to drones, the aircraft have been identified at five bases in China’s Fujian Province and one in Guangdong Province, the report said. J.
China used fake LinkedIn profiles to harvest sensitive data from NATO and EU institutions by soliciting information from staff, a European security source said on Friday. The operation, allegedly orchestrated by the Chinese Ministry of State Security, targeted dozens of employees at the military alliance or EU organizations through fictitious accounts, the source said, confirming reports in French and Belgian media. Posing as recruiters on the online professional networking platform, Chinese spies would initially request paid reports before later soliciting non-public or even classified information. One particularly active fake profile used the name “Kevin Zhang,” claiming to be the head
RSS