The media's exposure of the sighting of three Chinese spy ships off Taiwan's northeast coast last year prevented the military from tracking the Chinese vessels for half a year, a defense official said.
Following the media report, which detailed how Taiwan's military tracked the Chinese ships, defense officials were unable to make similar discoveries for up to six months after the incident. The details provided in the news report allowed the Chinese military to evade Taiwan's coastal surveillance systems, the defense official said.
The report was made public by the Chinese-language Power News on May 19 last year after three Chinese spy ships were spotted off Suao in northeastern Taiwan.
The report described in detail the coordinates of where the spy ships were discovered as well as the distance of the ships from the coast as they were sighted.
The information was discovered by the military to have been provided by an army major, Liu Chih-chung (劉持中), who has been sentenced to nine years in prison for leaking "classified information" in a ruling by the military court. The major is appealing his case to the military's supreme court.
"The people may have no idea how damaging to the military the information leaked by the major was. For as long as six months, we were unable to discover any Chinese spy ships off Taiwan. It was because of the Power News report that the Chinese military knew the capabilities of our coastal surveillance systems," the defense official said.
"We were then very worried since the Chinese spy ships could move freely off Taiwan's coastline as if they were `invisible.' Fortunately, we solved the problem by upgrading our coastal surveillance systems. But it cost us NT$200 million," the official said.
"We have been reluctant to tell the public what kind of damage the Power News report did to the military. We keep silent partly to prevent the army major, who leaked the sighting of the Chinese spy ships to Power News, from being punished more severely," he said.
"According to military regulations, the maximum penalty for the army major could be life imprisonment or death. Now we've just given him a prison term of nine years."
The defense official used a naval official surnamed Liao as an example of typical military sentencing. Liao was given life imprisonment because he passed on a piece of classified information to a retired officer who was his former colleague at the navy's general headquarters.
Liao is still serving his term in prison as he was convicted only six years ago. Liao's disclosure of military secrets was discovered seven years ago after a navy investigation.
In comparison, the penalty given to Liu for leaking information to Power News is much lighter, the official said.
"It is true that the Chief of the General Staff, General Tang Yao-ming (湯曜明), has instructed authorities to severely punish Liu and other similar offenders. But considering the damage he brought to the military, the nine-year prison term is really the minimum punishment the military could give to him," he said.
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