Kidds may not meet Taiwan's needs

The four Kidd-class destroyers that the US is to sell to Taiwan may not meet the country's defense needs, according to an internal Legislative Yuan report.

The same report also describes the destroyers as "unwanted," and envisaged for use by Taiwan mainly as transitional combat ships. Although it does not say so explicitly, the report appears to imply that Taiwan is likely to acquire AEGIS-equipped destroyers from the US in the future.

The Kidds may also become a financial burden to the navy since they are second-hand ships, which were used for 19 years by the US navy before being mothballed, the report says.

The report was prepared by researchers at the legislature's budget center for lawmakers on the Defense Committee.

The Kidds are expected to cost the navy nearly NT$900 million each year in maintenance and repairs, the report says.

In addition, the navy faces a huge outlay on training personnel and manning the four Kidds, each of which requires a crew of nearly 400.

"Taiwan did not ask for the Kidds. It was the US Congress that offered the Kidds to Taiwan. The Taiwan military was forced to accept the deal," the report says.

"The US wanted Taiwan to use the Kidds as transitional ships for the much more advanced AEGIS-equipped destroyers that are very likely to be sold to Taiwan in the future," it says.

"The Kidds are not what Taiwan wants. It is highly questionable whether these ships can meet Taiwan's defense needs since they were unwanted from the very beginning," it says.

Former chief of the general staff General Tang Yao-ming (湯曜明) said in the legislature last year that it was the AEGIS-equipped Arleigh Burke class destroyers, rather than the Kidds, that Taiwan really wanted.

"If the navy decided not to buy the Kidds, we would say `no' to the US even if the US insisted," Tang said at the time.

But Tang left the matter for the navy. Five months after the US announced its intention to sell the Kidds last April, the navy decided to buy them at a cost of NT$25 billion.

During the intervening five months, the navy worked out a deployment plan for the Kidds, and briefed all lawmakers on the defense committee on the plan in the hope of eliciting their support.

But many lawmakers remained skeptical of the Kidds' value to Taiwan's navy.

Chen Hsiao-ming (陳曉明), a retired deputy manager of the project management office of the state-run China Shipbuilding Corp (中船), said the Kidds were initially built for Iran before the Islamic revolution. Chen had been in charge of building Cheng Kung-class frigates, modeled on Perry-class frigates of the US.

"Do you know why each of the Kidds has to be over 9,000 tonnes in displacement?" Chen asked.

"It is mainly due to the fact that the US shipbuilder was asked to build a ship that could provide a comfortable living and working environment for [former shah of Iran] Pahlavi's seamen. The Kidds were basically designed as floating hotels," he said.