The Ministry of National Defense (MND) is considering making the Taiping Island (
According to the proposal, if Itu Abu became an attraction visited by international tourists, the chances of it being attacked would decrease. Taiwan would be able to take advantage of this "natural protection," instead of devoting extra manpower or budget to defend the island.
"The atolls of the Spratly Islands are all easy to take but difficult to defend," a staff member from the ministry's spokesman office said. "The ministry is currently working on several solutions to defend the Itu Abu more effectively, but at this time there has been no decision yet."
Taiwan currently occupies Itu Abu, but the islet has also attracted the notice of neighboring countries, including China, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia.
According to the latest edition of the Taiwan Year Book, there are 192 atolls in the region. Forty-eight of them are occupied by six countries, including Taiwan, China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei. Taiwan claims one of them, China eight, Vietnam 27, the Philippines nine, Malaysia three and Brunei one.
Vietnam has dispatched more than 2,000 soldiers to defend its claims, while China's army has assigned more than 600 soldiers to its atolls and the Philippines has 100 military personnel defending its islets.
The official, who wished to remain anonymous, said that Minister of National Defense Lee Jye (
According to the official, participants in the meetings -- all of whom were ministry staffers -- came up with several proposals to solve the problem peacefully, including making Itu Abu a tourist attraction and welcoming foreign tourists, resuming military defense of the island or simply withdrawing all defenses and giving the island up.
The official also said the idea of turning Itu Abu into a tourist attraction had been affirmed as a smart move by local military analysts, as the chances of a foreign country attacking a location full of foreign visitors would be significantly lower.
The official said that Itu Abu is difficult to defend because it is about 1,592km from Taiwan, and currently no air force aircraft are capable of flying directly to the island to help defend it if a military conflict were to take place. In the past, the military used to assign a platoon of marines to defend Itu Abu but these were withdrawn in 1999, and the Coast Guard Administration took over the job.
In addition, shipping supplies to the island by boat takes at least two days from Taiwan. Once near the islet, passengers and supplies must be transferred to smaller boats to land on the island, since there is no suitable harbor or airport on Itu Abu.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS