Seven senior retired US Air Force (USAF) officials on Tuesday sent a letter to US senators John Cornyn and Robert Menendez in support of a bill to upgrade Taiwan’s airpower and in favor of selling Taiwan the 66 F-16C/D aircraft it has been requesting since 2006.
In the letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Taipei Times, the signatories expressed “strong support” for bill S. 1539, Taiwan Airpower Modernization Act of 2011, introduced by the senators on Sept. 12.
Providing the F-16C/Ds to “our friend and ally, Taiwan” is “in the security interests of Taiwan and the United States alike. As the [US] Department of Defense ... has consistently reported in recent years, the cross-Strait balance continues to shift in China’s favor. At the same time, Taiwan’s aging air force has resulted in an erosion of the qualitative military advantage Taiwan has historically enjoyed and which has long served as a strong deterrent against Chinese military aggression,” the letter says.
The sale of the F-16C/Ds would “significantly help” restore the balance of power in the Taiwan Strait, increase stability in the region and decrease the likelihood that the US would one day be forced to intervene in the region, it says.
The letter, signed by Lieutenant General David Deptula, Lieutenant General Michael Dunn, General John Loh, General William Looney III, General Lester Lyles, General Lloyd Newton and former secretary of the Air Force Michael Wynne, was issued to coincide with the “Why Taiwan Matters” hearings at the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs the same day.
Then-US secretary of defense Robert Gates fired Wynne in June 2008 over embarrassing incidents involving the USAF, including the shipping by mistake of four classified electrical fuses — designed to trigger nuclear and non-nuclear Minuteman III ballistic missiles — to Taiwan rather than helicopter batteries.
It took nearly two years for the USAF to realize its mistake.
The Ministry of Education (MOE) is to launch a new program to encourage international students to stay in Taiwan and explore job opportunities here after graduation, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said on Friday. The government would provide full scholarships for international students to further their studies for two years in Taiwan, so those who want to pursue a master’s degree can consider applying for the program, he said. The fields included are science, technology, engineering, mathematics, semiconductors and finance, Yeh added. The program, called “Intense 2+2,” would also assist international students who completed the two years of further studies in
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) departed for Europe on Friday night, with planned stops in Lithuania and Denmark. Tsai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Friday night, but did not speak to reporters before departing. Tsai wrote on social media later that the purpose of the trip was to reaffirm the commitment of Taiwanese to working with democratic allies to promote regional security and stability, upholding freedom and democracy, and defending their homeland. She also expressed hope that through joint efforts, Taiwan and Europe would continue to be partners building up economic resilience on the global stage. The former president was to first
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Monday called for greater cooperation between Taiwan, Lithuania and the EU to counter threats to information security, including attacks on undersea cables and other critical infrastructure. In a speech at Vilnius University in the Lithuanian capital, Tsai highlighted recent incidents in which vital undersea cables — essential for cross-border data transmission — were severed in the Taiwan Strait and the Baltic Sea over the past year. Taiwanese authorities suspect Chinese sabotage in the incidents near Taiwan’s waters, while EU leaders have said Russia is the likely culprit behind similar breaches in the Baltic. “Taiwan and our European
The Taipei District Court sentenced babysitters Liu Tsai-hsuan (劉彩萱) and Liu Jou-lin (劉若琳) to life and 18 years in prison respectively today for causing the death of a one-year-old boy in December 2023. The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said that Liu Tsai-hsuan was entrusted with the care of a one-year-old boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), in August 2023 by the Child Welfare League Foundation. From Sept. 1 to Dec. 23 that year, she and her sister Liu Jou-lin allegedly committed acts of abuse against the boy, who was rushed to the hospital with severe injuries on Dec. 24, 2023, but did not
RSS