The annual Han Kuang exercises will take place in September with live fire drills to be performed by all branches of the military and major arms systems, Ministry of National Defense officials said yesterday.
Major General Hsu Chien-san (徐建三), vice director of the ministry’s Combat Readiness and Training Division, told a press conference that the computer-aided war games portion of the Han Kuang exercises will be held in May, with the scenarios and result of the war games serving as reference for live fire exercise plans.
The goal is to practice more difficult joint arms warfare scenarios and strengthen the military’s joint warfare capability, he said.
The live fire missile exercises will be held on a base in Jioupeng (九鵬), Pingtung County, he said.
Other bases in the county will serve as staging points for air-to-air, air-to-land, land-to-air, ship-to-ship and sea-to-air missile exercises, he said.
The Han Kuang exercises are usually held in May or June.
Major General Mei Chia-shu (梅家樹), vice director of the ministry’s Operations and Planning Division, said exercises were pushed back to September in part to allow the military to take part in rescue and disaster relief efforts during the rainy season, if necessary.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has said the military should make disaster prevention and rescue work its core missions.
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