Houston First Corp, a company operated by Houston, Texas, has contacted the Taiwanese government regarding the possibility of cooperating on suborbital commercial spaceflight, the company said on Sunday. The city is home to the Houston Spaceport, a federally licensed commercial facility for launching and landing suborbital vehicles, which the company said could reduce travel between Houston and Taiwan from more than 13 hours to as little as two. A planned national space mission launch facility in Jiupeng Village (九棚) in Pingtung County’s Manjhou Township (滿州) could be developed into a spaceport, a source said.
However, suborbital passenger flights remain prohibitively expensive with current technology and passenger travel faces severe challenges related to the physical strain of launch and re-entry, the source said. As a result, initial applications would likely focus on cargo.
In the near term, collaboration between Taiwanese and American researchers could begin at Jiupeng with materials and equipment testing. They could also assess how materials withstand the extreme heat of atmospheric re-entry. Data gathered near the edge of space would be valuable to aerospace engineers and meteorologists. Suborbital flights could be used to test satellites, sensors and components in space-like conditions. Such capabilities would give Taiwan a strategic edge in the emerging aerospace industry, helping to diversify its economy beyond its heavy reliance on semiconductor exports.
Expanding Taiwan’s aerospace sector would also bring significant national security benefits. One growing concern is the vulnerability of Taiwan’s undersea communication cables, which have already been disrupted on several occasions. To mitigate that risk, the government has expressed interest in building a satellite-based Internet network. More critically, suborbital flight could enable the rapid deployment of troops and military equipment from the US or other friendly countries in the event of an attempted Chinese invasion. While any spaceport would likely become a target in such a scenario, the speed of suborbital flight makes pre-emptive deployment possible during the initial phase of a crisis.
Analysts have said that China would seek to capture Taiwan swiftly and decisively, aiming to present the world with a fait accompli that discourages foreign intervention. However, the rapid positioning of foreign forces in Taiwan could give Beijing pause, as it would raise the risk of direct conflict with another country.
In a broader sense, establishing an aerospace research hub in Taiwan — particularly one involving foreign resident researchers — would raise the country’s international profile, just as semiconductors have. Increased international visibility would make Taiwan a more difficult target for annexation or blockade. If the site at Jiupeng eventually grows into a spaceport, Taiwan could emerge as a key regional hub for next-generation aviation.
After taking office in May 2016, former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) included aerospace and defense among the pillars of her “five plus two” innovative industries plan, aiming to harness government support to drive private-sector momentum. Alongside semiconductors and artificial intelligence, the aerospace sector is becoming increasingly critical, economically and militarily. As countries race for dominance in the information domain, aerospace technologies would be vital for achieving air superiority and intelligence gathering. That is why China has heavily invested in systems such as the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System.
Taiwan must continue to advance its aerospace capabilities, especially in the face of growing threats to its sovereignty. Partnering with Houston — a global center for human spaceflight and related industries — is an opportunity Taiwan cannot afford to miss.
In the first year of his second term, US President Donald Trump continued to shake the foundations of the liberal international order to realize his “America first” policy. However, amid an atmosphere of uncertainty and unpredictability, the Trump administration brought some clarity to its policy toward Taiwan. As expected, bilateral trade emerged as a major priority for the new Trump administration. To secure a favorable trade deal with Taiwan, it adopted a two-pronged strategy: First, Trump accused Taiwan of “stealing” chip business from the US, indicating that if Taipei did not address Washington’s concerns in this strategic sector, it could revisit its Taiwan
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) challenges and ignores the international rules-based order by violating Taiwanese airspace using a high-flying drone: This incident is a multi-layered challenge, including a lawfare challenge against the First Island Chain, the US, and the world. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) defines lawfare as “controlling the enemy through the law or using the law to constrain the enemy.” Chen Yu-cheng (陳育正), an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of China Military Affairs Studies, at Taiwan’s Fu Hsing Kang College (National Defense University), argues the PLA uses lawfare to create a precedent and a new de facto legal
The stocks of rare earth companies soared on Monday following news that the Trump administration had taken a 10 percent stake in Oklahoma mining and magnet company USA Rare Earth Inc. Such is the visible benefit enjoyed by the growing number of firms that count Uncle Sam as a shareholder. Yet recent events surrounding perhaps what is the most well-known state-picked champion, Intel Corp, exposed a major unseen cost of the federal government’s unprecedented intervention in private business: the distortion of capital markets that have underpinned US growth and innovation since its founding. Prior to Intel’s Jan. 22 call with analysts
Chile has elected a new government that has the opportunity to take a fresh look at some key aspects of foreign economic policy, mainly a greater focus on Asia, including Taiwan. Still, in the great scheme of things, Chile is a small nation in Latin America, compared with giants such as Brazil and Mexico, or other major markets such as Colombia and Argentina. So why should Taiwan pay much attention to the new administration? Because the victory of Chilean president-elect Jose Antonio Kast, a right-of-center politician, can be seen as confirming that the continent is undergoing one of its periodic political shifts,
RSS