A US newspaper is reporting that China earlier this month carried out a series of practice or “simulated” attacks targeting Taiwan.
“The tests included multiple firings of short and medium-range ballistic missiles as well as land-attack cruise missiles,” the Washington Times reported.
The report was written by national security journalist Bill Gertz, who has established a reputation for his intelligence community contacts. Gertz earlier broke news of China secretly testing Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs).
The latest missile tests may actually have taken place while US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was in Beijing on Sept. 4.
Citing US officials, Gertz said Chinese military forces recently carried out a series of ballistic and cruise missile tests that “simulated salvos of attacks on Taiwan.”
US intelligence sources reached by the Taipei Times would neither confirm nor deny the report.
“The missile tests were monitored by US spy agencies which reported that the tests used capabilities designed to penetrate missile defenses and to hit hardened or protected targets,” Gertz said.
According to Gertz, China has between 1,000 and 1,600 DF-16 medium-range and DF-11 and DF-15 short-range missiles within range of Taiwan and recently deployed a new DH-10 land-attack cruise missile.
“The anti-Taiwan missile tests followed a series of long range flight tests of Chinese missiles that began in July, with the first test of a new road-mobile DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile,” Gertz said.
A US Department of State official said: “We are well aware of China’s extensive military modernization efforts and are monitoring them closely,” adding that “we remain concerned about the lack of transparency from China.”
Richard Fisher, a specialist on China’s military with the International Assessment and Strategy Center, said: “The timing of this latest missile exercise with the arrival of the US Secretary of State seems consistent with the Chinese Communist Party leadership’s penchant for martial posturing.”
“[US] Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta got his share when China revealed its J-31 stealth fighter the day before his arrival. The dictators are playing for PLA [People’s Liberation Army] applause and may even think they are scaring the rest of us, but they are also demonstrating their insecurity and reminding us that their paper thin legitimacy makes them prone to violence,” he said.
Fisher said that with the latest report it was clear that China’s Second Artillery had undertaken an intensive missile demonstration and testing program this summer.
“We are already seeing an effort by the PLA to counter Taiwan’s new missile defenses with the deployment of longer range and faster DF-16 missiles that are much harder to shoot down,” Fisher said.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS