China plans to build nearly 42,000 military drones over the next eight years, a Pentagon report estimated on Friday.
The land and sea-based drones are expected to cost about US$10.5 billion.
While the US Department of Defense’s annual report to US Congress on the Chinese military did not detail the potential impact of such a huge drone fleet on Taiwan, an analyst at a Washington-based think tank said it would be “substantial.”
Photo: Reuters
He said the autonomous aerial vehicles would be used to gather intelligence on a constant basis,and in the case of military conflict, could fill the skies over Taiwan to stage bombing and missile attacks.
Extensive references in the report to the Chinese threat to Taiwan are carried in separate Taipei Times coverage.
Three of the drones now under development, the Yilong, Sky Saber and Lijian, are to be configured to fire precision weapons, the report said.
“The acquisition and development of longer-range [drones] will increase China’s ability to conduct long-range reconnaissance and strike operations,” the report said. “China is working on a range of technologies to attempt to counter US and other countries’ ballistic missile defense systems, including maneuverable re-entry vehicles; multiple, independently targetable re-entry vehicles; decoys, chaff, jamming and thermal shielding... The US and China acknowledge that the Chinese tested a hypersonic glide vehicle [last year].”
This last weapon can travel at 10 times the speed of sound and is designed to carry nuclear warheads, reports showed.
It added that China is increasing the lethality of its conventional missile force by fielding a new ballistic missile, the CSS-11 (DF-16) which possesses an estimated range of 800km to 1,000km.
“The CSS-11, coupled with the already deployed conventional variant of the CSS-5 (DF-21) medium-range ballistic missile will improve China’s ability to strike not only Taiwan, but other regional targets,” the report said.
It said that the Chinese military is an arm of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its top priority is not to defend the nation, but to preserve the power of the party.
LONG FLIGHT: The jets would be flown by US pilots, with Taiwanese copilots in the two-seat F-16D variant to help familiarize them with the aircraft, the source said The US is expected to fly 10 Lockheed Martin F-16C/D Block 70/72 jets to Taiwan over the coming months to fulfill a long-awaited order of 66 aircraft, a defense official said yesterday. Word that the first batch of the jets would be delivered soon was welcome news to Taiwan, which has become concerned about delays in the delivery of US arms amid rising military tensions with China. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official said the initial tranche of the nation’s F-16s are rolling off assembly lines in the US and would be flown under their own power to Taiwan by way
CHIP WAR: The new restrictions are expected to cut off China’s access to Taiwan’s technologies, materials and equipment essential to building AI semiconductors Taiwan has blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co (華為) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯), dealing another major blow to the two companies spearheading China’s efforts to develop cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) chip technologies. The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ International Trade Administration has included Huawei, SMIC and several of their subsidiaries in an update of its so-called strategic high-tech commodities entity list, the latest version on its Web site showed on Saturday. It did not publicly announce the change. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. Local companies need
CRITICISM: It is generally accepted that the Straits Forum is a CCP ‘united front’ platform, and anyone attending should maintain Taiwan’s dignity, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it deeply regrets that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “one China” principle and “united front” tactics by telling the Straits Forum that Taiwanese yearn for both sides of the Taiwan Strait to move toward “peace” and “integration.” The 17th annual Straits Forum yesterday opened in Xiamen, China, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) local government heads were absent for the first time in 17 years, Ma attended the forum as “former KMT chairperson” and met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Wang
OBJECTS AT SEA: Satellites with synthetic-aperture radar could aid in the detection of small Chinese boats attempting to illegally enter Taiwan, the space agency head said Taiwan aims to send the nation’s first low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite into space in 2027, while the first Formosat-8 and Formosat-9 spacecraft are to be launched in October and 2028 respectively, the National Science and Technology Council said yesterday. The council laid out its space development plan in a report reviewed by members of the legislature’s Education and Culture Committee. Six LEO satellites would be produced in the initial phase, with the first one, the B5G-1A, scheduled to be launched in 2027, the council said in the report. Regarding the second satellite, the B5G-1B, the government plans to work with private contractors