Mon, Jan 19, 2026 page1

• Military police add air-defense group

  REINFORCEMENTS: Although designated as a no-fly area, Taipei’s administrative core lacks sufficient defensive deployments during peacetime, an expert said

  • By William Hetherington / Staff writer, with CNA
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  Military police have strengthened garrison defense capabilities in Taipei as part of a force-structure adjustment to address enemy threats, the 202nd Military Police Command said yesterday.

  The command said it has added a new air-defense company under the 228th Battalion stationed in Taipei’s Shilin District (士林) for the purpose.

  The unit — its only artillery unit — has been equipped with Stinger anti-air missiles and anti-tank Javelin systems, it added.

  

  Military personnel take part in an exercise at a metro station in Taipei on July 14 last year.

  Photo: MINISTRY OF NATIONAL DEFENSE via AFP

  Beijing has increasingly waged cognitive warfare and military intimidation against Taiwan — including frequent incursions by aircraft and vessels into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone, and repeated crossings of the median line of the Taiwan Strait — severely undermining regional peace and stability, it said.

  The command has responded to these threats in the past few years by bolstering counter-decapitation capabilities and protection of critical infrastructure, it said.

  It increased the number of active duty officers from 5,000 to 10,000 in 2024, coordinating with one-year mandatory military service units to guard key infrastructure, it said.

  The command oversees seven battalions, which guard facilities across Taipei, it said.

  Those battalions are the 211th Battalion, responsible for Presidential Office security; the 332nd Battalion, which handles security for the president’s and vice president’s residences; the 229th Battalion, which guards the Ministry of National Defense; the 239th Battalion, the military police’s only armored unit; the 228th Artillery Battalion in Shilin; the 261st Battalion, which is dispersed across multiple locations including Songnan Camp at Songshan Airport and Zhongzhen Camp at the Military Police Command; and the 262nd Battalion, which has yet to be fully formed.

  Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said that artillery units have historically had air-defense artillery, so providing the Taipei garrison with surface-to-air missiles is not without precedent.

  “Deploying short-range, man-portable Stinger missiles enhances mobile air defense, while Javelin missiles can counter Chinese Communist Party landing craft attempting surprise assaults at the Tamsui River estuary,” he said. “Together, the two systems serve to strengthen both counter-surprise and counter-decapitation capabilities.”

  Taiwan could draw lessons from other countries’ air-defense deployments in capital no-fly zones, he said.

  For example, Washington has the National Capital Region Air Defense, with rotating deployments of air defense artillery regiments, he said.

  Sentinel A4 radars, National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems, Avenger systems and Stinger missiles are routinely deployed on surrounding buildings to protect the White House, the Eisenhower Executive Office Building — which houses the vice president and the US National Security Council — and the Pentagon, he added.

  South Korea’s 1st Air Defense Brigade is responsible for Seoul’s P-73 zone, covering a radius of 3.7km that includes the city’s Seocho, Dongjak and Jung districts, Su said, adding that short-range Mistral missiles and domestically produced KM167A3 air defense guns are routinely deployed on nearby high-rise buildings.

  Su suggested that the government also consider permanent deployments in Taipei’s Boai Special Zone (博愛特區) surrounding the Presidential Office.

  Although designated a no-fly area, it lacks sufficient physical deployments during peacetime, he said.

  Permanent deployments could strengthen resilience against surprise attacks, he added.
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