A top-secret military radar station on Taipei's Yangmingshan was opened to the media yesterday for the first time since 1968, when it was relocated to the mountain.
The move was made in the face of increasing requests from the media for access to military installations, as well as to assist with the station's psychological counseling program for its isolated conscripts.
The Sungshan radar station, or, as it is officially known, First Combat Control Center, is located on one of the highest points in the Yangmingshan area at 1,000m, and is one of the four control and reporting centers (CRCs) of the air force's nationwide "strong net" air defense network.
PHOTO: REUTERS
It was only the second time that the air force had ever received members of the media at a CRC.
The first occasion was nearly 10 years ago, when reporters were invited to visit a radar station in mountains surrounding Hsinchu.
Like the three other CRCs scattered across the country, the Sungshan radar station operates under the auspices of the air force's anti-aircraft operations center based in Kungkuan, Taipei, responsible for monitoring and identifying aircraft flying in air space under its jurisdiction, as well as providing real-time information to friendly aircraft.
Veiled in mountain haze and a shroud of secrecy throughout its operational life, the base had until yesterday left everything to the imagination.
Yesterday, however, even its top-secret area -- the radar control room, was open for scrutiny.
The control room is largely automated and is equivalent in capacity to the air defense radar system of an aircraft carrier battle group of the US navy, according to Erich Shih (
It retains, however, one outdated feature incongruous with its otherwise up-to-the-minute appearance: control room staff have to write by hand on a giant see-through notice board in order to update information on flight activities in monitored air space.
Colonel Chung Chen-han (
"We are now upgrading our system to one that is capable of three-dimensional monitoring. It is expected to be completed soon. By that time, the updating of information from computer to notice board will be automatic," Chung said.
Giving the media an overview of the history of the station, Chung said, "The radar station contributed a lot to the air force in the 1950s before it was relocated from Taipei County's Shihmen township to its current site in Yangmingshan in 1968."
"In 1956, 1958 and 1959, the station assisted fighter planes in shooting down invading Chinese warplanes. A total of 18 Russian-made fighter planes, ranging from MiG-15s to MiG-19s, were downed by our planes in air campaigns during those periods," he said.
The Sungshan base was one of Taiwan's five radar stations which China threatened to destroy with missiles during the 1996 missile crisis.
To defend against missile attacks from China, said an official at the base, proper counter measures had been prepared, including a back-up system.
"Though weakly armed in itself, the radar station is under the protection of a missile shield formed by air defense missile bases not far away down the hill," the official said.
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