Taiwan yesterday said it has signed a NT$4.5 billion (US$144.8 million) deal to purchase 14 anti-tank munition-laying systems from the US.
Under the deal, which was signed recently and became effective on Wednesday last week, the US-made arms are scheduled to be delivered before the end of 2029, the Ministry of National Defense said in a public notice yesterday.
The purchase deal followed the US Department of State’s approval in December last year of a proposed US$180 million arms package for Taiwan, including vehicle-launched Volcano anti-tank munition-laying systems and M977A4 HEMTT 10-tonne cargo trucks on which those systems would be mounted.
Photo: screen grab from the US Army Reserve Web site
In the public notice, the ministry did not explain the discrepancy between the US$180 million proposal and the completed deal of NT$4.5 billion.
Army Command Headquarters said that the military’s proposal for the purchase of the US-made vehicle-launched Volcano anti-tank munition-laying systems was first put forth in 2018.
The main advantage of this type of system is its ability to rapidly deploy anti-tank mines over a large area to repel an amphibious landing, the command headquarters said.
The Federation of American Scientists Military Analysis Network said the M136 mine dispenser provides soldiers with a scatterable mine capability delivered by helicopter or ground vehicles.
Each Volcano dispenser contains 960 anti-tank/anti-personnel mines, and is capable of laying a minefield 1,100m long by 120m wide within four to 12 minutes, the network said. In addition, the mines have a timed self-destruct capability, it said.
At a ministry news conference in January, army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Chang Yuan-hsun (章元勳) tried to quell concerns that the mine dispersing system would turn Taiwan into an island of mines.
If the military knows where hostiles will be landing, it can use the system to lay landmines swiftly on certain parts of a beach rather than on the entire beach, he said.
“If an enemy chooses to land, it will have to pay the price,” he said, touting the mine-dispensing system as capable of slowing the advance of enemy troops.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
RSS