The military yesterday held live-fire exercises involving precision weapons in Pingtung County to test troops’ capabilities to counter potential amphibious and sea attacks by China.
The “Sky Horse” exercises were open to the media and involved troops from the army’s 542nd, 564th, 269th and 234th brigades, Hualien Defense Command, Army Infantry Training Command and the 99th Marine Brigade.
During the drills, soldiers fired TOW 2A anti-tank missiles at targets in the sea from a coastal drill area in Fangshan Township (枋山).
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
Major Huang Chieh-hung (黃介宏), an instructor from the Army Infantry Training Command who was in charge of the drill, said the soldiers used sighting devices to boost the missiles’ accuracy, adding that about 70 percent of the projectiles hit their designated targets at sea.
The major difference between this year’s Sky Horse exercise and previous ones is that TOW 2B anti-tank missiles were fired from vehicles instead of from the ground, he said.
Firing missiles from a vehicle increases mobility and helps soldiers defend against enemy attacks by engaging effectively at an early stage, Huang added.
Photo: Lo Pei-de, Taipei Times
Taiwan has purchased 1,240 TOW 2B anti-tank missiles, 24 Humvee armored vehicles upon which the missiles would be mounted and 30 targeting systems from the US, the Ministry of National Defense has said.
The weapons are to be delivered by 2025, the ministry said.
The military also held a live-fire exercise involving helicopters and Thunderbolt-2000 rocket systems at a separate drill ground in Pingtung.
Today, the armed forces are to hold live-fire exercises that would involve Avenger air-defense systems and Stinger surface-to-air missiles.
The drills come against the backdrop of aerial and naval maneuvers by China in and around the Taiwan Strait.
Last month, eight Chinese warplanes approached Taiwan’s contiguous zone — or the band of sea within 24 nautical miles (44km) of its coast.
In May, China’s Shandong aircraft carrier group sailed through the Taiwan Strait in a rare voyage.
Additional reporting by AFP
Taiwanese scientists have engineered plants that can capture about 50 percent more carbon dioxide and produce more than twice as many seeds as unmodified plants, a breakthrough they hope could one day help mitigate global warming and grow more food staples such as rice. If applied to major food crops, the new system could cut carbon emissions and raise yields “without additional equipment or labor costs,” Academia Sinica researcher and lead author the study Lu Kuan-jen (呂冠箴) said. Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) said that as humans emit 9.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide compared with the 220 billion tonnes absorbed
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Wanda-Zhonghe Line is 81.7 percent complete, with public opening targeted for the end of 2027, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said today. Surrounding roads are to be open to the public by the end of next year, Hou said during an inspection of construction progress. The 9.5km line, featuring nine underground stations and one depot, is expected to connect Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station to Chukuang Station in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和). All 18 tunnels for the line are complete, while the main structures of the stations and depot are mostly finished, he
Taipei is to implement widespread road closures around Taipei 101 on Friday to make way for large crowds during the Double Ten National Day celebration, the Taipei Department of Transportation said. A four-minute fireworks display is to be launched from the skyscraper, along with a performance by 500 drones flying in formation above the nearby Nanshan A21 site, starting at 10pm. Vehicle restrictions would occur in phases, they said. From 5pm to 9pm, inner lanes of Songshou Road between Taipei City Hall and Taipei 101 are to be closed, with only the outer lanes remaining open. Between 9pm and 9:40pm, the section is
China’s plan to deploy a new hypersonic ballistic missile at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) base near Taiwan likely targets US airbases and ships in the western Pacific, but it would also present new threats to Taiwan, defense experts said. The New York Times — citing a US Department of Defense report from last year on China’s military power — on Monday reported in an article titled “The missiles threatening Taiwan” that China has stockpiled 3,500 missiles, 1.5 times more than four years earlier. Although it is unclear how many of those missiles were targeting Taiwan, the newspaper reported
RSS