The annual Han Kuang military exercises this year would be unscripted and not feature live-fire drills on Taiwan proper in a departure from previous iterations, Chief of the General Staff Admiral Mei Chia-shu (梅家樹) told lawmakers yesterday.
Mei made the remarks in a question-and-answer session on the exercises at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee in Taipei, the first time a chief of the general staff had reported to lawmakers in nearly 25 years.
This year’s Han Kuang exercises are scheduled for July 22 to 26.
Photo: CNA
The design of this year’s military drills has undergone extensive changes focusing on familiarizing maneuver brigades with their operational environment and roles in war plans to address the rising threat from China, he said.
The exercises would emphasize realism and practicing decentralized command and control, and would not have scripts and rehearsals or the participation of marines and army special forces role-playing as opposition forces, he said.
That means the annual Lien Hsin marine corps amphibious assault drills and annual army special forces parachute drills would be held separately from Han Kuang exercises in another change from past practice, Mei said.
The former would be conducted early next month, while the latter would be held sometime after the Han Kuang exercises, he said.
Marines and special forces would instead focus on their assigned missions, operational environment, and command and control arrangements, he added.
When asked to clarify the partial omission of live-fire drills, Mei said troops based in the nation’s outlying islands would practice with live ammunition as before.
Military units based in Taiwan proper would conduct live-fire exercises separately, he said, adding that this year’s guided precision munition drills have increased in rigor.
Giving commanders freedom of action, clear areas of responsibility and rules of engagement, and ensuring units are capable of operating without being given orders are part of the distributed command and control capabilities that this year’s exercises would put to the test, he said.
Echoing Mei’s comments, Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) told legislators that the canceled part of the live-fire drills was performative and that units have been allotted more live-ammo practice than in previous years.
Separately, Mei told reporters on the sidelines of the legislative meeting that he does not consider attending the committee meeting in person to be demeaning to the chief of the general staff’s office.
Should his appearance at the meeting instill a greater understanding for and appreciation of the armed forces in the public and media, going to the legislature would be worthwhile, he said.
Koo at the same impromptu news conference said that the admiral attended the session out of respect for lawmakers and that Ministry of National Defense officials believe the nation’s top commander in principle should answer their summons.
However, legislators should limit their questions to the annual military drills and not expect to summon the chief of the general staff as a matter of course, Koo said.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
RSS