A recent assessment of proposed military hangars to be built in a Taichung air base has shown that they would be capable of withstanding hits from the Chinese Dongfeng series of ballistic missiles, Air Force Chief of Staff Huang Chih-wei (黃志偉) said Wednesday.
The National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) recently re-evaluated the design of the 36 planned hangars in Ching Chuan Kang Air base in Taichung, Huang told the Legislature’s Foreign and National Defense Committee.
NCSIST experts have reaffirmed that the hangars are designed to survive Dongfeng missile strikes, Huang said at the committee hearing held to review of the budget request of the Ministry of National Defense (MND) for the fiscal year 2023.
In 2020, the MND proposed a plan to build the hangars to protect military aircraft and preserve their combat capability in case of an attack from China with a seven-year budget of NT$4.392 billion (US$136.59 million), with the aim of completing the project by 2026.
Following the completion of the design and risk assessment phases, construction of the project will be outsourced by the end of this year, Huang said.
Also at the hearing, Navy Chief of Staff Vice Admiral Chiang Cheng-kuo (蔣正國) was peppered with questions from lawmakers regarding the navy’s recent scrapping of its plan to build a 4,500-tonne guided missile frigate in favor of building two light frigates.
Taiwan’s military had initially budgeted NT$24.5 billion from 2019 to 2026 to build one 4,500-tonne guided missile frigate, but it recently decided to build two 2,000-2500 tonne light frigates instead — an anti-air frigate expected to enter service by 2025 and an anti-submarine frigate by 2026.
Amid China’s increasingly aggressive military actions toward Taiwan in an attempt to create a “new normal,” the new plan is meant to better counter China’s gray-zone threats in a more cost-effective way, Chiang said.
The two light frigates will be equipped with mid-range anti-air missiles and longer-range supersonic anti-ship missiles and will serve as the Navy’s main vessels for patrolling the Taiwan Strait and to monitor the maneuvers of Chinese military warships, he added.
Meanwhile, speaking to reporters before the legislative hearing, National Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正) vowed that the military would fight “to the end” should China invade Taiwan but would never start a war.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel