TAIPEI, TAIWAN — Taiwan is increasing the potential and combat capability of its F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter jets. On January 11th, Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense announced the missile purchase. This was reported by Yahoo News reporter Yang Zhenkai. BulgarianMilitary.com recalls that Taiwan has 110 F-16 Fighting Falcon units, and another 56 are in the process of being ordered.
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The order for the new “long-range precision weapon for the F-16” is worth an estimated $150 million. The order should be fulfilled in the coming months. Reporter Zhenkai says that the entire quantity of missiles, after arriving in Taiwan, will be deployed at Taiwan Air Force Base Taitung.
A total of three treaties between the US government and Taiwan have been concluded, covering the three types of missiles. 100 AIM-9X Sidewinder air-to-air missiles with four sets of tactical targeting components are part of the order list. Aviation anti-ship weapons are 60 AGM-84L-1 Harpoon anti-ship missiles with four training missiles and other accompanying equipment.
Missiles that will improve the range of Taiwan’s F-16s are the order of AGM-88 anti-ship missiles, as well as the purchase of new AGM-154 homing bombs and AGM-84 extended-range missiles. The variants of the three missiles are AGM-84H air-to-sea, AGM-88B air-to-ground anti-radiation missiles, AGM- 154C.
Taiwan invests in F-16
Taiwan has a plan to gradually increase the combat capability of its air fleet from F-16s by 2027. Taipei has earmarked $1.5 billion for precision weapons needed for the F-16 by 2027.
The Air Force explained that this was based on the national military’s strategic concept of “solid defense, multiple levels of deterrence” and the concept of “joint air control” in the national defense report.
Facing the powerful military threat of the Chinese Communist Party [CCP] and the development of future war patterns, Taiwan plans to purchase long-range precision weapons that can effectively paralyze higher-threat targets and weaken the enemy’s air defense capabilities. In this way, Taiwan will facilitate the subsequent combat use and combat effectiveness of the main fighters.
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