Breaking news
Taiwan plans to allocate $2.5 billion to purchase Tien Kung III surface-to-air missile system.
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Defence & Security News - Taiwan |
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| Saturday, September 6, 2014 01:31 PM | |||
| Taiwan plans to allocate $2.5 billion to purchase Tien Kung III surface-to-air defense missile system. | |||
The National Defense Ministry of Taiwan plans to allocate the sum over
10 years from 2015 to 2024 to purchase "ground-based air defense
weapon systems," Kuomintang lawmaker Lin Yu-fang said in a statement
after the ministry's budget plan for 2015 was delivered to the Legislature. |
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 Launch unit of Tien Kung III (Sky Bow III) surface-to-air missile system at Defense Exhibition TADTE 2013. |
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The
military plans to spend NT$74.8 billion (US$2.5 billion) to purchase locally-made
surface-to-air missile systems, a lawmaker at the Legislative Yuan's National
Defense Committee revealed. "It will be the largest procurement of domestically produced weapon systems in recent years," Lin said, noting that a budget of NT$2.9 billion for 2015 will be the first proposed for the procurement. The air defense system the military is targeting is the Tien Kung III (Sky Bow III) surface-to-air missile system developed by the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology to counter tactical ballistic missiles. The new weapons will replace aging Hawk missile systems and be deployed for air defense missions and missile interception and homeland defense combat operations, according to Lin. The Tien Kung III will be able to strengthen the density of Taiwan's anti-aircraft network and close some of the gaps in its middle- and long-range air defense capabilities, Lin added. Apart from the plan to purchase several Tien Kung III missile systems, the ministry has also decided to upgrade the existing Tien Kung systems to promote air defense efficiency and mobility, he said. The Defense Ministry's 2015 budget, meanwhile, proposes spending of NT$319.3 billion, up NT$8.2 billion from the statutory budget in 2014. In the 2015 budget, "military investments" will increase by NT$11.8 billion from the previous year, while "personnel spending" will decline by nearly NT$9.2 billion to some NT$143.1 billion, about 44.8 percent of the total budget, according to Lin. |
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 Tien Kung III (Sky Bow III) missile at Defense Exhibition TADTE 2013. |
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The
third version of Tien Kung is based on the Tien Kung II but with enhanced
anti-ballistic missile capability. Tien Kung II is already credited with an ABM capability similar to Patriot PAC-3GEM but the TK-III will be closer in capability to PAC-3. It is not clear of the future of this system given US’ agreement to supply Patriot PAC-3 missiles but it if it enters service it will provide Tien-Kung batteries with a multi-tier integrated response capability. Tien Kung III was also shown on a new launcher although the overall layout is very similar to the Tien Kung and patriot systems with a slant-launch quadruple box on a turntable mounted on a towed trailer. |
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