Group Promotes Taiwan Fighter Sale

The United States should release 66 F-16C/D Block 50/52 fighter jets, on hold since a request in 2006, to Taiwan in order to help that country avoid a “fighter gap” with China, a U.S. defense industry advocacy group said in a report released yesterday.

“No decision is a decision not to sell,” Rupert Hammond-Chambers, president of the U.S.-Taiwan Business Council, said during the rollout of the report.

Lockheed Martin [LMT] is expected to deliver its final new F-16s to foreign customers by the end of 2013. There is also a 36-month lead-time for putting any additional aircraft on contract.

Taiwan’s mixed fighter fleet is comprised of 387 aircraft organized into18 squadrons. The country maintains 145 F-16A/Bs, 126 Indigenous Defense Fighters (IDF), 56 Mirage 2000s and 60 F-5E/Fs.

The new report, titled “The Balance of Airpower in the Taiwan Straights,” notes that the F-5s are slated for retirement in 2014 and that the Mirage 2000s are expensive to maintain at even a 60 percent availability rate. The flight-hour cost of the Mirage is more than triple that of the IDF and five times that of the F-16A/B, according to the report. Its operational costs use up nearly 59 percent of Taiwan’s fighter operations and maintenance budget–despite the fact that the aircraft makes up only 17 percent of the fleet.

The report warns that Taiwan’s fleet will drop from 387 to 271 aircraft as the F-5s and Mirages are phased out over the next 10 years. Within the same time frame, China’s fighter fleet is expected to increase far beyond its current 700 operationally ready airplanes.

The minimum number of operationally available fighters Taiwan should have at the start of any potential conflict with Beijing is no less than 360-400, the report states.

Hammond-Chambers said the Obama administration must carefully study the potential cost of Taiwan’s inability to defend itself. “U.S. forces in the region are already overburdened,” he said.

The report also notes that Taiwan is developing indigenous “deep-strike” capabilities, including short-range ballistic missiles, as well as advanced command and control facilities, radar stations and surface-to-air missiles for air defense activities. Taipei is also working on a land-attack cruise missile and a tactical ballistic missile.