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| Hai Lung class Submarine (Image: Wiki Commons) |
By WENDELL MINNICK
TAIPEI — Taiwan Navy officials are committed to their submarine build plans and will not wait for the US government to fulfill a 2001 pledge to sell Taiwan eight diesel submarines, a senior Navy official said.
The 2001 deal has been held up by a variety of problems, including the fact the US no longer builds conventional attack submarines. If the US won’t deliver, “we are prepared to go with an indigenous build,” the Navy official said.
The Taiwan Navy refers to the US foreign military sales case as the Taiwan Defense Submarine program. A State Department spokesman declined to comment.
As a standby, the Taiwan Navy has begun the Indigenous Defense Submarine (IDS) program. Even if the US cannot move forward on the sale, US companies can still participate in the IDS program, the Navy official said.
His comments were in response to testimony by Deputy Defense Minister Kao Tien-chung during legislative questioning Dec. 10. Kao told the legislature that a Taiwan-built submarine could be completed by 2024.
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