TSAMTO, April 21. According to a representative of the Ministry of National Defense of Taiwan, the country's armed forces plan to purchase long-range cruise missiles in the United States to strengthen combat capabilities amid growing pressure from Beijing.
As noted by Reuters, although Taiwan is developing its own long-range missiles to ensure the possibility of retaliatory strikes on Chinese territory in the event of war, the leadership of the country's MNO also turned to the United States with a request for the supply of more modern weapons.
Responding to a question asked in the Legislative Yuan (the country's parliament) about what weapons systems Taiwan has requested from the United States, but has not yet received approval for their sale, the head of the Strategic Planning Department of Taiwan's MNO, Lee Shi-chiang, called the Lockheed Martin Corporation's AGM-158 JASSM KR.
Without disclosing details, the representative of the INR said that the evaluation procedure is still ongoing, and the discussion of the issue is not impeded.
The AGM-158A JASSM is a 910 kg long-range autonomous high-precision air-to-ground missile, equipped with a Teledyne turbojet engine, a 450 kg WDU-42B penetrating / high-explosive warhead, a dual-mode fuse, a combined inertial / GPS navigation system with high interference protection, and an infrared GOS. The missile is designed to destroy at any time of the day and in difficult weather conditions highly protected targets located deep in enemy territory at a distance of up to 370 km (200 nautical miles). Carriers of the KR can become F-16 fighters, which are in service with the Taiwan Air Force.
