In a very unexpected occurrence, the Taiwanese Air Force has reportedly published pictures of its extremely sensitive area, which looks like an underground cave and is also connected with the “Chiashan Air Force Base”. In the pictures, it can be seen that the maintenance staff is probably carrying out some weapon loading operations on some of Taiwan’s most sophisticated fighter jets, which include the F-16V Viper (that has recently been upgraded) equipped with “Harpoon anti-ship” missiles. You must have been aware of the fact that Taiwan makes substantial use of its Harpoon missiles, which can also be seen in the released images.
As a matter of fact, the most important point to be noted is that it is still unclear why it posted the images of the most sensitive location on its Facebook page. However, it has to be noted that there is still no official declaration regarding the acceptance of these images coming from the Taiwanese military base. Along with the photos, the caption stated that the practice for day two is being carried out to perform in the annual military Han Kuang Exercise. Not only this, the personnel, particularly the “subjects” beside the aircraft who are checking it for the flight operations, are from the “ROCAF’s 5th Tactical Composite Wing”.
However, there was no specific name of the aircraft that was mentioned in the post, but seeing the missiles and the platform, the concerns about the aircraft being an F-16 Viper are obvious. While talking about the construction parameters of the Chiashan Air Force Base, the author of the modern Taiwanese Air Power, Roy Choo, stated, “Individuals who have visited the base have spoken of massive steel blast doors at the entrances that could withstand the shock of a potential hit. According to them, the base comprises a northern and southern complex, each made up of five horizontal and five vertical tunnels interlaced together in a crisscrossed fashion. The taxiway tunnels reach up to a height of about three stories.”
Choo further wrote, “Thirty-six protective shelters, designed to take the direct impact of a 2,000 lb bomb, are being built at CCK Air Base over a seven-year period from 2020 at a cost of US$157 million. It is expected that new hardened aircraft shelters will also be built at Chihhang Air Base, which has been identified to receive new F-16C/Ds from 2023. ” From this, we can infer that Taiwan’s military is all ready to counter any possible attack from China and has no fear related to the release of these images because experts have already analyzed from the images that even more sophisticated aircrafts are “currently in the works.” It should be noted that ROCAF has deployed live Harpoons with F-16s in the past to carry out “air patrol missions”. Above all, Taiwan’s Air Force is certainly not sitting on its hands and is making efforts to step up the development of its sophisticated fighter jets along with impressive missile modifications.