2012-07-14 — Lockheed Martin inched closer this week to working with Taiwan on upgrading the island nation’s aging fleet of 145 F-16A/Bs.
Taiwan’s state-owned Aerospace Industrial Development Corp. disclosed that its president, Butch Hsu, signed a memorandum of understanding Wednesday with Ana Garcia Wugofski, Lockheed’s vice president of international business development, at the Farnborough International Airshow in Britain, Taiwan’s CNA wire service reported.
Contract negotiations and government approval are ahead, an industry source said. Hsu indicated that he expects the retrofitting to be done in facilities built in Taiwan.
China has long opposed new warplane sales to Taiwan, saying it would damage reunification efforts.
Apparently with that in mind, the Obama administration rejected Taiwan’s request for 66 F-16C/Ds but later notified Congress of its support for a $5.8 billion retrofit package for Taiwan’s old F-16A/Bs.
Lockheed declined to provide details about the memorandum beyond a brief statement: “Lockheed Martin appreciates the confidence that Taiwan has placed in Lockheed Martin and we value our long-standing relationship with the Republic of China Air Force. Any further questions should be addressed by the governments of Taiwan or the United States.”
CNA quoted Aerospace Industrial Development spokesman Mike Lee as saying that the upgrades would create a number of jobs in Taiwan, and would be carried out with Lockheed’s cooperation, provided that the U.S. defense contractor wins the bid to oversee the project.
Only BAE Systems has the capability to carry out the work, but it apparently has not been considered, it said.
Hsu was quoted as saying that the 43-year-old Aerospace Industrial Development will seek Taiwanese government support to build maintenance hangars needed for the F-16 project.
He said it wants to build a world-class maintenance center with the aid of Lockheed Martin, in order “to elevate Taiwan’s ability to conduct its own repairs.”
This is like dropping $2k on a 15 yr old toyota to fix its transmission, only even worse than dumping its trashy half century old coast guard ship to Philippine. I kinda see the importance of South East Asia to U.S —- America’s junk yard.
Yeah right. 205 C/D models that none of China’s planes can match. they must be peeing in their pants. China will never be able to invade Taiwan. I can smell freedom!
I’m sorry my bad. It’s been happening already. Actually Japan already consider them as separate country. Next is South Korea, then the Philippines, and so forth.
http://focustaiwan.tw/ShowNews/WebNews_Detail.aspx?Type=aIPL&ID=201207090030
Yeah keep bullying your neighbors. China is doing a great job!
They are f16s. Even by fighter jet standards, they arent very good. By overall military standards, they would be bombed even before they left the air field. Japan, Korea, etc. dont recognize taiwan as a sovereign country. They arent even listed as such in the United Nations, which China is a Security council member of.
That’s right. You read it right, Nationality – Taiwan.
“Hiroshi Kimizuka, an official at Japan’s immigration bureau, said the revision does not indicate a shift in government policy on Taiwan; rather it is aimed at providing greater convenience and improving registration management processes”.
Even the constitution of taiwan refers to itself the constitution of the republic of China.
Subtle yet definite. It ain’t People’s Republic of China for sure.
It wasnt an attempt to differentiate from China since Republic of China was the name of the constitution since 1928. In the constitution of taiwan, taiwan is a province of China. The mainland added “People’s” to the Republic of China in 1949.
“People’s” was added in 1954 actually.
Nice come back, clever trick for cash strapped country to make a few bling from another cash strapped island. Everyone even including the lying sobs in the U.S defense industry knows the air war with taiwan would be over in minutes.
“China’s massive arsenal of ballistic missiles that in an opening salvo would destroy most Taiwanese aircraft.”
“In other words, parking more fighters on Taiwan’s ramps would make the Chinese deplete more of its missile magazines”
yeah google those sentences and see who concluded those results. Nice yummy C/Ds for chinese missiles.
China have lost other territories for over a century before and still recover them through time. This taiwan thing is just a matter of time. The place is called “republic of China” not “republic of taiwan” and it just proves again Taiwan itself have no control over its own fate. IF the communist had lost they could escape there and set up a exile regime too. That fate is determined by motherland and motherland only.
There are a few different variants to the F-16A/B: F-16A/B Block 1/5/10,F-16A/B Block 15,F-16A/B Block 20 So before you criticize one of the most successful jets of all time,you need to do your homework! BTW: China still can’t make a good turbofan for most of its jets,that’s why they still buy them from Russia. China finally has better jets (on paper) then Taiwan,but there is no real proof of that. Kind of pitiful if you ask me,a jet that’s almost 30 years old,can still kick ass! Looks like our junkyard,is still better then China’s modern planes lol
“Taiwan itself have no control over its own fate.” Just like China cannot control Hong Kong’s fate! But one day soon,when China feels like it has its big boy pants on,they will just invade Taiwan (like most of you said,will never happen) and crack down on protest in Hong Kong,like they did in Tiananmen Square! Now I see why they keep vetoing U.N. resolutions on Syria.
Looks like China is getting a taste of its own medicine: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/19/us-china-russia-fishermen-idUSBRE86I0PM20120719
How can China get mad at something they do all the time,now that’s hypocrisy lol
Better be nice to the Great Bear,or you will have to make your own military equipment and we all know how bad China is at making their OWN technology!
Its single engine aircraft with limited attack capabilities due to its short range. It will be limited to interception roles. And there are still better single engine aircrafts in Chinese arsenal. From an overall military perspective, it would be useless against China since few of them would ever leave the runway.