Taiwan, US firm to make missile, underwater drone

TAIPEI, September 20 ------ Taiwan will jointly manufacture a missile and an underwater drone with an American company for the first time, officials said on Thursday, as Taipei seeks to boost its domestic production of weapons and ammunition. The democratic island faces the constant threat of an invasion by China, which claims it is part of its territory, and is under United States pressure to spend more on its own defense.

Taiwan's National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) agreed earlier this year with US defense firm Anduril to jointly make the company's Barracuda-500, a low-cost, autonomous cruise missile.

NCSIST and Anduril signed another agreement to co-produce the company's underwater drone. These are Taiwan's first such agreements with a foreign company, NCSIST President Li Shih-chiang told Agence France-Presse (AFP). "Our purpose is, [even amid] warfare [or under a] blockade, we can manufacture every weapon we need to protect ourselves," Li said on the sidelines of the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition, where the Barracuda missile is on display.

Anduril's Taiwan head, Alex Chang, said the focus of the joint cooperation was on "mass producibility" and making local production sustainable. The company would "work very closely" with the US and Taiwan, Chang told AFP. NCSIST said it would take 18 months to build the supply chain in Taiwan for the Barracuda-500, which uses 100-percent Taiwanese components.

Taiwan has ramped up spending on military equipment and weapons over the past decade, and has its own defense industry. But the island remains heavily reliant on US arms sales to deter China. A senior Taiwanese lawmaker told AFP last week that the defense ministry would seek up to a record NT$1 trillion ($33 billion) in special funding to upgrade the island's defenses.

The plans include integrating Taiwan's air defense systems, acquiring from overseas partners more advanced technology to detect small drones, rockets, and missiles, and ensuring a rapid response to an attack, and increasing the island's capacity to produce and store ammunition for wartime. Taiwanese leader Lai Ching-te's government announced last month plans to boost its 2026 defense budget to NT$949.5 billion, or more than 3 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). It aims to increase spending to 5 percent of GDP by 2030.

Source: manilatimes.net