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Taiwan has officially joined the US “hellscape” strategy to defend itself from Chinese aggression with two Defense Security Cooperation Agency-approved purchases worth more than US$350 million (AU$540 million).
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Amid growing concerns about the potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) has formally approved two multi-million-dollar arms sales to Taiwan via the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States.
This decision comes following recent comments made by the Commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, Admiral Samuel Paparo, who stressed the importance of the US, Taiwan, and it’s broader regional alliance network embracing a “hellscape” strategy to complicate Beijing’s offensive actions.
Admiral Paparo explained to The Washington Post journalist Josh Rogin at the Shangri La Security Conference, “They [China] want to offer the world a short, sharp war so that it is a fait accompli before the world can get their act together. My job is to ensure that between now and 2027 and beyond, the US military and the allies are capable of prevailing.”
The “hellscape” strategy proposed by Admiral Paparo includes the deployment of hundreds, if not thousands of loitering munitions, autonomous surface, submarine and aerial vehicles to swarm attacking Chinese forces as they cross the 160-kilometre-wide Taiwan Strait.
Admiral Paparo expanded on the strategy, explaining, “I want to turn the Taiwan Strait into an unmanned hellscape using a number of classified capabilities. So that I can make their lives utterly miserable for a month, which buys me the time for the rest of everything. I can’t tell you what’s in it. But it’s real and it’s deliverable.”
In order to deliver this “hellscape” strategy, the DSCA has approved two Foreign military sales requests by the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, including US$60.2 million (AU$90.2 million) 720 Switchblade 300 (SB300) All Up Rounds (AURs), 35 fly-to-buy AURs, and 101 SB300 fire control systems (FCS).
Additionally, the DSCA has approved the foreign military sales request by Taiwan to acquire up to 291 ALTIUS 600M-V systems, comprised of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) loitering munition with extensible warhead and electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) camera worth approximately US$300 million (AU$450 million).
