Taiwan Announces Plans for Five ‘Carrier-Killer’ Corvettes Loaded With Supersonic Anti-Ship Missiles

The Taipei government’s military has announced plans to upgrade the last five of the scheduled Tuo Chiang-class corvettes to carry more powerful anti-ship missiles capable of threatening China’s prized aircraft carriers.

According to reports in Taiwanese media, the five remaining Tuo Chiang-class corvettes on order, a catamaran-style patrol ship displacing just 685 tons, will be loaded down with eight Hsiung Feng III (Brave Wind) supersonic anti-ship missiles each.

The powerful missile is among the most dangerous in the Taiwanese arsenal, propelling a 500-lb-class warhead at speeds of up to 2.5 times the speed of sound, to strike a surface target at a distance of up to 250 miles. At that speed and distance, the missile will pose an existential threat to warships much larger than it, even the Chinese aircraft carriers that can top out at 85,000 tons each, because of the difficulty for air defenses to engage it.

In addition to the advanced missiles, the forthcoming Tuo Chiangs will get four older Hsiung Feng II anti-ship missiles and 16 Ha-Chien II (Sea Sword) surface-to-air missiles. That’s a lot of firepower for a coastal patrol ship. The three Tuo Chiangs already completed have a slightly lighter weapons loadout, but remain potent weapons.

Taiwanese Tuo Chiang-class corvette on maneuvers

© Wikimedia Commons

Fitting out nimble craft like corvettes with powerful shoot-and-scoot weapons like missiles is part of the asymmetric warfare strategy increasingly being pursued by Taipei as its fears of conflict with China grow.

The US has encouraged asymmetric thinking in Taiwan, motivated in part by the conflict in Ukraine, where the US has supplied Kiev with large amounts of standoff and ambush weapons like shoulder-fired anti-tank missiles and HIMARS rocket artillery. The US has sold Taipei a variety of anti-ship and anti-air weapons in recent years, and pushed Taipei to increase its civil defense corps in case of a Chinese invasion.

Beijing regards Taiwan as a wayward province and sees the Taipei government as the vestigial remnant of the former Republic of China, kept alive by support from foreign powers like the US. The US has made clear it sees supporting Taiwan, a capitalist society with a western-style liberal democratic government, as a key weapon in its “great power competition” with China. Ironically, however, Washington formally recognizes China’s position on Taiwan and agrees with Beijing’s One-China Policy.

The news comes amid reports that Japan is seeking to buy hundreds of Tomahawk cruise missiles from the United States. The long-range missile, which can strike targets 1,000 miles away, is also being sought in response to increased tensions over Taiwan, as well as with North Korea.