Indo-Pacific news
The US State Department has cleared another potential arms sale to Taiwan, making it the fifth arms package approved for the self-governing island in a matter of weeks.
The latest potential sale announced by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency is for four General Atomics MQ-9B “weapons-ready” unmanned aircraft, for an estimated value of A$835.4 million. The package also includes the Raytheon SeaVue maritime multi-role patrol radars, suggesting that the Taiwan will be acquiring the SeaGuardian variant of the MQ-9B.
The package also includes two mobile ground control stations, 14 embedded global positioning system/inertial navigations systems, and Wescam MX-20 multi-spectral targeting systems.
The US has also in recent weeks cleared the sale of mobile land-based anti-ship Harpoon and land attack missiles, air-launched stand-off land attack missiles, and airborne long range reconnaissance pods to Taiwan.