The performance of our People's Liberation Army in the recent days of Taiwan and Island drills can be described as "powerful and powerful"! On the other hand, the "army" on the opposite side has a posture of "showing off force". Facing the Dongfeng series missiles passing through the island, they can only "wait and sigh". The land heavy artillery exercise organized by the authorities fired at the sea indiscriminately. "The fighter plane is flying "full of ammunition" with the blessing of "PS", and the nearly 50-year-old "old" ship is hobbling out to sea...
Before this, such a picture even broke the Internet. The old Lan The Yang frigate drags its rusty hull to patrol around Taiwan. Compared with our military warship , it looks like a "dying" old man! Some netizens jokingly said: is really afraid that the Lanyang will sink into the sea during the voyage!
The idiom "You can see the whole picture at a glance" can be said to be more appropriate when used now on the "Taiwan Navy". From the old frigate Lanyang, we can see that today's "Taiwan Navy" is already a The maritime power of China is in its twilight years. Over the years, there have been almost no updates to its maritime combat ships, and all of them are products from the last century. Twenty years ago, it might still have the power to fight, but now, facing my country's rapidly developing and powerful navy, this force is no longer to be afraid of !
The surface combat force of the "Taiwan Navy"
Currently, the "Taiwan Navy" has a total of 57 main surface combat ships, including 31 "Guanghua-6" missile speedboats with a displacement of less than 200 tons, 22 Jiyang-class ships, and Kangding-class ships. and Chenggong-class frigates (numbers are 6, 6 and 10 respectively), as well as 4 Keelung-class guided missile destroyers, which are regarded as the highest combat power of the "Taiwan Navy".
Except for the Kangding-class frigate , which was purchased from France, the rest of the ships are from the United States or self-built on Taiwan. The Lanyang belongs to the Jiyang-class frigate . Its predecessor was the United States in the 1960s. The Knox-class frigates produced were later delivered to the "Taiwan Navy" on lease after the US military retired. Currently, these six old ships have been bought out.
Among the frigates installed by the "Taiwan Navy", the leased Jiyang class is at the bottom, the self-built Chenggong class is in the middle, and the Kangding class purchased from France with partial stealth performance is not bad, but in view of their "age" "Things are already high", most of them are products from the mid-to-late 1990s. In Asia, where giant ships of 10,000 tons gather, their combat power is "better than nothing".
Next, we will focus on the current highest combat capability of the "Taiwan Navy" surface combat force, the Keelung-class guided missile destroyer!
Keelung-class destroyer is a retired U.S. Navy destroyer introduced by the "Taiwan Navy" between 2005 and 2006. It turns out that this destroyer in the U.S. military is called the Kidd class, which is the former Spur The Roones-class guided missile destroyer is derived from .
In fact, it is not very accurate to say that it is the standard equipment of the U.S. Navy, because during the construction of the ship, the U.S. Navy never thought of fielding this type of warship. It was completely designed and built for export, but later The buyer's regime of warships collapsed and there was no export market. As a last resort, the U.S. Navy took over these warships.
The complicated history of the Kidd-class destroyer
html In the early 1970s, the relationship between Iran and the United States was still very "iron", and the arms trade between the two sides was also very active, so during the Pahlavi dynasty Iran turned to the United States. A request was made to purchase six destroyers. At that time, given the good relationship between the two parties, the United States naturally responded to the request of this wealthy "financier".However, because Iran’s requirement for new destroyers is that they must have sufficient air defense capabilities, and the Spruance-class destroyer under construction at the time has relatively strong anti-submarine capabilities but relatively weak air defense capabilities, so in order to meet the needs of buyers, The U.S. arms dealers specially launched this type of destroyer. Before it entered the U.S. Navy, its name was still called the Spruance class;
In order to strengthen its air defense capabilities, the newly built destroyer has the original "Standard-1" air defense missile. On the basis of this, two sets of "Tatar-D" ship-to-air missile systems have been added. The hull is also about 10 meters longer than the Spruance class. At the same time, the ship has been customized to adapt to the hot climate of the Middle East. design.
But just as the first four warships were about to be completed, the Pahlavi dynasty of Iran overthrew, and the Iranian regime that seized power informed the United States that the warship order was canceled and the contract was terminated;
This made the Americans dumbfounded, and it was specially tailored for you. The warships were not wanted at all, but the relationship between the two countries was no longer so harmonious at this time. There was no other way. Lao America had to cancel the plan for two subsequent warships that had not yet been built, and instead looked for buyers in the international market;
was very Unfortunately, rich people in the arms market looked down on this alternative destroyer, and those who liked it could not afford it. In the end, the U.S. Navy took over the four destroyers and named them the Kidd class;
by In addition, the Kidd-class destroyer also set a small record in the U.S. Navy, that is, the smallest number of single-class destroyers built. This record has not been broken until the advent of DDG-1000;
Kidd-class destroyer is in service in the U.S. Navy It was retired in 1999 after nearly 20 years. Because it was a warship specially designed for the climate of the Middle East, these four destroyers were deployed in the Middle East for most of their service.
changed from the Kidd class to the Keelung class, the highest combat power of the "Taiwan Navy" and the most expensive warship
Starting in 2000, in order to strengthen the maritime area air defense combat capabilities, the "Taiwan Navy" upgraded the old "Yang Zihao" destroyer Looking for successors, they have set their sights on the recently retired US Kidd-class destroyer;
According to the "Navy" assessment, the combat power of a Kidd-class destroyer will be more than 2.5 times that of the current Success-class frigate. If purchased For four ships, compared with the seven "Wu Jin III" destroyers that are about to be retired, the combat power level will be significantly improved;
So the arms purchase proposal began to be promoted at the end of the year, and the United States approved the arms sales contract in April of the following year. , Taiwan "obtained" four Kidd-class destroyers for US$730 million;
However, what is interesting is that when the United States sold this decommissioned warship to Australia and Greece , the unit price was only more than 20 million US dollars. , but Taiwan Island bought it for a unit price of nearly 170 million U.S. dollars. This was a waste of money.
After the contract was finalized, the four destroyers did not sail directly to Taiwan. Instead, they were upgraded and refitted at a U.S. shipyard. The "standard-1" anti-aircraft missiles carried by the original ships were replaced with "standard-2" "type, the combat system was replaced by ACDS Block 1
and WDS MK-14, etc. The main purpose of these modifications is to further strengthen its air defense capabilities. However, modification also costs money, and it is not included in the purchase price of US$730 million. It is reported that Taiwan paid a total of US$1.2 billion to modify four warships. The unit price of a Kidd-class destroyer is about US$500 million. Maybe you don’t know that the cost of a new ship that year was only US$250 million. The U.S. Navy used it for nearly 20 years, but its value has increased?
In October 2005, the two Kidd-class destroyers were delivered after the refit was completed, and were immediately named Keelung and Suao. The next year, two more Zuoying and Magong were added to the fleet. After all four ships arrived, The name of the Kidd class was officially cancelled, and was instead named after the lead ship Keelung, which is how the Keelung class came about.
According to what Taiwan said when it was first introduced: The Keelung class was the destroyer with the strongest air defense firepower in the U.S. Navy before the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer entered service. After joining the "Taiwan Navy", it relied on the "Standard-2" type Anti-aircraft missiles can increase the air defense capabilities of the entire fleet by at least 10 times.
This statement still made some sense at the time. The effective range of the Keelung-class modified "Standard-2" anti-aircraft missile was about 153 kilometers. Compared with the original "Standard-1" type, which only had a strike range of 40 kilometers, the improvement was indeed Quite a few;
is equipped with the ACDS Block 1 combat command system that can detect, identify and track sea areas within a 500-kilometer range, and can handle 64 targets at the same time;
In addition, this class of warships also inherited the original Sipu The excellent anti-submarine capabilities of the Loones-class destroyer!
It’s just that its level in anti-ship is a bit unsatisfactory. Although 8 "Harpoon" anti-ship missiles are standard equipment for US-made warships, its range is only 70 nautical miles and its maximum flight speed is Mach 0.7. Today, is super In an era when the sonic anti-ship missile is rampant, this firepower configuration is really a bit pitiful.
This is the current strongest combat capability of the "Taiwan Navy"'s surface combat force. The Keelung-class destroyer with a displacement of nearly 10,000 tons looks very intimidating, but is actually not as good as our 7,000-ton 052C.
The strongest combat power is like this, so you can imagine the status and performance of other warships, and there are only four ships of the unique ship type of the Kidd class. Once there is battle damage, the only way is to destroy one of them. There is no room for repairs on one ship.
