According to media reports, on June 7, an F-16A fighter jet affiliated to the Taiwan region of China forced a landing in Hawaii due to a failure on the way back to Taiwan. During the landing, an accident occurred when the nose wheel failed and could not be put down. On the same day, another six F-16As returned to Taiwan Island from the United States.
"Special" F-16 Block 20
Taiwan and the US-made F-16 have a deep connection. Taiwan has shown great interest in this aircraft since the F-16 began to serve in the U.S. military in the 1970s. It is obvious that in the case where the F-15 is basically impossible to obtain, the F-16 is the most advanced model with the possibility of introduction in Taiwan.
But at that time, due to the political considerations of the United States in foreign military trade decisions, Taiwan did not obtain the F-16 as expected. So the foreign trade model F-16/79 in the F-16 family was born. Since it is a foreign trade model, its performance has been reduced. The F-16's advanced third-generation turbofan engine was replaced with the old J79 second-generation turbojet engine.
In 1989, Taiwan obtained the introduction license of 60 "Phantom" 2000-5. Coupled with changes in the international environment, the United States quickly changed its attitude and agreed to "export" 150 F-16 fighter jets to Taiwan: including 120 Type A and 630 B Type html, with a total amount of US$6 billion.
This export project was named "Phoenix Project" by Taiwan.
is deployed in the Taiwan region of the United States. The " Air Force " F-16 Block20
This batch of aircraft is quite special:
At first, the United States was unwilling to provide Taiwan with a full-performance version of the F-16C/D model, and only agreed to export the earlier version of the F-16A/B model; but after the 1990s, GE's mass-produced models had significantly different from the F-16A/B model.
After coordination, Taiwan obtained an extremely special F-16 A/B mixed version, which is the so-called "F-16 Block 20".
F-16 Block 20 uses the fuselage body platform of the F-16A/B Block 15 OCU and simulated fly-by-wire flight control system; the other parts mainly come from different batches of the F-16C/D type, including the F100-PW-220 engine of the Block 32, the wing of the Block 30/40, the tail of the Block 52 and the air intake duct with hanging points of the Block 42.
In fire control and avionics systems, the F-16 Block 20 mainly takes the F-16 MLU plan as the standard, but has some functional limitations and simplifications. These changes are mainly related to the machine's supporting pod and weapon solution design.
AN/APG-66 radar.
As for the supporting pods and weapons solutions of this batch of F-16s, they are naturally constrained by the United States:
The United States refuses to provide the aircraft with the AIM-120 active medium-range missile that can lock and attack multiple targets at the same time after launch, and only provides the AIM-7M semi-active medium-range missile that needs to be continuously illuminated during the launch process and can only lock in attacking a single target at one time.
For this reason, the AN/APG-66 radar has removed the ability to launch the AIM-120 missile, but has added a continuous wave illuminator.
It can be said that the batch of F-16 block20s originally obtained by Taiwan are third-generation aircraft whose precise attack capabilities to the ground and sea and their over-visual air combat capabilities are severely limited and their performance limitations are very limited.
For example, in the attack on the ground to sea, it could only launch unguided bombs and TV-guided "Maverick" missile .
But in more than ten years after 1998, the combat capability of the F-16 block 20 has been greatly improved.
Taiwan has successively obtained incomplete functional versions of LANTIRN pods, AN/VDS-5 LOROP-EO reconnaissance pods, AIM-120C-5/7 active medium-range missiles, "harpoon" anti-ship missiles and "sniper" pods from the United States.
The F-16 after mounting AGM84 can pose a major threat to medium and large warships .
changes have enabled the F-16 Block 20 to obtain the ability to detect and shoot multiple targets at the same time, the ability to fight low-altitude combat at night, the ability to combat anti-ship combat in medium and large warships, and the ability to launch the laser-guided bomb to accurately attack the ground.
Among these improvements, there are not much changes in the F-16 Block 20 fuselage and core avionics equipment themselves - comprehensive and significant improvements and upgrades appeared in the later F-16V project.
or F-16V
that needs to be taken seriously According to Taiwan's wishful thinking, its F-16 will follow the relevant plans of the US military to achieve "comprehensive upgrade".However, due to the United States' reduction in military budget, the US military's F-16 comprehensive upgrade plan is almost all cancelled.
But since F-16 is irreplaceable for Taiwan, Taiwan chose to continue to promote the completion of this project with "real money" - the result is the F-16C/D Block 70/72, which first appeared at the Singapore Air Show in 2012, also known as the F-16V.
F-16V displayed on the official website of Lockheed Martin.
According to some "agreed" between the United States and Taiwan, the ownership of the F-16V prototype belongs to Taiwan. The aircraft is stationed in Edward Air Force Base in the United States and is responsible for relevant R&D and testing tasks. The serial number is AF93-702.
AN/APG-83 Active Phased Array Radar.
F-16V is a standard third-generation and a half-generation fighter. In terms of configuration, it includes AN/APG-83 active phased array radar, JHMCS joint helmet aiming system, night vision , new electronic warfare system, wave absorbing coating, enhanced landing gear, etc.
is further subdivided. Taiwan’s F-16V includes two categories: one is upgraded from the F-16 Block 20, called the F-16 AM/BM; the other is the newly manufactured 66 C/D models, called the F-16 CM/DM.
On airborne equipment, there is a certain difference between AM/BM and CM/DM. CM/DM should be more advanced in electronic warfare , communications, optoelectronic aiming and other devices.
In addition, the automatic anti-collision ground system involves the deep integration of the fly-by-wire flight control system, and has not been installed on AM/BM so far. According to the previously disclosed information, the installation will not start until the end of 2023 at the earliest. In terms of power, the F-16 AM/BM has not been further improved; although it was originally planned to replace the F100-PW-229 engine, due to the significant increase in the intake flow of the new engine, the replacement of the engine involves a series of factors such as the replacement of the intake channel . Due to cost control factors, this improvement was cancelled.
and F-16 CM/DM are replaced with GE F110-GE-129 engine with significantly increased thrust.
F-16 mounts AIM-120 and AGM-88. Under this mounting configuration, the F-16 can pose a high level of threat to key nodes such as air defense radar and communication command center.
In addition to the body itself, the biggest improvement in the F-16V combat capability is also due to the significant update of the supporting weapon system. These include the fourth-generation fighting missile AIM-9X, JDAM precision guided bomb, AGM-154 stealth long-range gliding bomb, AGM-88 high-speed anti-radiation missile and MS-110 reconnaissance pod.
Because of its good flight performance and combat capabilities of F-16, the F-16V has also gained favor from some other customers. As of June 2021, the F-16V has received orders of 140 newly manufactured aircraft, and the upgrade orders are more: the United States itself will upgrade 608 aircraft.
Under such "investment", Taiwan may also be able to obtain certain profits from the development and sales of F-16V. Judging from the current situation, Taiwan’s F-16V aircraft fleet may be a force that needs to be taken seriously.
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