Taiwan’s Advanced Sky Sword II Missiles To Tackle Chinese Fighter Jets

Taiwan will reportedly equip country’s Indigenous Defense Fighter (IDF) and frigates with domestically built Sky Sword II missiles, to tackle growing Chinese fighter aircraft threats.

The Taiwan Navy’s Lafayette frigates will be equipped with the sea-to-air version of the Sky Sword II from 2020 to 2028, Taiwan News reports quoting a report in the Liberty Times. In addition, Indigenous Defense Fighter jets, a multirole combat aircraft, will see their number of missiles double from two to four per plane, a move targeted at China’s Chengdu J-20 stealth aircraft and Sukhoi Su-35 jets, the report says.

The Sky Sword II missile, also known as Tien Chien II, or TC-2, was originally developed as a family of air-to-air missiles that could be launched from army, navy and air force platforms. The new TC-2C missiles have an extended effective range of 100km, up from 60km, as well as increased precision.

The report added that the missile’s maximum speed amounted to Mach 6, or six times the speed of sound, sufficient to counter the Mach 2 speeds of the Su-35.