Taipei Times
Date: June 5, 2016
By: CNA
TAIPEI–President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) reaffirmed her administration’s determination to push
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) waves during an inspection tour of a naval base in Suao, Yilan on Saturday, June 4. (CNA)
for a self-reliant national defense force when she boarded a domestically built warship off Yilan in Eastern Taiwan Saturday.
Following a May 29 inspection tour of air bases in Hualien, Eastern Taiwan — the first time in her capacity as commander in chief of the nation’s Armed Forces — she visited a naval base in Suao, Yilan and boarded the Tuo Jiang (沱江), Taiwan’s first locally developed stealth missile corvette that was commissioned in March 2015.
She said the nation will continue to promote the policy of building its own vessels.
“In addition to enhancing naval combat capacity, it will also help the development of the shipbuilding and machinery sectors, as well as system integration,” she said.
The government’s approach will be to make “demands for national defense the driving force of industrial upgrade and transformation,”Tsai said.
The government is bound to encounter numerous challenges in the pursuit of a self-reliant national defense force, however, she admitted.
“The path is not an easy one, but there is no return,” she told naval officers and cadets aboard the Tuo Jiang. [FULL STORY]
