Taiwan airline seeks role in ‘whole of society’ defence with surveillance flights to counter China

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By Yimou Lee, Fabian Hamacher and Ann Wang

TAITUNG, Taiwan, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Flying over the blue waters off Taiwan’s east coast, a light aircraft equipped with a powerful U.S.-made radar slung under its belly tracks Chinese warships, collecting data its operator is keen to provide to Taipei’s security forces. 

Small Taiwanese operator Apex Aviation, better known for pilot training and charter flights, is pitching the surveillance flights to a government that has started engaging civilian firms in developing new technologies for its “whole of society resilience” initiative. 

The government has invited businesses, research groups and other organisations to take on more active roles, including backing up communications and logistics, shoring up cyber defences and, potentially contributing to surveillance and intelligence-gathering.

While common in countries such as the United States, this joint military-civilian approach is new for Taiwan, whose armed forces are increasingly hard-pressed responding to daily Chinese incursions in the skies and waters around the island. 

Taipei has said it aims to boost defence spending to 5% of GDP by 2030 and will introduce a $40 billion supplementary budget, including “significant” new U.S. arms purchases.

Apex is seeking a role in that build-up. But unlike companies that have received defence contracts so far, the airline wants to run its surveillance operation in-house, while remaining open to transferring equipment to authorities. 

“These Chinese drills are happening more and more frequently, getting closer and closer. That’s what creates that sense of urgency. If we don’t jump in now, we might not even get the chance later,” Apex Chairman Wilson Kao told Reuters. 

Apex declined to give estimates on potential revenue from such a deal.

OPEN TO NEW IDEAS

Taiwan’s defence ministry has so far been cautious about external partners, telling Reuters it is able to effectively monitor Chinese activities and currently has no plans for cooperation. But it said it was open to new ideas. 

“The ministry welcomes discussions on ‘public-private collaboration’ to strengthen national defence build-up,” it said in a statement.

Taiwan’s coast guard said it is working to boost its own reconnaissance capacity and will prioritise drones before gradually expanding the effort to include manned aircraft.

Apex has spent more than T$400 million ($13.07 million) to convert an 11-seater Italian-made Tecnam P2012 Traveller propeller plane into a reconnaissance aircraft equipped with a U.S.-made synthetic aperture radar under its fuselage. 

The company wants to feed data from the radar, which can detect objects as small as 0.09 square metres, to Taiwan’s military and the coast guard as they track Chinese ships around the island. 

The business opportunity goes beyond Taiwan. 

Apex said it could also market the relatively low-cost patrol service to friendly governments in the region that monitor Chinese activity, adding it can quickly build a reconnaissance fleet with both aircraft and drones.

LEGAL UNCERTAINTIES

Experts said authorities must establish a legal basis to allow civilian aircraft to engage in reconnaissance and also raised concerns about whether they would be made vulnerable to Chinese forces.

“Patrol aircraft involves the use of enforcement. Whether enforcement can be handed off to the private sector is a matter of legal debate,” Su Tzu-yun, a research fellow at Taiwan’s top military think tank, the Institute for National Defence and Security Research, said.

But the cost of flying a light aircraft on a reconnaissance mission could be as low as one-tenth of a military plane. 

While Apex only operates in Taiwanese air space, one of its medical charter flights to Kinmen, which sits next to China’s coast, was repeatedly approached by Chinese military planes for three consecutive days in June.

The incident, condemned by Taiwan’s government, raised concerns about the safety of civilian aircraft facing China’s stepped up “grey-zone” harassment tactics. 

Kao said Apex’s board had deliberated potential risks before taking on the project. 

“I’m just doing the right thing. I’m just steadily moving forward. And I won’t back down just because of any harassment,” he said at Taitung airport on Taiwan’s east coast.

SEA DRONES AT THE FOREFRONT

Apex has been buoyed by a growing government push for companies with limited or no defence pedigree to develop products for military use. 

One of the initiative’s biggest highlights is a new generation of sea drones developed by remote control model car, aircraft and boat producer Thunder Tiger.

The company’s SeaShark 800 drone can carry 1,200 kg (2,600 lbs) of explosives and travel up to 500 km (310 miles), and featured prominently at a summer “beauty show” where operators offered their wares to Taiwan’s military.

One senior Taiwan security official said joint military-civilian initiatives were an idea the government needed to take seriously. 

“The operational stress on troops is extremely high. The Communist military is creating new forms of pressure, so we must develop new approaches to counter them.”

(Reporting By Yimou Lee, Fabian Hamacher and Ann Wang; Editing by Ben Blanchard and Saad Sayeed)