Mirage fighter jets readiness rate acceptable: legislator
ROC Central News Agency
2013/01/26 21:50:50
Taipei, Jan. 26 (CNA) The Air Force's Mirage fighter jet fleet is in an 'acceptable' state of readiness after gradual improvement over the past two years, Legislator Lin Yu-fang said Saturday.
Lin said a remark by him, quoted Saturday in the media, that the fleet of 60 Mirage jets was in a poor state of readiness was taken from a legislative interpellation two years ago.
The situation has since improved and the jets, acquired from France in 1993, are in an acceptable state of readiness, he said.
Lin said the journalist who wrote the report did not ask him any questions before writing the story.
His staetment was supported by the Air Force, which said in a press release Saturday that the Mirages have a readiness rate of 69 percent, higher than the requirement of the Ministry of National Defense.
Meanwhile, military sources denied reports that several fighter plane pilots are contemplating en masse retirement because of the jets' poor rate of readiness and a government plan to cut pensions for retired military personnel.
Luo Shou-he, a spokesman for the Ministry of National Defense, said the reports are groundless.
Lieutenant General Wu Wan-chiao, chief of Air Force Political Warfare Department, dismissed the information in the reports as 'improbable.'
(By Rogge Chen, Chen Shun-hsieh and Maubo Chang)
ENDITEM /pc
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
