TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Four Chinese warships and possibly a Taiwanese military ship shadowed a U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyer and a Royal Canadian Navy frigate as they patrolled the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday (Sept. 20).
The U.S. Navy's Seventh Fleet on Tuesday announced that the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer the USS Higgins (DDG 76) and the Royal Canadian Navy Halifax-class frigate HMCS Vancouver (FFH 331) had "conducted a routine Taiwan Strait transit" that day "through waters where high seas freedoms of navigation and overflight apply in accordance with international law." That evening at 8 p.m., the Ministry of National Defense (MND) announced that four Chinese military aircraft and four naval ships were around Taiwan as of 5 p.m. that afternoon.
An independent journalist, Duan Dong, on Wednesday (Sept. 21) posted an image on Twitter from the Sentinel-2 satellite taken at 2:52 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), 10:52 a.m. Taiwan Time, on Tuesday. Duan told Taiwan News that four of the ships were from the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN).
In the image, two PLAN ships can be seen sailing on the opposite side of the median line from the HMCS Vancouver and USS Higgins. Behind the Higgins are three other warships, one just to the east of the median line and two others to the south of the American warship.
Duan said that at least one of the PLAN ships was a Type 054A frigate. He judged that it was likely that the other three were also frigates.
Given that the MND only announced four PLAN ships, the fifth ship seen trailing the U.S. and Canadian vessels in the satellite image could be from the Taiwan Navy.
(Twitter, Duan Dong image)
