Taiwan is planning to develop a new combat vehicle with 105-mm rifled cannon to increase the mobility and firepower of troops.
As Taiwan News previously reported, the Ministry of Defense’s (MND) Armament Bureau launched the development of a new variant of the Yunpao infantry support vehicle.
The new combat vehicle, commonly known as a tank hunter, will be armed with three different weapons; the main gun a 105-mm rifled cannon, a 12,7-caliber heavy machine gun and a 7.62mm machine gun as secondary weapons.
According to the 2021 MND budget, the Armament Bureau has set aside $27 million to made prototypes of future fire support combat vehicle.
According to military sources, although the 105-mm gun barrels were purchased from abroad, future mass production of the weapons will be developed in Taiwan through technology transfer. Furthermore, it is expected the recoil force of the armored vehicle can be effectively reduced by more than 70 percent.
The new variant will be suited for rapid strikes and introduced in MND’s newly established joint arms battalion. At the same time, the Armament Bureau is updating the gun system to be remotely controlled. The Bureau is working with the National Chung Shang Institute of Science and Technology to come up with the vehicle design.
The Taiwanese military currently has a variety of Yunpao (Clouded) Leopard armored vehicles, including the CM-32 and CM-33 models, which are both equipped with grenade launchers, and the CM-34 variant, which is armed with a 30-mm MK44 chain gun.