Taiwan Coast Guard Vessel Arrives in Hawaii

Patrol vessel of Coast Guard Administration CG 5002 Hsinchu at the launching ceremony. Official Photo by Makoto Lin / Office of the President, 28 April 2021

We have a report that a Taiwanese Coast Guard Cutter arrived in Hawaii on June 11. The vessel, Hsinchu (CG5002), one of a new class of four 5,044 ton cutters, was commissioned in December 2022.

This may be just a stop for supplies and liberty, but I suspect there will be some interaction with the US Coast Guard. Despite speculation, there was a denial that the ship would participate in RIMPAC scheduled June 26 to Aug. 2. Taiwan was not listed as a participant in a May 21 Third Fleet announcement of the exercise.

Reportedly the cutter will be engaged in fisheries management. This is well outside Taiwan’s EEZ, so I presume they will be policing and supporting the Taiwanese fishing fleet.

This background from Wikipedia,

In March 2021 the CGA and the US Coast Guard announced that they had signed a cooperation agreement, the agreement was promptly denounced by China. In May 2021 US President Joe Biden praised the cooperation agreement while speaking at the commencement of the United States Coast Guard Academy. The first bilateral meeting under the agreement occurred in August 2021.

2 thoughts on “Taiwan Coast Guard Vessel Arrives in Hawaii

  1. They just commissioned one of these with their President in attendance I believe. They might consider it as the simple path to their new frigate now that they have renewed that development. Vard’s concepts could easily be adapted to a more AAW focused ship.

  2. Hi all.

    Andy, you answered my question on why Taiwan has such a big CG ship. Makes sense, since they did the same thing with their Anping Class CG ships, which are really just Tuo Chiang class corvettes but not fitted with missiles. a nice way to get economies of scale building ships , and get a doubling of wartime naval vessels when needed

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