Taiwan’s top military officer, Gen. Shen Yi-ming, was killed Thursday morning when an air force helicopter went down in the mountains south of Taipei, the Defence Ministry said. Seven others died with him.
The UH-60M Black Hawk had 13 people on board. It took off shortly after 7:50 a.m. from Taipei’s Songshan air force base, headed for a base in Yilan county on the east coast for a new year’s activity. A little over 10 minutes later it dropped off the radar. It came down in the heavily forested, mountainous Wulai area southeast of the capital.
Shen was 63. As chief of the general staff he oversaw the island’s defence against China, which threatens to use force to take what it considers its own territory. He had taken over the post in July after serving as air force commander, a service now being upgraded with the newest version of the U.S. F-16V fighter.
Alexander Huang, a strategic studies professor at Tamkang University who had known Shen for ten years, remembered a different kind of general. “He was very calm and very stable, and unlike other army guys he was always smiling,” Huang said. That style, he added, made Shen popular across the military. Andrew Yang, a former deputy defence minister who worked with Shen, said: “He was highly respected throughout his career.”
Cause still unknown
It will likely be months before anyone knows what went wrong. Both pilots were killed and appeared to have been highly experienced. Huang said people will think first of mechanical failure or a maintenance problem, “but without proof, you can’t say anything.”
The aircraft was a search-and-rescue model delivered in 2018, according to the ministry. Taiwan’s military has flown Black Hawks for decades, and in 2010 it completed a purchase of 60 more UH-60Ms from the United States, valued at $3.1 billion.
Weeks before the election
Taiwan votes for president and lawmakers on January 11. Yang said the loss of Shen and other senior officers will force a quick reshuffle of positions and will hit the armed forces. He did not expect the crash to have a strong impact on the election. President Tsai Ing-wen’s Democratic Progressive Party has been sharply critical of Chinese pressure, and she appeared on track for a second term over Han Kuo-yu of the opposition Nationalists.
