TAIPEI – Taiwanese forces are employing 35-year-old CM-11 Brave Tiger tanks in static, defensive positions to guard the Tamsui River, a strategic waterway providing direct access to the capital's military command center and presidential office. The deployment of these aged, hybrid armored vehicles was observed during recent Han Kuang military exercises, reflecting a practical, resource-constrained defense strategy against a numerically superior adversary.
Re-purposing Old Assets for a Narrow Mission
First assembled in 1990, the CM-11 is a composite of American Cold War-era components, pairing a 1970s M60A3 chassis with a turret derived from the even older M48A3 Patton. Military analyst Ben Lewis noted this static forward positioning is a logical use of obsolete armor. "For tanks that are as old as the CM-11, using them for support to engineering units and in static positions is logical," Lewis said. "The armor on these tanks is not suitable for protection against modern anti-tank weaponry or tank-to-tank combat."
With a direct-fire range covering the roughly three-quarter-mile span of the Tamsui, a tank's 105-mm gun becomes a fixed coastal artillery piece, tasked not with mobile warfare but with ambushing or warding off landing craft and amphibious vessels. This strategy avoids pitting the outdated steel against China's modern main battle tanks, numbering approximately 6,000, in a maneuver fight they would almost certainly lose. This pragmatic adaptation keeps American-sourced hardware in the fight to serve a sovereign defense, even if its utility has shifted, and carries no direct cost to the U.S. taxpayer.
Sovereignty and Artillery in a Narrow Strait
The island fields around 450 of these tanks, a fraction of Beijing's armored force, which includes thousands of light tanks transportable for a cross-strait invasion. American taxpayers should be aware that while Taiwan recently began receiving a more modern spearhead of 108 M1A2T Abrams tanks, the core defensive mission relies heavily on repurposing older platforms for holding chokepoints. This static-defense model echoes tactical realities seen in global conflicts, where aging tracked vehicles serve as entrenched direct-fire support. A local veteran analyst confirmed to Business Insider that using armored vehicles to hold chokepoints or set ambushes is the optimal use of such outnumbered forces given the likelihood of enemy air superiority.