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F-104 Starfighter of the ROCAF |
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The following units of the ROCAF operated the Starfighter:
427th Tactical Fighter Wing, ROCAF based Ching Chuang Kang AB
7th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
8th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
28th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
35th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
499th Tactical Fighter Wing, ROCAF based at Hsinchu AB
41st Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
42nd Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
48th Tactical Fighter Squadron, ROCAF
401st Tactical Combined Wing, ROCAF based at Taoyuan AB
12th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron
After serving with the ROCAF for thirty-eight
years, the F-104 was officially withdrawn from service in the decommissioning
ceremony held at Ching Chuang Kang (CCK) Air Base (AB) on May 22, 1998. The base
is home to the 8th TFS, the first ROCAF squadron to operate the F-104. Now
equipped with the F-CK-1 Ching Kuo (a.k.a. IDF), the 8th TFS took delivery of
its first F-104s (A and B models) on May 17, 1960. It was for this reason that
the ceremony was held at CCK, rather than Hsinchu AB, where the last operational
F-104s had been based.
The ROCAF's F-104 program was run under the code name "Alishan" (Mountain Ali),
from Alishan 1 to Alishan 11. According to the news release, the ROCAF had
acquired 247 F-104s through the Alishan Program. These F-104s were mostly
second-handed, their sources including USA, Canada, Germany, Japan, Denmark, and
Belgium. The versions ranged from F-104A, B, D, G, J, DJ, RF-104G, to TF-104G.
Some of these aircraft obtained were not even flyable and were cannibalized for
spare parts only. In its heyday, the F-104 equipped the 7th, 8th, 28th TFS of
the 427th TFW at CCK AB, the 41st, 42nd, 48th TFS of the 499th TFW at Hsinchu
AB, and the 12th TRS at Taoyuan AB.
The climax of ROCAF F-104's service came on January 13, 1967, when Maj Shih-Lin
Hu and Capt Bei-Puo Shih each shot down one People's Liberation Army Air Force
MiG-19. This marked the first F-104 combat victory in the world. However, the
F-104's service history with the ROCAF was marred by its highly publicized and
sometimes exaggerated accident record, although in reality, ROCAF F-104's crash
rate is probably no worse than those of the F-100 and the F-86, whose crashes
were less known to the public due to tighter media control at the time when they
were flying. Indeed, as F-104s aged, they became more and more difficult to
maintain and most F-104s had been gradually removed from service in recent
years. First gone were F-104s of the 427th TFW, which started to convert to
F-CK-1s in 1993. Then, in May 1997, the 499th TFW at Hsinchu AB started to
replace its Starfighters with Mirage 2000-5s for the interceptor role.
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