Taiwan Building Midget Submarine: Huilong Project

In parallel to the full-sized Indigenous Defense Submarine (IDS), Taiwan is building a much smaller submarine. The Huilong design is a midge submarine intended for testing, It will be armed with torpedoes however.

Some reports suggest that the Huilong submarine (慧龍水下載具) will be uncrewed, but it will likely be crewed. It will be 30 meters long, have a 3.6m diameter outer hull and a sail, giving it an overall height of 6 meters. The pressure hull length is 20 meters. Displacement is around 100 tons. The sail and size of the pressure hull are good indications that it is not uncrewed.

It is intended to test Taiwanese sonar and systems for the IDS. There is the suggestion that it will use lithium-based battery technologies. Two torpedo tubes suggest it has a secondary warfighting capability.

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