In a latest listening to, Dassault Aviation’s CEO Éric Trappier instructed lawmakers about efforts to assist Taiwan’s fleet of Mirage 2000s and their curiosity within the Rafale.
Dassault Aviation’s CEO Éric Trappier has prompt Taiwan is within the Rafale fighter, however the resolution to promote the system to Taipei could be a political and diplomatic prerogative. The corporate’s function could be merely within the industrial, business area, stemming from what the French management decides.
Showing earlier than the Financial Affairs committee of the French Nationwide Meeting on Sep. 24, 2025, Trappier was responding to a query by MP Marie-Noëlle Battistel, who queried in regards to the points within the upkeep and provide of elements for the RoCAF’s (Republic of China Air Power) outdated Mirage 2000 jets. Battistel is the president of the Taiwan Friendship Group.
Trappier responded by explaining the commercial difficulties being confronted each by France and the Mirage 2000’s different worldwide customers after the jet ceased manufacturing and is ready to get replaced by the Rafale F4. He then immediately addressed Battistel saying she was conscious Taiwan desires the Rafale, however that the decision isn’t in his arms.
Trappier’s response makes it clear that the Taiwanese curiosity within the Rafale could have been made unofficially, clearly to keep away from dragging Paris right into a diplomatic acrimony with the PRC (Individuals’s Republic of China).
✈️🇹🇼 Lors d’une audition à la fee des affaires économiques de l’@AssembleeNat ionale, le PDG de @Dassault_OnAir Aviation Eric Trappier révèle que Taïwan qui possède déjà des Mirage 2000-5, veut des #Rafale
— Philippe Prime-Motion (@top_force) September 27, 2025
Taiwan desires Rafale, however the authorities decides whether or not to promote
Battistel pointed to Trappier that in her final go to to Taiwan in her capability because the Chair of the Taiwan Friendship Group in France, she “gathered the issues of each the federal government and the navy in regards to the operational upkeep of their Mirage 2000 delivered in 1992.” This go to was on Jun. 12, 2025, the place the French delegation met President Lai Ching-te.
The President thanked the French Nationwide Meeting’s contribution in making France the “first main nation on the earth to enact laws to uphold freedom of navigation within the Taiwan Strait,” in line with a launch by his workplace.
Battistel then requested Trappier to touch upon the steps taken by Dassault Aviation to “facilitate entry to spare elements obligatory for upkeep, that are delivered for some in extraordinarily lengthy delays, as much as two years.” She additionally requested “Are they basically linked to political and diplomatic points or are there technical issues?”, a machine translation of the audio mentioned.
130 Aviateurs déployés en Corse pour 15 jours de campagne de tir ! Objectif : se (re)qualifier au tir canon pour 14 pilotes de #Rafale de la 30e escadre de chasse et former les jeunes “pétafs” aux procédures de upkeep spécifique à ce kind d’entraînement. pic.twitter.com/aUcdZHdr3W
— Armée de l’Air et de l’Espace (@Armee_de_lair) September 12, 2025
This can be a shortened model of Trappier’s response, the place he finally referenced the Rafale:
“To start with, the Mirage 2000 is on the finish of its life. It’s nonetheless flying just a little in France, however it’s going to cease. It’s additionally true of all our export clients who’re going from the Mirage 2000 to the Rafale. So it’s true that the commercial dynamics of spare elements, repairs is just a little bit […] tougher than earlier than […] however we’re completely supporting Taiwan […] very effectively. And you recognize very effectively what the Taiwanese need. They need Rafale. It doesn’t rely on me. It’s not my duty. It’s the federal government’s.”
This means that the Taiwanese have informally, probably over time, conveyed their curiosity within the Rafale, each to Dassault executives in business talks when sourcing spares, and to French lawmakers. Fight pilots and aerospace consultants would agree that the latest face-off between the Indian and Pakistani air forces, albeit amid Chinese language propaganda in regards to the superiority of their J-10Cs to the Rafale, doesn’t discredit the latter. Outcomes of aerial fight rely on plenty of tactical, logistical, planning and assist infrastructure sources.
A implausible view of a ROCAF Dassault Mirage 2000-5DI dual-seater coming in for a touchdown. Taipei is in talks with Dassault to modernize and prolong the service lifetime of its getting old Mirage fleet. Alongside F-16s and F-CK-1s, the Mirages type the spine of Taiwan’s fighter drive. pic.twitter.com/54x7kpIali
— Air Energy (@RealAirPower1) June 29, 2025
The last word resolution of promoting the Rafale to Taiwan would lie with the Elysee Palace, and its personal equations with the White Home. The 2 have incessantly diverged on many geopolitical points, together with over Russia and Ukraine.
China in the meantime opposes any worldwide navy, diplomatic engagement with Taiwan. This contains the one with the US, which is now Taipei’s solely overseas navy provider. Nations stability their commerce and funding ties with Beijing, with France and China significantly having strong diplomatic relations.
RoCAF’s present fleet
In response to Taiwan Information, Taiwan purchased 60 Dassault Mirage 2000-5 jets from France for the reason that Nineteen Nineties, and at present operates 54 airframes, after dropping six to accidents. The RoCAF’s different fighter fleet consists of 139 F-16A/B Block 20 Mid-Life Replace (MLU) jets, which had been transformed to the F-16V Viper customary. The F-16V Viper is the designation assigned to older F-16 jets modernized to the Block 70 customary.
Blissful #FighterFriday to our wonderful F-16V fighter plane in #ROCAF#4thTacticalFighterWing pic.twitter.com/xG3CrxhPtY
— 國防部 Ministry of Nationwide Protection, ROC(Taiwan) 🇹🇼 (@MoNDefense) August 2, 2024
It is usually set to obtain 66 newly constructed F-16C/D Block 70s, a part of a 2019 $8 billion deal, the primary of which was unveiled in a ceremony at Lockheed Martin’s facility in Greensville in South Carolina on Mar. 28, 2025. Taiwan additionally operates 129 of the homegrown AIDC F-CK-1 Ching-kuo IDF (Indigenous Protection Fighter) within the ‘C’ and ‘D’ variants.
As for particular mission and assist plane, Taiwan reached out to France and the U.S. for buying aerial refueling tankers and AEW&C (Airborne Early Warning and Management) plane. The RoCAF’s present AEW&C fleet consists of 5 E-2Ks, the Taiwanese variant of the E-2C Hawkeye, out of an authentic fleet of six. L3Harris additionally displayed a scale mode of its CAEW (Conformal Airborne Early Warning)-type plane idea, primarily based on the Bombardier International 6500 jet, on the TADTE 2025 exhibition in Taiwan.
