Taiwan’s Military Is Finally Developing Sea Drones
The Manta is a small, autonomous vessel that can handle both the Taiwan Strait’s volatile geological and geopolitical conditions.
On March 25, the Taiwanese company China Shipbuilding Corporation (CSBC) unveiled its Endeavor Manta drone, its first military specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV). The Manta, a small custom-built vessel for the Taiwan Strait’s volatile conditions, will give the Taiwanese Navy (ROCN) and civil defense groups significant new asymmetric capabilities.
While this development demonstrates a breakthrough in overcoming major institutional hurdles to adopting an asymmetric strategy, the U.S. government can help by moving away from strategic ambiguity.
According to CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung, the Ukrainian Navy’s USVs, which significantly contributed to crippling Russia’s Black Sea fleet, inspired the company to begin developing the Endeavor Manta early last year.
What Are the Specifications of the Manta Sea Drone?
Unlike publicly released USVs, the Manta embodies several key design goals: the ability to operate in rough water, mobility, rapid deployment, survivability, indigenous control software, and launch deterrent strikes.
The Manta is a small twenty-eight-foot by twelve-foot vessel that, when fully loaded, has a water displacement of just over five tons. Including lightweight torpedoes, it can carry up to one ton of payload. The vessel also features a lightweight fiber-reinforced plastic hull CSBC designed to make it difficult for radar to detect.
Because of its size, operators can easily transport the Manta in large quantities on ships or individually on trucks and then deploy the vessel where the mission requires it. For instance, Taiwan’s Yushan-class landing platform dock could carry around twenty USVs for rapid deployment.
The Manta is versatile and designed to launch anywhere, including the surf, or discreetly in hidden coves. This would be especially useful in an invasion scenario where Taiwan’s main ports would likely be among the first casualties.
To ensure the Manta can operate effectively in the Taiwan Strait, it features a trimaran hull, which provides an excellent balance in unstable waters. With a maximum speed of thirty-five knots, its small size allows this USV to perform high-speed complex maneuvers.
The Manta also features AI-assisted target acquisition capabilities that allow it to autonomously coordinate and operate in drone swarms that can include other types of drones. It is user-friendly, with one control tower able to control up to fifty Manta drones simultaneously.
The Manta is highly adaptable to battlefield conditions and can operate through various communication channels, including 4G networks, radio frequency, or even satellite guidance. If an enemy interrupted all communication forms, the Manta would be programmed to return to its home base. Moreover, if an enemy were to capture the vessel, it would be designed to self-destruct.
In war, the Manta carried an undisclosed number of external lightweight torpedoes. After expending its torpedoes, the Manta could act as a kamikaze drone and ram an enemy target with an explosive charge on its bow.
The Manta Sea Drone’s All-New Capabilities Inside and Outside of Combat
USVs add a new dimension to naval warfare. As the Ukraine War has demonstrated, traditional naval ships often lack the capabilities to defend against them effectively. This means that the People’s Liberation Army-Navy’s (PLAN) advanced warships, which it regularly features in its military exercises around Taiwan, would be susceptible to attack.
Because of their versatility and low radar signature, these drones could also be vital in combating vulnerable second-wave invasion vessels like the Shuiqiao barge. These vessels require total localized sea, air, and land dominance to successfully land troops and equipment.
While CSBC has not yet released the Manta’s effective range, this kind of USV could theoretically increase the ROCN’s striking range. Depending on how far the ROCN can control it, the Manta’s stealthy design and small size could enable it to complete missions deep inside Chinese territorial waters, wreaking havoc on Chinese ships, ports, naval facilities, and shipyards.
This capability contributed to Ukraine sinking one-third of Russia’s Black Sea fleet since the war began in 2022.
In addition to serving in combat roles, customers can outfit the Manta to perform non-combat operations, including search and rescue, reconnaissance operations, port patrolling and security, and other commercial uses. This means that different government agencies or even civil defense groups like the Taiwan Hemlock Civil Defense Group could purchase them, providing the ROCN with more auxiliary capabilities in wartime.
Because of production timeline conflicts, CSBC has opted not to participate in the MND’s USV competition in June of this year. However, the navy is expected to express interest, and the company is confident the ROCN will place orders soon.
The Supply Chain Security and Cost of the Manta Sea Drone
To ensure the Manta does not rely on enemy supply chains, CSBC used a “de-red supply chain” method in its design that banned using Chinese-made components and materials. Everything except the satellite guidance system and outboard motors was made domestically.
Sourcing components and systems domestically provides better supply chain security and facilitates further development. Because CSBC used its subsidiary, TSMC Power Technology, to develop Manta’s remote-control technology, CSBC can more easily upgrade, expand, and customize the USV to customers’ needs.
While CSBC did not publicly release Manta’s price tag, the company stated that it is relatively cheap to produce. With 45 percent of the cost of its imported satellite guidance system, much depends on customer specifications.
Why Is Taiwan Taking So Long to Deploy the Manta?
When CSBC released the Endeavor Manta, many Western analysts were surprised that despite the PLA’s increased aggression over the past few years, Taiwan was only now investing in USV development.
However, while the concept of sea drones is new, small boat swarms are not. The only issue was that, until recently, the military’s institutionalized ideology, focus on combatting gray zone tactics, and lack of U.S. security guarantees prevented almost any kind of asymmetric capability from coming to fruition.
In 2018, Admiral Lee Hsi-ming, then Taiwan Chief of the General Staff, the equivalent of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the United States, spearheaded a program to build sixty small fast attack missile boats meant for swarming operations against the PLAN, a project in line with his “Overall Defense Concept” (ODC) to shift military strategy towards asymmetry.
By 2021, however, the ROCN scrapped the program, citing the boats’ small size as a reason for their inability to fire missiles accurately in choppy waters, an issue CSBC demonstrated was easy to fix.
What’s more, Admiral Lee, who retired in 2019, noted that on his way out, he felt military leadership was already sidelining ODC initiatives like the fast attack boats in favor of more extensive projects like the Indigenous submarine program.
Why would Taiwanese military leadership oppose this kind of asymmetric capability?
The reason is that old habits die hard.
The military was, up until relatively recently, a part of the Kuomintang (KMT) and, therefore, was founded on a nationalist ideology that focused on offensive warfare to retake the mainland. While the military has long since abandoned any absolute seriousness of unification under the Republic of China (ROC) banner, its offensive, symmetric disposition and affinity for big-ticket military items have persisted.
Additionally, the PLA’s regular gray zone incursions across the median line in the Taiwan Strait require Taiwan’s military to respond with conventional platforms like the F-16.
Compounding this, Taiwan must account for U.S. strategic ambiguity. The lack of U.S. security guarantees unintentionally pressures Taiwan to focus its defense spending on more conventional big-ticket platforms to fight the PLA head-on.
Though an asymmetric defense strategy maximizes Taiwan’s limited defense capabilities, it cannot guarantee ultimate victory and presupposes U.S. intervention.
The Status of the Manta Under New American and Taiwanese Administrations
Because of these challenges, the Taiwanese government’s efforts to overhaul the military around 2018 under the previous Tsai Ing-wen administration met stiff resistance. However, in the past year, the new Lai administration has seen tremendous success after appointing Wellington Koo, an outsider immune from military groupthink, as Minister of National Defense.
Under this new leadership, Taiwan has more successfully streamlined military training and reoriented the military’s doctrine towards asymmetry. This is evidenced by Taiwan prioritizing purchasing platforms more conducive to asymmetric warfare, such as switchblade drones and loitering munitions. CSBC’s Endeavor Manta is only the latest addition.
To further encourage Taiwan to procure weapons conducive to asymmetric warfare, U.S. policymakers should continue to move away from U.S. strategic ambiguity and offer more concrete security guarantees. The current and previous U.S. administrations have made moves in this direction by increasing U.S. military regional presence, and the Biden administration even went as far as saying the U.S. military would intervene in an invasion.
However, all still fall short of legitimate guarantees.
To provide Taiwan with greater assurances, the U.S. military should continue accelerating its military buildup in the Pacific and increasing military and economic cooperation.
The Trump administration should reconsider its 32 percent tariffs on Taiwan. While these tariffs exclude semiconductors and led the Lai administration to make significant concessions, tariffs weaken the U.S. commitment to Taiwan.
If the ROCN chooses to invest in CSBC’s Endeavor Manta, it will give the Taiwanese military significant new asymmetric naval capabilities. This vessel will increase demand, allowing commercial and civil defense groups to buy it more efficiently and providing additional military capabilities in wartime.
While this development demonstrates that Taiwan is successfully overcoming profound institutional barriers, U.S. leadership can help by moving away from strategic ambiguity and further military and economic cooperation.
About The Author: Jonathan Harman
Jonathan Harman is an administrative associate at the Global Taiwan Institute, a non-profit think tank in Washington, DC that focuses on Taiwan policy issues. His research focuses primarily on defense industrial and military recruitment issues in the United States, Taiwan, and the PRC.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons/ Youth Daily News.