On Monday, July 28, 2025, Taiwan’s Central News Agency (CNA) reported the second delivery of M1A2T tanks, consisting of 42 units, which have joined the 38 previously delivered on December 16 of last year, out of a total of 108 ordered.
Photo: Military News Agency, Ministry of National Defense of the Republic of China (Taiwan)
The sea transport arrived at the port of Taipei, in the Bali District of New Taipei City, on Sunday evening local time. The shipment was initially scheduled to arrive by ship on the evening of July 26. However, entry into the port was delayed due to a typhoon.
At around 12:10 a.m. on Monday, the vehicles were loaded onto low-bed trailers and transported, under police and military escort, to the armored training center of the 584th Armored Brigade, headquartered in Hsinchu, in northwestern Taiwan. CNA published photographs of the transported vehicles, which are available on the agency’s website (LINK).
Delivery of the remaining 28 tanks is planned for 2026. In addition to the Abrams tanks, the Taipei authorities have also contracted support vehicles. However, there is no information yet regarding the start of those deliveries.
Meanwhile, in May this year, the first live-fire training exercise took place at the Hangzikou training ground in Hsinchu, involving main gun firing. A four-tank platoon fired 19 training rounds at a stationary target simulating a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) tank as part of practical exercises. Taiwan’s Military News Agency of the Ministry of National Defense published photos from the exercise on July 10.
According to a statement by Taiwan’s Armed Forces Command on January 22, 2024, 98 tanks are to be stationed in Hsinchu, while the remaining 10 will be assigned to the 269th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, headquartered in Taoyuan, also in the island’s northwestern region, under the Department of Armaments and Training. The Abrams tanks are replacing CM-11 Brave Tiger tanks in the 6th Army Corps.
The first two M1A2T tanks were presented at the Taiwan-U.S. Army New Combat Vehicle Project Management Conference in July 2022. Taiwan received approval to purchase the tanks on July 8, 2019. By the end of that year, an intergovernmental agreement was signed.
The contract was estimated to be worth up to approximately 2 billion USD, but under the signed agreement, the value was listed at 39.8 billion TWD, around 34% less. Initially, deliveries were scheduled to be completed by June 30, 2028; however, the timeline was significantly accelerated due to increased production capacity at the Joint Systems Manufacturing Center in Lima, Ohio, which is owned by the U.S. Department of Defense and operated by General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS).
In addition to the tanks, Taiwan also requested 14 M88A2 HERCULES armored recovery vehicles and 16 Oshkosh M1070A1 HET heavy equipment transporters, along with an equal number of M1000 low-bed trailers. The package also included support equipment and weapons (there are also plans to launch local production of 120mm ammunition – editor’s note).
The M1A2T is a variant of the M1A2 SEPv3, lacking depleted uranium armor inserts and not configured for integration with a hard-kill active protection system (APS).
Meanwhile, deliveries of the M1A2 SEPv3 are ongoing to Poland (47 out of 250 units delivered) and Australia (46 out of 75 units delivered) (Technical support for Polish and Australian Abrams tanks).
