ROCAF 401st Wing – Hualien Air Base

The predecessor of the 5th wing was the 5th Tactical Fighter Group and was established in Jianqiao, Hangzhou, in 1936.
It was assigned to the Air Force Third Command in 1939 and stationed at Shuangliu, Sichuan Province.
In 1943, it was assigned to the Chinese-American Composite Corps and stationed at Zhijiang, Hunan.
It returned to Nanjing in 1945, after the victory over Japan.
The Chinese-American Composite Corps was then dissolved and the unit was assigned to the Air Force 1st Command and stationed at Dajiaochang, Nanjing, before being assigned to the 4th Military Region Command in 1946.
In 1948, the wing was ordered to relocate from Nanjing to Taiwan and station at Taoyuan Air Force Base.
In 1953, a reconnaissance squadron was assigned to the command to form the 5th Tactical Fighter Wing.
In 1960, the wing was renamed 5th Composite Wing.
In 1976, the wing was renamed 401st Tactical Composite Wing.
This wing has the record of victories in aerial battles during the War of Resistance against the Japanese
aggression, and reached a score of 1:10 although being by far inferior in numbers.
The pilots of the wing have shot down more than 120 enemy planes and severely damaged another 23.
A remarkable mission was the surprise attack on Bailuo Airfield in Yueyang. The brave pilots have destroyed more than 200 enemy planes at one time and contributed to the final victory.
On October 15, 1955, the 5th Group shot down one Mig-15 of the PLA for the first time in the air battles over
the Taiwan Straits. On July 21, 1956, the pilots of this wing also shot down two Mig fighters of the PLA in the
airspace north of Matsu. Later on, the wing shot down a total of 21 Mig-17's in the battles of August 14,
September 8, September 18, September 20, September 24, and October 10, 1958, and might have shot
down another three and damaged another five enemy planes in the same period.
The performance of the wing resulted in the conferring of a banner of honor by late President Chiang Kai-Shek in person in August 1959.
This was the glorious page in the history of the wing during the civil war.
On July 1st, 1998, the wing was ordered to relocate from Taoyuan Air Force Base to Hualien Air Force Base and started to operate the Lockheed Martin F-16A/B Fighting Falcon (block 15OCU's upgraded to MLU standard before delivery and designated block20) under the new streamlined organizational structure of the military forces. Under the same policy, the reconnaissance squadron was also assigned to the wing.
With this new unit, the wing supported the establishment of the "Phoenix eye" surveillance and photography capacity of the Air Force and completed several important missions of intelligence gathering through surveillance and photography, and was highly praised by the senior officials.
Former President Chen Shui-Bian visited Hualien Air Force Base on January 16, 2002 and took part in the
ceremony of the formation of the Air Force 401st Wing. The 5th Composite Wing was then dissolved on
October 31, 2004 with the formation of the 17th, 26th, and 27th Tactical Fighter Squadrons on November 1.

The 401st Tactical Wing today :
Four squadrons are part of today's 401 Wing : 12 TRS, 17 TFG, 26 TFG and 27 TFG.
12 TRS (Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron) flies a mix of Northrop RF-5E Tiger gazer/F-5F Tiger II (still wearing 4 TRS markings) and Lockheed Martin F-16A/B Fighting Falcon being wired to carry a Modular Reconnaissance Pod designed by the Danish Company Terma. A total of seven F-5E's were modified to RF-5E's which required the removal of the radar and the starboard gun in order to accommodate room for the cameras.
17 TFG, 26 TFG and 27 TFG (Tactical Fighting Groups) are multirole squadrons flying the Lockheed Martin F-16A/B Fighting Falcon.