Taiwan beefs up anti-ship missile arsenal to counter threat of Chinese invasion

Taiwan will sharply increase its arsenal of powerful anti-ship missiles to more than 1,800 by early 2029, as it seeks to enhance its capacity to counter a mounting threat of blockade or invasion by China, according to a Reuters calculation.

This expanding arsenal of weapons that can be fired from aircraft, ships and ground-based launchers is part of Taiwan's shift towards a ​so-called asymmetric strategy, where the island's defenders seek to offset China's massive advantage in firepower with big numbers of affordable but deadly weapons.

These also include shorter-range missiles and swarms of surface and aerial drones, say current and former Taiwan military officers.

Taiwan, these officers ‌say, aims to build a resilient force designed to survive an opening Chinese air-and-missile bombardment and emerge in a position to strike an invasion fleet or ships blockading the island. 

The officers point to the success of Ukraine and Iran in using missiles and drones to level the playing field in battling more powerful adversaries.

The Reuters calculation of Taiwan's growing anti-ship missile arsenal is based on arms trade data, US export approval documents, estimates from defence analysts, and interviews with Taiwanese government officials.

Additional precision missiles with sufficient range to attack Chinese vessels in the Taiwan Strait or forces at embarkation ports on China's coast are also in the pipeline after Taiwan's opposition-controlled parliament approved US munitions last month.

The spearhead of Taiwan's ​anti-ship arsenal is made up of US-supplied Harpoon missiles and domestically produced Hsiung Feng missiles.

A big force of these weapons would allow Taiwan to set up a "kill zone" in the Taiwan Strait, an area where concentrated firepower would inflict heavy losses in a bid to defeat a Chinese ​invasion, said Ou Si-fu, deputy chief executive officer for research at the Institute for National Defence and Security Research, Taiwan's top military think tank.

"Our goal is to stop them from landing and completing their mission, not to destroy every PLA ⁠ship," Ou told Reuters, referring to the People's Liberation Army, China's military.

Investing in anti-ship missiles is a sensible move, said Grant Newsham, a retired US Marine Corps colonel and researcher at the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies.

If you're China, "one thing you'd not want to deal with is long-range precision weapons that can crack your ​ships in half before they even set out across the Taiwan Strait, or at any point between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan's shores, Newsham said. "Employed properly and with adequate numbers, these missiles are a huge problem for a Chinese invasion force."

To mount an invasion across the Taiwan Strait, China would need to deploy an armada ​of warships and civilian transports, according to military experts. China has the world's biggest navy and a massive merchant fleet.

Taiwan's defence ministry said in a statement that anti-ship missiles "can establish a powerful maritime strike capability and degrade the enemy's combat effectiveness. Details regarding their deployment involve military security and are not disclosed."

China's defence ministry and Taiwan Affairs Office didn't respond to a request for comment.

The Pentagon had no comment on Taiwan's specific capabilities, delivery timelines, or potential future security assistance packages, an official said in response to questions from Reuters. The White House didn't respond to questions for this story.

As part of efforts to further boost its defences, Taiwan is seeking US President Donald Trump's now in the pipeline ​worth up to $14 billion.

Trump said last month he would soon decide on the sale after holding talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. During their talks, Xi warned Trump that mishandling Taiwan could lead to conflict between the two superpowers.

Beijing, which views Taiwan as its own territory, has never renounced the use ​of force to bring the island under its control. Taiwan rejects Beijing's sovereignty claims, saying only the island's people can decide their future.

LEARNING FROM UKRAINE AND IRAN

Ou and other military experts point to Ukraine's success in attacking Russian warships and transports with missiles and surface drones in the Black Sea as evidence that this strategy could be effective for ‌Taiwan in resisting a ⁠Chinese invasion or blockade.

Iran's continuing ability to attack shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and strike other regional targets despite more than a month of massive US and Israeli air-and-missile strikes demonstrated how a weaker power could retain the capacity to fight back, they said.

Proponents of this type of warfare argue that anti-ship missiles, particularly those mounted on ground-based, mobile launchers, could be dispersed and concealed around Taiwan. This would make it more difficult for the PLA to detect and destroy them in the initial waves of an attack.

One problem: Many of the island's anti-ship missiles are still deployed on warships and at fixed ground installations where they are vulnerable to pre-emptive strikes, said Yuster Yu, a retired Taiwanese naval officer who served on Taiwan's National Security Council. "And the Chinese know where they are," he said.

Taiwan's defence ministry said existing anti-ship missiles were "deployed in a mobile and dispersed manner to preserve combat effectiveness." Missiles in fixed positions, it said, were "equipped with protective and backup mechanisms and can ​be converted to mobile configurations as needed to enhance battlefield survivability."

While Taiwan's military ​doesn't disclose the size of its weapons inventories, the figure of more ⁠than 1,800 anti-ship missiles includes 450 Boeing-made Harpoon missiles so far delivered to the island, according to two senior Taiwanese government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Deliveries will begin this year under an arms sale valued at $2.4 billion that was approved in the final months of the first Trump administration in late 2020.

All of the 400 missiles are expected to be delivered by the end of March 2029, according to US government arms ​sales approval documents.

The Taiwanese navy told Reuters in a statement that, according to the letter of offer signed by the US in 2021, the missiles would be delivered on schedule.

If these deliveries proceed as scheduled, Taiwan would ​have 850 Harpoon missiles by early 2029.

By then, ⁠the island's military will also have about 1,000 or more domestically produced Hsiung Feng II and Hsiung Feng III anti-ship cruise missiles, according to Ou and two senior Taiwanese government officials. That would bring Taiwan's anti-ship missile arsenal to about 1,850.

This estimate of where Taiwan's anti-ship missile inventory will stand by 2029 assumes US deliveries proceed largely on time and in full. It doesn't account for potential production bottlenecks or competing wartime demands on US stocks that could slow deliveries.

One of the two senior Taiwanese officials told Reuters the delivery timetable could slip to 2030.

In separate arms deals, Washington has also approved the sale of another 195 air-launched Harpoon missiles or missiles derived from this weapon, valued ⁠at a combined $1.36 billion, ​according to US government approval documents and arms trade data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

The two sides are still negotiating the terms of these deals, and no delivery date ​has been agreed, according to one of the senior Taiwanese officials.

A Pentagon official, Michael F. Miller, the director of the Defence Security Cooperation Agency, confirmed in testimony at a congressional hearing in March that Taiwan is America's top priority for Harpoon deliveries.

To coordinate this extra firepower, the Taiwan military on 1 July will form a new Littoral Combat Command to combine its coastal radars, anti-ship missiles and ​drones into one force.

For Taiwan's defenders, the anti-ship missiles will bolster their objective of resisting an attempted invasion for long enough to give allied forces time to come to the island's aid.

"We must always be prepared to fight a prolonged, war-of-attrition-style battle," Ou said.