Taiwan’s new long-range cruise missiles are slow and easy to shoot down, Chinese media reports — claims whose truth depends on many unknowns.
But it does show that Beijing is paying close attention to Taiwan’s development of advanced weapons that could take on an invasion force and even knock out some of the command centers and missile launchers on the mainland.
The article, in the late November issue of Ordnance Industry Science Technology, took aim at a new longer-range version of the Hsiung Feng IIE land-attack cruise missile, which resembles the U.S. Tomahawk. The new variant has an estimated range of 620 to 930 miles, which would put it within range of large swathes of coastal China, as well as interior targets in the country’s heart.
The Chinese magazine criticized the missile because its “relatively large size, subsonic speed and lack of stealth technology made it vulnerable to detection,” according to the South China Morning Post, which first disclosed the article.
Taiwan has maintained a low profile for its missile program, and details have been somewhat elusive. Taiwan is known to have six different types of cruise missiles, including land-attack and anti-ship weapons, according to the Missile Threat program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. Until recently most have been short-range defensive weapons to thwart an invasion, but “Taiwan has begun developing and deploying missile systems better suited for strike missions, including longer-range, land-attack cruise missiles,” CSIS said.
“In a report to Taiwan’s legislature in 2022, the island’s defense ministry said the missile could carry two warheads — a high-explosive one to target command centers and shelters, and a dispersal warhead that could attack airfields,” noted the Morning Post. However, it wasn’t until August 2023 that video emerged in Taiwanese media of what appears to be a test launch of the Hsiung Feng IIE. There are also reports that Taiwan is developing the Ching Tien (formerly known as the Yun Feng) supersonic cruise missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles).
Some US experts want Taiwan to buy more missiles, instead of expensive F-16 fighters and M1 Abrams tanks. In their view, a Chinese invasion would be preceded by a massive bombardment by missiles that would devastate Taiwanese airbases and armored vehicles. Better to invest in relatively cheap anti-invasion weapons such as missiles, drones and mines.
Missiles launched by Taiwan and the US played a key role in a wargame, simulating a Chinese amphibious invasion of Taiwan, that was conducted last year by the CSIS.
“The US and coalition teams focused on ports and airfields, attacking with long-range cruise missiles, generally JASSM [Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile],” Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at CSIS, told Business Insider.
In the game, Taiwan used its missiles against the Chinese invasion fleet in the Straits of Taiwan, rather than striking ports. However, “a sensitive question is whether Taiwan would ever preempt an invasion and attack the invasion fleet while it was still at anchor,” Cancian said. “The Taiwanese say they would not, but there’s a lot of literature indicating that they have it least considered it seriously.”
Could Taiwan’s long-range cruise missiles penetrate Chinese defenses? As the Ukraine war has shown, subsonic cruise missiles can be intercepted by anti-aircraft missiles such as the U.S. Patriot and Russia’s S-300. China has an array of missile defense systems, including Russia’s S-400, the HQ-15 (China’s version of Russia’s S-300), and the HQ-16 (based on the Russian Buk).
However, details on Chinese air defenses — including integration of missiles, radar, and command systems — are scarce. And China would have a lot of territory to defend, including around 9,000 miles of coastline.
Either way, the technical capabilities of Taiwan’s cruise missiles may not be the biggest issue. Taiwan lacks adequate ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) capabilities to ensure missiles can hit targets a thousand miles away.
“Taiwan needs better ISR capabilities for its long-range missiles, especially against mobile targets,” Masao Dahlgren, a missile defense expert at CSIS, told Business Insider. China’s rocket forces rely on truck-mounted launchers that can move around to avoid pinpoint detection.
In particular, Taiwan lacks a military space program that can develop spy satellites, which leaves Taiwan dependent on targeting data from U.S. satellites. “They have announced contracts with private industry to build reconnaissance drones,” Dahlgren said. “But to build out that entire end-to-end target detection and strike capability, there’s a long road ahead on that.”
Taiwan could use data from commercial satellites, but private spacecraft may not have the same capabilities as their military counterparts. “When you’re talking about deep strikes into China, there are certainly going to be some fixed strategic targets. I expect that Taiwan will lean on commercial capabilities to know where those are.”
Michael Peck is a defense writer whose work has appeared in Forbes, Defense News, Foreign Policy magazine, and other publications. He holds a master’s in political science. Follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
