By Joyce Huang | 2026-06-16

Taiwan has conducted its first live-fire drills of U.S.-supplied rocket launchers, High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), on the west coast -- the likeliest location for an amphibious landing attempt by the Chinese military.

Held around the Dajia river estuary in Taichung, Taiwan, the June 10 drills marked the army's first HIMARS firing in China's direction. It first tested the precision weapons off Taiwan's east coast last year.

The missile launcher systems, with an expanded strike envelope, will enhance Taiwan's deterrence of a potential Chinese invasion and likely force the People's Liberation Army (PLA) to deploy key military assets along the southeastern coast farther inland than it wanted, analysts say.

Longer reach

"Should [Taiwan] further deploy the U.S. [HIMARS'] newer Precision Strike Missiles with an expanded firing range of 500km…. China will have to push further back its deployment of long-range rocket and air defense forces as well as their command centers," Wang Ding-yu, a member of Taiwan's parliament from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), told Focus.

The DPP holds the presidency but has a minority in parliament.

HIMARS is a significant asset that will greatly enhance Taiwan's response time, airspace maneuvering and deterrence against China's possible invasion, Wang added.

Taiwan currently has 11 HIMARS launchers with another 18 units slated to be delivered by the end of 2026.

The island is expected to accumulate 111 HIMARS units, next only to the 400 HIMARS held by the United States. Its 2026 special military budget has called for the procurement of an additional 82 units.

That HIMARS procurement is supposed to be paired with the purchase of 420 long-range guided Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS), which have a maximum strike range of 300km.

Taiwan plans to place these powerful launchers along its western coastline facing China.

Amid a bitter domestic political standoff, Taiwan, however, has yet to purchase any of those 82 HIMARS, which would stretch its maximum strike radius from 300km to 500km.

The opposition, which holds parliament, has blocked the government's proposal to spend $40 billion over the next eight years on weapon purchases.

Counterstrike role

During its June 10 drills, Taiwan successfully launched 32 M28 reduced-range rockets by a total of six HIMARS launchers from the Taichung coast, with impact points in waters 9km offshore.

But another four rockets either failed to ignite or misfired with the causes under investigation, Col. Weng Yi-ming, chief of staff of the army's 58th Artillery Command, said after the drills.

The exercise, nevertheless, demonstrated HIMARS' advantages of mobility and ability to "shoot and scoot" within minutes or quickly withdraw after firing, which saves the launchers from being hit by enemy counterfire, the Taiwanese military said in a statement.

Erich Shih, a Taipei-based military analyst, urged Taiwan to soon engage with the U.S. military and arms contractors and solve the weapon system's malfunctions.

During the recent test fire, the use of rockets with a range of 45km from coastal beaches allowed the Taiwanese military to simulate counterstrikes against potential pre-landing operations, he said.

But during actual combat, the army is likelier to keep these HIMARS launchers concealed in the woods along Taiwan's central mountain range, firing rockets with a 70km range to fend off the enemy at sea or on air, according to Shih.

"The use of longer-range rockets like ATACMS with a firing range of 300km could further reach China's southeastern coast and strike its assets and mobilization hubs," Shih, chief editor of the Military and Aviation News website in Taiwan, told Focus.

Taiwan is reportedly considering forward deployment of HIMARS on offshore islands such as Matsu and Penghu, which are closer to China, to engage in so-called "origin strikes" with the aim of annihilating PLA forces before they embark into the Taiwan Strait.

Deployment debate

Some observers question the wisdom of that deployment.

Shih called the move "unwise," saying it would be a waste of such high-value weapon systems as their combat viability on offshore islands under constant Chinese surveillance would be low.

In a research paper dated May 29, Dennis Yang, a research assistant at the Jamestown Foundation in the United States, said that, in theory, such forward deployment would allow Taiwan to hit the PLA during mobilization phases, when units are concentrated and more vulnerable.

Yang, like Shih, questioned whether HIMARS could survive on exposed offshore islands, where maneuver space is limited and against which PLA firepower could be concentrated. Still, signs that Beijing is building airfields on the far side of mountains in Fujian province suggest that Chinese planners already view the systems as a credible threat, said Yang.

If combined with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platforms and battlefield networking, he said, the launchers could help Taiwan build a "kill chain" capable of detecting, tracking and striking PLA forces during mobilization. At that stage units are bunched up and more vulnerable.