China’s deployment of the HQ-16F missile in front of Taiwan reflects Beijing’s growing concern that future wars could be fought not just across the strait, but deep within the continent itself.
This month, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that China has deployed a new sophisticated medium-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, believed to be the HQ-16F, to front-line military units stationed directly opposite Taiwan.
Chinese state broadcaster CCTV aired the footage on Friday (5 June) documenting the first live and operational evaluation of the weapon by the Army’s 73rd Group.
The strategic unit, based in Xiamen, Fujian province, traveled thousands of kilometers to the northwestern Gobi desert to conduct exercises during which a mobile-launched missile reportedly successfully intercepted an incoming target 50 kilometers away.
Designed to enhance the capabilities of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Eastern Theater Command, the highly efficient wingless missile uses four tail fins, an integrated engine and advanced thrust vectoring to engage highly evasive, low-altitude or supersonic threats.
While official specifications remain classified, the system’s capabilities match or exceed those of its export variant, the HQ-16FE, which features an active electronically scanned array (AESA) tracking range of over 250 kilometers.
The upgrade significantly bridges the quality gap with the US-made Patriot PAC-2 and PAC-3 systems that defend Taiwan, introducing a guided fragmentation warhead to counter intercept defense networks.
The HQ-16F may have been developed in response to Taiwan’s emerging precision strike capabilities against potential invasion zones.
Brennan Deveraux and Kyle Marcrum score on a February 2026 ITEM to the US Army’s 75th Reserve Innovation Command that the US-supplied Taiwan Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) could enable it to strike targets in China from a 300-kilometer ring around the island, possibly prompting the deployment of air defense assets within HQ-16F control facilities near the HQ-16F’s control area.
Deveraux and Marcrum point out that the ATACMS threat may be too difficult for China to handle, noting that the Taiwan Strait is only 180 kilometers wide and that Taiwan has a significant number of ATACMS missiles scattered across many areas on the island. ATACMS missiles are also very difficult to interceptgiven their Mach 3 terminal phase speedleaving air and missile defense systems little time to react.
In addition to the ATACMS, Taiwan’s new deep-strike capabilities could also be a concern for China. Taiwan reportedly fired cruise missiles, including Hsiung Feng IIE. According to Missile Threat, its extended-range variants have a range of 1,200 kilometersenough to reach targets deep in mainland China when launched from Taiwan.
The Tomahawk missile combines extended range with low-altitude flight to avoid enemy air defenses. Mission planners can direct Tomahawk strikes through known gaps in radar coverage, use indirect flight paths instead of predictable ballistic trajectories, fly at high subsonic speeds below radar detection thresholds, and utilize terrain camouflage to reduce the likelihood of interception. The Hsiung Feng IIE can use similar tactics against Chinese air defenses.
In addition to the Hsiung Feng IIE, China’s large land mass, often seen as a source of strategic depth, could become a liability in an era of long-range precision strikes. Russia’s experience in Ukraine suggests that a vast territory can be difficult to defend comprehensively, allowing attacks on critical military, industrial and energy infrastructure far from the front lines.
As with Russia, China may face a similar dilemma: its vast territory may make comprehensive air defense impractical, forcing it to concentrate air and missile defenses around critical military, political, and strategic locations rather than providing nationwide coverage.
Taiwan’s long-range missiles – especially the ATACMS and Hsiung Feng IIE – could pose a significant threat to China’s invasion zones and strategic rear, exploiting gaps in China’s air defenses to strike critical targets, inflict economic damage and impose psychological costs, including possible suspicion of China’s leadership.
While conventional attacks on China’s occupation zones and targets, by organizing in depth its territory, could theoretically raise public opposition to an invasion of Taiwan, they could also strengthen public sentiment against the self-governing island, thereby supporting a doubling of military operations against Taiwan.
China’s concerns may extend beyond Taiwan’s growing strike capabilities, including advanced US conventional strike systems capable of threatening strategic targets deep inside the mainland. Beyond the missile threat posed by Taiwan, the HQ-16F can be used to defend against US threats to China’s nuclear arsenal and core leadership.
The June 2025 US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities likely underscored the possibility that the same US capabilities could be used against China in the event of a conflict over Taiwan. Seven American B-2 stealth bombers carrying 14 13,600 kilogram Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) bombs hit three major underground nuclear centers in Iran – Natanz, Fordow and Isfahan.
While it is unclear whether the attacks actually destroyed Iran’s nuclear facilities, they most likely caused serious damage to Iran’s underground centrifuge facilities and collapsed underground tunnels, possibly cutting off Iran’s access to its fissile material stockpiles and enrichment facilities.
Accordingly, the HQ-16F could be used to protect sites such as the Hami nuclear silo field, with Reuters reporting in May 2026, the facilities appear to be protected by camouflaged positions cut into the desert, presumably housing anti-aircraft batteries.
In addition to protecting nuclear silo fields, the HQ-16F can also be used to protect critical leadership and command and control (C2) facilities, such as Beijing Military Citya massive underground complex designed as a command center and intended to protect China’s leadership from nuclear attack.
While the HQ-16F may have been designed to protect China’s strategic rear, leadership, critical infrastructure and nuclear arsenal, such conventional strikes could trigger nuclear retaliation.
Although China maintains a nuclear no-first-use (NFU) policy, it can abandon it if it feels its ruling Communist Party regime or nuclear arsenal is threatened, or to avoid imminent catastrophic military defeat.
However, even the HQ-16F may not fully address China’s vulnerability to long-range precision strikes against its strategic rear. It may bolster China’s defenses against new long-range attack threats, but its deployment also underscores a deeper reality: China increasingly expects that a conflict over Taiwan could spill across the strait and into the mainland itself.
Maintaining deterrence without crossing China’s nuclear red lines could become one of the defining challenges of any future crisis in Taiwan.
