Opinion | Four Military Lessons for Taiwan From the Iran War

Since Feb. 28, U.S. and Israeli forces have been conducting Operation Epic Fury, a sustained campaign of precision strikes against Iran's leadership, nuclear facilities, ballistic missile launchers, underground storage sites, and critical military infrastructure.

By March 11, the joint campaign had killed 49 senior Iranian officials, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It effectively dismantled Iran's C4ISR network, air defense architecture, and naval and air combat capabilities, while substantially suppressing its ballistic missile retaliatory capacity.

While the campaign has not yet achieved all the war aims set by U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, its conduct already carries four specific, urgent warnings for Taiwan's defense posture.

Decapitation Strikes Are Far More Feasible

The most striking single action of Operation Epic Fury was Operation Genesis. On the morning of Feb. 28, Israeli aircraft fired dozens of air-to-surface missiles at Khamenei's residence during a senior leadership meeting, killing the Supreme Leader along with his top defense and intelligence officials. （Related： Opinion | Stop Guessing: PLA Aircraft Absence and Fewer Warships Near Taiwan Linked to Weather, Not Politics ｜ Latest ）

Operation Genesis succeeded due to Israel's extraordinary intelligence capabilities, heavily augmented by artificial intelligence. Critically, Israel relied on AI to process vast volumes of intercepted communications, surveillance footage, and fragmentary data in near-real time, enabling it to act on a fleeting window of opportunity.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) has long incorporated strikes on Taiwan's political and military leadership into its invasion planning. Previously, PLA assessments suggested that eliminating Taiwan's senior leadership at the outset of hostilities would be difficult due to geographic separation and the protective measures Taiwan's leaders would take upon early warning.

Operation Genesis fundamentally alters that calculus. It demonstrates that AI-assisted data processing can compress the "observe-orient-decide-act" cycle to a degree previously considered impractical. Given the PLA's existing cyber and satellite monitoring capabilities, meaningful AI integration could substantially increase the probability of a successful decapitation strike against Taiwan's leadership in the opening hours of a conflict.

Cheap Drones Can Neutralize Expensive Systems

During the conflict, Iran used low-cost drones to damage a $1.1 billion early warning radar in Qatar and cripple a $300 million radar in Jordan—rendering the co-located, $1 billion THAAD missile battery significantly less effective. （Related： Opinion | Stop Guessing: PLA Aircraft Absence and Fewer Warships Near Taiwan Linked to Weather, Not Politics ｜ Latest ）

These Iranian drone attacks were largely uncoordinated, yet they still penetrated U.S. air defenses and caused material damage to vital systems.

This poses a severe threat to Taiwan. By 2035, PLA joint fire strike operations will likely combine ballistic missiles with AI-guided drone swarms. If a cheap PLA drone successfully destroys the radar or control station of a Taiwanese Patriot PAC-3 battery, the entire multimillion-dollar system becomes combat-ineffective, even if the missiles themselves remain intact.

Inexpensive platforms could realistically disable Taiwan's mobile sensor networks and dispersed anti-ship missile systems before a main assault even begins.

Taiwan's Eastern Tunnel Bases Are No Longer Safe

Iran spent decades constructing underground bunkers to protect its missile stockpiles. Operation Epic Fury revealed a critical vulnerability: U.S. and Israeli aircraft used standoff munitions to strike the access points and surrounding terrain of these "missile cities," causing tunnel entrances to collapse and trapping the weapons underground. （Related： Opinion | Stop Guessing: PLA Aircraft Absence and Fewer Warships Near Taiwan Linked to Weather, Not Politics ｜ Latest ）

This scenario has direct implications for Taiwan. The ROC Air Force's two primary hardened air bases—Chiahshan in Hualien and Chihshang in Taitung—are carved into the Central Mountain Range. Capable of sheltering over 250 combat aircraft, they were long considered among Taiwan's most survivable assets because their location on the eastern face of the mountains provided natural protection against missiles launched from the Chinese mainland.

However, once PLA strike packages and carrier battle groups can conduct standoff strikes from the Western Pacific, those tunnel entrances become fully exposed. If the PLA targets the adjacent terrain to trigger landslides and block the exits, Taiwan's sheltered aircraft could be sealed inside their bunkers. Even a delay of a few hours could prove decisive.

China Is Learning How to Sever Data Links

PLA strategists have grown increasingly concerned that the United States could use next-generation intelligence and command systems to deeply integrate with Taiwan's defense operations, enabling U.S. participation without deploying direct combat troops.

In response, PLA doctrine emphasizes severing the satellite data links between Taiwan and the U.S.

Against this backdrop, the recent movements of the PLA Navy vesselLiaowang-1 warrant close attention. Equipped with large radar domes and high-gain antennas capable of tracking satellites and hypersonic weapons, the ship traveled to the northern Indian Ocean before Operation Epic Fury began, ostensibly for a joint naval exercise. （Related： Opinion | Stop Guessing: PLA Aircraft Absence and Fewer Warships Near Taiwan Linked to Weather, Not Politics ｜ Latest ）

However, after U.S. and Israeli strikes commenced,Liaowang-1 reportedly repositioned northward to the Gulf of Oman rather than returning to China.

If accurate, the ship's presence suggests a deliberate effort by Beijing to collect intelligence on U.S. military systems while they are operating at scale. The likely operational purpose is to identify parameters related to satellite data links, allowing China to develop methods for disrupting the communications architecture connecting Taiwan's forces to American support networks in a future conflict.

* The author is an associate researcher commissioned by the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, and a research fellow at the Center for Integrated Strategy and Technology Studies, Tamkang University. （Related： Opinion | Stop Guessing: PLA Aircraft Absence and Fewer Warships Near Taiwan Linked to Weather, Not Politics ｜ Latest ）