US airfields increasingly exposed to a Chinese missile at...

Kadena Air Base, the US’s largest airpower hub in Japan, has intensified preparations against potential Chinese missile strikes by conducting rapid airfield damage repair drills amid rising tensions over Taiwan.

Located on Okinawa, roughly 595 kilometers from Taiwan, Kadena is considered a likely target if China attempts to forcibly seize the self-governing island, given its role hosting rotational fighter jets and operating US Air Force, Marine Corps and Navy drone fleets.

The US Department of Defense (DoD) estimates that China possesses more than 2,000 ballistic missiles capable of reaching Japan, underscoring Kadena’s vulnerability despite its Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) defenses.

In November, the 18th Civil Engineer Squadron—a US Air Force engineering unit typically responsible for base infrastructure—led recent joint exercises simulating crater repairs, debris clearance and runway restoration to ensure the base could sustain combat operations in a contested environment.

“Every second counts when it comes to airfield recovery,” said Senior Airman Seth Callahan, emphasizing the need for speed in returning aircraft to service.

Concurrently, Kadena is undertaking its most extensive runway upgrades of the year, replacing worn pavement and reinforcing critical sections to bolster durability and reduce future maintenance.

Officials said the improvements will secure Kadena’s role as a “critical launch point” for US operations across the Indo-Pacific, as the US continues to sharpen readiness amid escalating cross-strait tensions with China.

It may be too little, too late, however, according to analysts. Japan’s 36 military airfields—including major US bases such as Kadena and Iwakuni—have minimal hardening, with only ~140 mostly Cold War–era shelters and minimal additions over the last decade, Thomas Shugart III and Timothy Walton mention in a January 2025 Hudson Institute report.

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They note that because these bases are unhardened and densely packed, China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could neutralize aircraft and fuel stores with only a small number of submunition-armed ballistic or cruise missiles, making Japan-based US airpower especially susceptible to a rapid, overwhelming strike at the start of a conflict.

Beyond Japan, US airbases in the Philippines may be similarly vulnerable. Stacie Pettyjohn and Molly Campbell, in a September 2025 report for the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), use a tabletop vignette of US Air Force fighters and US Army air defenders conducting Agile Combat Employment (ACE) operations from distributed airbases on Mindanao to illustrate their vulnerability to Chinese drone attacks.

The US ACE strategy is a dispersed, flexible scheme of maneuver that rapidly shifts aircraft, personnel and support across multiple small or austere locations to increase survivability and ensure continued combat power generation under threat.

In this scenario, the ACE bases are about 160 kilometers apart, and the authors conclude there were not enough defenses to cover them adequately. Their scenario shows Chinese forces employing jet drones and truck-launched turbofan kamikaze drones from Hainan, ship-fired CJ-10 cruise missiles and an air-launched ballistic missile (ALBM) from an H-6 bomber.

They warn that US warfighting concepts premised on distributed joint operations will be defeated if distributed forces cannot be protected against drone attacks, and that repeated drone attacks could deplete US interceptor stockpiles and outstrip active defenses.

Such vulnerabilities may point to larger challenges with the US ACE airpower strategy. In a July 2024 Proceedings article, Michael Blaser mentions that ACE is premised on the idea that China lacks sufficient long-range missile capacity and that its targeting cycle remains slower than US sortie generation.

However, Blaser points out that the PLA Rocket Force (PLARF) fields the world’s largest missile arsenal, capable of striking dispersed aircraft across Pacific bases simultaneously. Moreover, he adds that advances in AI and space-based sensors enable China to accelerate its kill chain, potentially outpacing ACE’s tempo.

Delving deeper into ACE’s premises, US airpower may have been envisioned to operate from rear-area “sanctuary” bases, with the predictable and uncontested logistics buildup of US forces becoming a thing of the past.

A 1990s Desert Storm-style massing of US forces may no longer be feasible due to long-range strike capabilities and persistent surveillance, rendering traditional overseas basing concepts obsolete.

Kelly Grieco and other writers mention in a December 2024 Stimson Institute report that Chinese missile attacks could shut down US-run runways and taxiways in Japan for the first 12 days of a conflict, preventing fighter operations to assist Taiwan.

Grieco and other writers note that aerial refueling tankers would be unable to operate from Japan for over a month, denying US aircraft the range needed to reach the Taiwan Strait or South China Sea. They note these closures would severely limit sortie generation, delay bomber employment and risk giving China a 30-day window of air superiority to attempt a rapid fait accompli.

Crucially, they point out that no realistic combination of runway repair, dispersal and missile defense is likely to solve the problem of airfield outages in the opening phases of a US-China conflict over Taiwan.

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Despite those vulnerabilities, Sean Zeigler and other writers mention in a July 2025 RAND report that the US is expanding efforts to fortify Pacific airfields by building new dispersed locations such as Tinian and Yap, reinforcing existing bases, adding hardened shelters, improving fuel redundancy and upgrading rapid runway repair.

However, Zeigler and others note that progress remains limited and lags behind China’s expanding missile arsenal. They point out that passive defenses—the most cost-effective survivability measures—were deferred for several years, generating a cumulative funding deficit, while US Pacific Air Forces (PACAF) military construction (MILCON) averaged only US$300 million annually, far below requirements.

They add that implementation is further complicated by host-nation political stability and access risks. Countries such as the Philippines carry high internal or external political-risk scores that could restrict US basing or operations with a change in political leadership. They stress that even effective ACE investments will require sustained manning, deployment and long-term access to succeed.

China’s missile and drone arsenal is eroding the very foundations of US Pacific airpower, exposing a strategy built on assumptions that the PLA may have already outpaced and overcome. Unless the US hardens and disperses its Pacific bases at scale and keeps its allies close, its forward airpower may be disabled long before it can enter any fight with China.