Iran’s mountain shelters offer Taiwan a China survival playbook

Asia Times | Gabriel Honrada

Iran is repairing and expanding its underground Eagle 44 airbase in Hormozgan province despite at least three rounds of joint US and Israeli airstrikes this year, according to Planet Labs imagery reported by The War Zone. Late-September images show engineers clearing debris and runway obstructions, finishing paving on a western taxiway and preparing a redundant access link.

The March and July strikes under Operation Epic Fury were meant to sever the underground hangars from the 4.35-kilometre runway. Three support buildings remain heavily damaged, and conditions at the deep portals are obscured. Dylan Malyasov of Defense Blog estimates that sheltering preserved two-thirds of Iran's operational air fleet, with only 38 exposed aircraft lost by his April 2026 article. Surviving F-4s, MiG-29s and Mi-28s flew after the ceasefire. The source then applies the pattern to Taiwan's Chiashan tunnels, which can shelter up to 200 fighters, and to North Korea's hardened airfields.

Comment

A mountain shelter such as Eagle 44 protects aircraft, but a jet counts for little until it can leave the mountain. Eagle 44's exposed point is the surface joining its hangars to the 4.35-kilometre runway. Iran's paving of a western taxiway segment and subgrade work on a redundant link suggest engineers treat access as a repeatable chore. For Iran's F-4s and MiG-29s, sortie generation, the rate at which a base launches and recovers aircraft, turns on whether repair crews outpace the cratering.

Israel ran that sequence against Egypt in Operation Focus on 5 June 1967, cratering runways first and destroying the stranded aircraft afterwards. Eagle 44 suggests the same choke point persists inside a mountain: shelters solved the destroyed-on-the-ground problem but left the cratered-runway problem open. Matthew Revels describes Chinese plans to crater Taiwan's runways with ballistic and cruise missiles, a test Chiashan's exits would face. Jimmy Chien's proposed Phoenix 2 fighter force, backed by rapid airfield runway repair units, addresses that same gap.

Each repair at Eagle 44 reopens the question that the March and July strikes under Operation Epic Fury were meant to settle. Three rounds of strikes this year have so far left the runway repairable. If repair costs less than cratering, the exchange at Eagle 44 favours the defender.

Strategic Question for Discussion

If Iranian crews at Eagle 44 keep restoring the runway faster than attackers can re-crater it, which carries more weight in the next round: the runway or the aircraft inside?

My assessment is that cratering the runway pays off only when restrikes arrive faster than repairs. Three rounds this year do not appear to have achieved that at Eagle 44. The pattern suggests sustained surveillance of the surface would count for more than another large strike.

Share your assessment in the comments below.

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