Around noon on Friday, 2 October, an F-16 with a Republic of China flag spread across its instrument panel touched down at Chihhang Air Base in Taitung, on Taiwan’s Pacific coast. A second jet followed it in. After three years of slipped schedules and six weeks parked in Hawaii, the Taiwan F-16 Block 70 programme finally has aircraft at home.

The pair, single-seat F-16Cs numbered 6727 and 6728, are the first of 66 new-build jets Taiwan ordered in 2019 for about US$8 billion. A Taiwanese pilot flew 6728, the jet with the flag, while an American flew the lead jet, 6727, the Liberty Times and United Daily News reported. Until a formal handover and acceptance check, both remain US property.

Dozens of locals with binoculars and long lenses lined the perimeter fence, AFP reported. Kimi Chi, a salesman who had travelled overnight from Taichung, was philosophical about the wait: “good things take time.”

Six weeks at Hickam

The journey began on 17 August, when the jets left Lockheed Martin’s Greenville, South Carolina, plant and staged through Fort Worth, Texas. Refuelled in flight by US Air Force tankers, they reached Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam on 21 August. Taiwan expected them by month’s end; Defence Minister Wellington Koo had forecast September.

Instead they stayed. Departures for Guam were aborted at least twice, once with the pair turning back to Hickam shortly after take-off, the Taipei Times and the South China Morning Post reported. Fans who kept racing to Taitung nicknamed them “Taiwan Beer One” and “Taiwan Beer Two”, United Daily News reported, after the beer they jokingly promised a Hawaii-based spotter who checked on the jets through gaps in hangar doors.

No official explanation was given. SBS reported an equipment malfunction and caution around the Trump–Xi summit. Su Tzu-yun of Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research said storms around Hawaii came first, with tankers drawn to the Middle East, politics or technical problems as possible factors, EBC reported. Xi Jinping’s state visit to Washington ended on 25 September; the jets left Hawaii for Guam on 1 October.

CNA footage of the two F-16 Block 70s landing at Chihhang Air Base in Taitung on 2 October 2026.

Home, without fanfare

The last leg took about three and a half hours, according to United Daily News, and three Taiwanese F-16s met the pair at the edge of the air defence identification zone. Before they left Guam, US ground crew peeled off stickers covering their Republic of China insignia. Both still wore ferry fit: conformal tanks, three drop tanks and a luggage pod under the right wing.

There was no water-cannon salute, the same paper reported; both jets taxied straight into a hangar and the pilots did not meet reporters. Discretion has a history here. In April 1997, Taiwan’s first two F-16s landed at Chiayi a day early to wrong-foot spies and were towed into hangars after dark, retired Lt Gen Tien Tsai-mai, who ran the early ferry flights, told United Daily News.

Taiwanese media hailed Friday’s pair as the first brand-new fighters in 29 years, counting from those 1997 arrivals and the first Mirage 2000-5s. But deliveries from Taiwan’s 1990s fighter programmes, including the home-built Ching-kuo, ran until 2001, so a quarter of a century is the fairer measure.

Three years late, one system short

Washington approved the sale in August 2019: 56 single-seat F-16Cs and 10 two-seat F-16Ds, funded from a NT$247.2 billion budget for 2020 to 2026. Deliveries were meant to run from 2023 to the end of this year, until the relocation and restart of the production line, supply-chain disruption and software problems intervened, CNA and Reuters reported. Taipei is seeking non-cash compensation, such as extra spares and longer warranties, legislators Ma Wen-chun and Wang Ting-yu said.

Koo said more jets would arrive “before the end of the year” but gave no number. The Air Force says 63 more are on the US production line, some ready for delivery, and United Daily News reports the 66th, a two-seater, is testing the electronic warfare suite at Edwards Air Force Base. The rest are due in 2027 and 2028.

Taiwan already calls its 139 rebuilt F-16A/Bs “F-16Vs”, and the new jets share their core avionics, including Northrop Grumman’s AN/APG-83 AESA radar. The Block 70 adds a new-build airframe, conformal fuel tanks that extend range without using weapon stations, and strengthened landing gear for heavier loads. CNA lists AIM-9X and AIM-120 missiles, AGM-154C glide bombs and Harpoon anti-ship missiles among its weapons.

One piece is missing for now. The pair arrived without their AN/ALQ-254(V)1 Viper Shield electronic warfare suites, United Daily News reported. Koo said testing of the system was on schedule and denied reports that ballast had been fitted in its place.

Spotter footage of the new F-16 Block 70s arriving at Chihhang Air Base, still in ferry configuration.

More than 200 Vipers

With all 66 delivered, Taiwan will fly more than 200 F-16s, one of the largest F-16V fleets, CNA notes. They will serve with the 7th Tactical Fighter Wing, formed in December 2023 to guard the east coast from Chihhang, until recently a training base for Taiwan’s now-retired F-5s. Acceptance checks and conversion training come next, the Air Force said.

China’s foreign ministry did not respond to a Reuters request for comment; Beijing claims Taiwan and has repeatedly told Washington to stop arming it. Koo was blunt: “China’s intention to annex Taiwan by force has never changed.” A State Department spokesperson said Washington stands with its Indo-Pacific friends and allies, “that includes Taiwan”. Yet a separate US$14 billion arms package, paused by Trump after Chinese objections, still awaits approval, AFP noted.

Kimi Chi named the gap that hardware cannot fill. “In terms of hardware capabilities, there will definitely be an improvement,” he told AFP. “But what we are actually lacking the most right now is pilots.”

Sources: Taiwan Ministry of National Defense (Air Force Command press release), 2 October 2026; Military News Agency (MND), 2 October 2026; Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, 21 March 2026; Focus Taiwan (CNA), 19 August and 2 October 2026; CNA, 7 January and 23 March 2026; Reuters, 2 October 2026; AFP via Asharq Al-Awsat and The Sun, 2 October 2026; SBS, 2 October 2026; United Daily News, 30 September to 2 October 2026; Liberty Times, 21 August and 2 October 2026; ETtoday, 2 October 2026; EBC, 1 October 2026; Taipei Times, 30 March 2025 and 7 September 2026; South China Morning Post, 8 September 2026; CTWANT, September 2026; F-16.net, 24 August 2026; defence-blog.com, 2 October 2026; FlightGlobal, 2 October 2026; Office of the President (ROC), 18 November 2021; Wikipedia: F-16 operators, Dassault Mirage 2000, AIDC F-CK-1 Ching-kuo, Republic of China Air Force, 2026 state visit by Xi Jinping to the United States