Dept. Of Defense sees the value of STOVL aircraft.

via the Washington Times..

In addition to announcing the Taiwanese military upgrade, the Pentagon this week will release a congressionally mandated study on Taiwan’s air power.
The study concludes that Taiwan's military should buy short-takeoff and vertical-landing jets such as the British-design AV-8B Harrier jump jet or the new F-35B vertical-takeoff version, according to the officials familiar with the aircraft.
That conclusion was based on anticipated Chinese missile strikes against Taiwanese airfields with cratering munitions that would thwart takeoffs by F-16s and other jets

Read the whole thing.  Understand that the WT was able to find an "expert" that shot down the report as simply being justification not to sell new F-16's to Taiwan.  But in my opinion there is more to it than just that.  It should be obvious to all that the nation of Taiwan is vulnerable and that the only aircraft that will be able to get into the air after a missile strike is on that is STOVL.