Taiwan Struggles to Build Drone Defense Force to Counter China (2)

On a corporate campus in northwest Taiwan, a rushed effort to bolster the island’s defenses against China is taking shape — with little help from the technology giants who turned this outpost into a global chipmaking hub.

The military officials entering and exiting a factory run by Coretronic Intelligent Robotics Corp. — located just miles from the beaches where Beijing’s forces would land in an invasion — underscore the firm’s role at the heart of Taiwan’s homegrown efforts to arm itself with aerial drones.

The task is huge, with Taiwan’s stockpile of roughly 1,000 military-grade drones just a sliver of the tens ...