Beijing’s choice of locations for military exercises near Taiwan that began yesterday was intended as a clear provocation and likely the first in a series of drills based on the name “Joint Sword-2024A,” experts said.
Chinese sea, air, land and rocket forces were to conduct military exercises in areas surrounding Taiwan yesterday and today, said Colonel Li Xi (李熹), spokesman for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Eastern Theater Command.
The drills are intended to be a “strong punishment for acts of Taiwanese separatists, and severe warning against interference and provocation by external forces,” Li said.
Photo: I-Hwa Cheng, Bloomberg
The letter “A” in the exercise’s designation implies that the PLA plans to conduct additional drills with other forces in the operating area, National Policy Foundation associate research fellow Chieh Chung (揭仲) said.
The scope and details of the drills suggest that the exercise is a full dress rehearsal for an invasion, including blockades or amphibious assaults on Taiwan’s outlying islands, Chieh said.
The outlying islands were not part of China’s so-called Taiwan encirclement drills in August 2022 and April last year, exercises that revolved around developing joint blockade and joint fire capabilities respectively, he said.
Photo: AFP
The drills simulating offensive actions on the islands underscore that the PLA is ready to carry out a complete simulation of an invasion of them, a step up from past exercises, he said.
The incursion of China Coast Guard ships into restricted waters off Dongyin (東引) and Wuchiu (烏坵) islands could be a sign that Beijing no longer intends to respect the unofficially recognized boundaries it honored previously, Chieh said.
The election of William Lai (賴清德) as president might be a pretext for China to send ships into contested maritime areas, he said, adding that Chinese vessels have been trespassing into Taiwan’s restricted waters well before Monday’s inauguration.
The drills are also a message meant for the US, making it clear that Beijing would make security guardrails and de-risking impossible unless Washington makes concessions in the Taiwan Strait, Chieh said.
The PLA exercises are an expression of China’s discontent with Lai’s election aimed at the international community, National Taiwan University associate professor of political science Chen Shih-min (陳世民) said.
The Eastern Command’s comment about “external forces” was clearly a reference to the US, Chen said, adding that the drills were a symbolic declaration of dissatisfaction and a warning to the outside world reinforcing Beijing’s stance that Taiwan is a part of China.
China is not likely to embrace significant acts of military adventurism in the months leading up to the US presidential election in November, as rash actions might tempt US President Joe Biden or former US president Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, to call for harsher measures against Beijing, he said.
Beijing’s top priorities lie with China’s economy and resolving other internal problems, he said, adding that hardline actions run the risk of scaring away foreign investors.
China’s placement of the drills near Taiwan’s 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone is a deliberate provocation, Institute for National Defense and Security Research associate research fellow Shu Hsiao-huang (舒孝煌) said.
The PLA is not likely to fire missiles, as using live weapons so close to Taiwanese and other foreign forces exposes China to the risks of miscalculation and accidents, and could reveal the setup of its kill chains to prying eyes, including US surveillance assets, Shu said.
However, more restrained gunnery displays could still happen during the drills, he said.
Whether the PLA would follow the drills with other exercises or wait for other states in the region to respond before deciding on the next step cannot be known with the information available at this time, he said.
Although China claimed that its exercises started at 7:45am, the PLA was reportedly massing forces in Fujian’s Dacheng Bay (大埕灣) a week before Lai’s swearing-in ceremony, said Lin Ying-yu (林穎佑), an assistant professor of international affairs and strategic studies at Tamkang University.
There is little doubt that the drills were a direct response to the election in Taiwan, as they come shortly after Nauru severed diplomatic ties with Taipei, unilateral modification of the M503 flight route and Chinese vessels in Kinmen’s restricted waters, Lin said.
Echoing Shu’s assessment, Lin said he does not expect Beijing to fire missiles over Taiwan, as such actions would leave China no space for escalation when dealing with Lai for at least four more years.
China designates three levels of military exercises ranging from firing live ballistic missiles; maneuvers of a joint force consisting of air, sea or land units; and maneuvers involving units from a single service, such as a formation of combat aircraft, he said.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
RSS