The day after Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the United States House of Representatives, visited TaiwanHonoring it as a bulwark of democracy, China has launched three days of drills around the island, which its forces can use to draw ever closer, raising their ability to impose their blockade.
A flurry of Chinese propaganda said the drills, which began at midday on Thursday, would be punishment for Ms. Pelosi’s visit, and as a shock deterrent to protesters’ love. Beijing’s policy on self-governing islands. But more than that, the six exercise areas that the People’s Liberation Army has marked in the waters off Taiwan – a nudge less than 10 miles off its southern coast – could give Chinese forces valuable practice, should they one day be ordered to encircle and attack the island.
“Using momentum to surround,” reads a slogan used by the People’s Daily, the main newspaper of the Communist Party of China, when it announced that the drills had begun. Taiwanese military observer said it did not detect any immediate resurgence in Chinese naval activities.
The six regions were chosen for their importance in a potential campaign to blockade Taiwan and prevent foreign interference, said Major General Meng Xiangqing, professor of strategy at National Defense University in Beijing, said in an interview on Chinese state television. An area that covers the narrowest part of the Taiwan Strait. Others could be used to blockade a major port or attack three of Taiwan’s main military bases, he said.
The area near Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan, where important bases are located, “facilitates locking doors and beating dogs,” said General Meng, using a Chinese phrase that alludes to blocking the escape route of the enemy. enemy.
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, has said that he hopes to eventually unify Taiwan and China through peaceful steps. But like his predecessors, he does not rule out force, and China’s military build-up has reached the point where some military commanders and analysts see an invasion as a threat. increasingly plausible scenario, although still high risk. The exercises could help Chinese forces test their readiness for that.
“They will definitely use this as an excuse to do something to help them prepare for a possible invasion,” Oriana Skylar Mastroa fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University, who studies the Chinese military and China’s ability to strike Taiwan.
“It’s not just about texting,” she said. “Under the guise of signaling, they are trying to fundamentally test their ability to conduct the complex maneuvers required for an amphibious assault on Taiwan.”
It remains unclear how forces close to China will arrive in Taiwan during the exercise, which is scheduled to end on Sunday. In a possible sign of what to expect, China’s Liberation Army Daily say on Thursday that the Eastern Theater Command is organizing its own practices including navy, air force, and missile force. They focus on “joint encirclement and control,” sea and land attacks, and air dominance operations, it said.
The Chinese military could also test Taiwan’s response by firing into territorial waters directly off its coast. Three of the exercise areas have corners that jut out into that sea.
“It signals that, since Taiwan is part of China, it does not have a 12-nautical-mile zone,” said William Overholta senior researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School, referring to the maritime belt that Taiwan determine its territorial sea. “Taiwan must either defend its region as an independent or cave state.”
Kinmen Island, an island controlled by Taiwan, more than six miles off the Chinese coast, reported that on Wednesday night, flying objects of unknown origin – possibly drones – flew overhead. Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense said its website was crippled by “denial of service” cyberattacks on Wednesday night.
Major General Chang Jung-shun of Taiwan’s Kinmen Defense Command said: “We don’t see anything unusual in the Kinmen area, but their movement closer to Taiwan is more obvious.” . “Some of their ships used for exercises have been discovered.”
Some China analysts say China is trying to bolster its influence over Taiwan by enhancing its deterrence capabilities following Pelosi’s visit.
“The trend of external forces exploiting Taiwan to contain China is becoming more and more obvious,” Wu Yongping, a professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing who studies Taiwan, said written answers to the questions. “The Chinese government has adopted a number of unprecedented military operations to deal with this.”
One of the People’s Liberation Army designated exercise areas is off the east coast of Taiwan, at the furthest point from mainland China. When China staged military exercises off Taiwan during the crisis 25 years ago, the People’s Liberation Army, or PLA, didn’t go that far.
“It is a message intended to highlight the PLA’s increased ability to project power away from the Chinese mainland, and it is a tangible signal that China can encircle the island, ” speak Brian Hart, a member of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It will also complicate traffic to and around the island from all sides.”
The Global Times, an ultra-nationalist Chinese newspaper, improving Missiles were fired from the mainland into that area to the east, firing over Taiwan. A Chinese commentator, Zhang Xuefeng, told the newspaper: “If the Taiwanese military responds, the Liberation Army can completely trap the turtle in the jar,” said a Chinese commentator, Zhang Xuefeng, told the newspaper, use a Chinese saying to catch prey easily.
But Mr. Hart said China is unlikely to fire missiles over Taiwan. “That would be extremely escalation,” he said. “Most likely they will fire missiles launched from ships or from the air at that area without the missile flying over the island.”
After decades of tension and several military crises with China, many in Taiwan have faced threats. But even if China doesn’t take potentially incendiary steps this time, experts and officials on the island worry that the activities could spark an incident – a collision at sea or in the air, or a missile is mistakenly fired – causing tension to run rampant. – Crisis.
A surveillance service operated by the United States Naval Institute report on monday that a strike group led by the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan had in the Philippine Seasome distance east of Taiwan, and the USS Tripoli, an amphibious assault ship, is also in the area.
“In the past, the Chinese Communists conducted military exercises at a distance, now they have become close-ups,” said Chang Yan-ting, a retired deputy commander of the Taiwanese air force. an interview.
“The Chinese military exercises around Taiwan will put our national army in a very dangerous position,” he said. “They were on our doorstep.”
Jane Perlez and John Liu contribution report. Claire Fu contributed research.
