China Launches Three-Day Military Drills Around Taiwan

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Facts

  • On Saturday, China's Eastern Theater Command of the People's Liberation Army announced that it had launched combat readiness patrols and military drills around Taiwan. The exercises — codenamed United Sharp Sword — are scheduled to last until Monday.1
  • United Sharp Sword reportedly includes a long-range rocket unit from the Eastern Theater Command, destroyers, frigates, missile boats, fighter jets, bombers, and electronic warfare planes.2
  • Following the announcement, Taiwan's defense ministry said it had detected at least nine ships and 71 aircraft crossing the unofficial Taiwan Strait median line as of Saturday morning.3
  • This comes as Beijing reportedly seeks to send a warning message to pro-independence forces in Taiwan after the self-ruled island's Pres. Tsai Ing-wen met with US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in California on Wednesday.1
  • After returning to the island late on Friday from her 10-day trip to the Western Hemisphere, Tsai also met with a visiting delegation from the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, whose chair pledged US training for Taiwan's military.4
  • The PRC claims sovereignty over Taiwan, with Beijing having also carried out military drills and fired missiles when then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) visited Taiwan last August.5

Sources: 1Al Jazeera, 2South china morning post, 3Independent, 4Ft and 5CNN.

Narratives

  • Pro-China narrative, as provided by Global times. Taiwan secessionist forces and their foreign allies have gone too far in their attempts to undermine China's national sovereignty and territorial integrity, prompting Beijing to respond powerfully to the provocative and completely unacceptable meeting between Tsai and McCarthy. The ongoing drills are needed to make rebels lay down weapons and resolve the dispute peacefully.
  • Anti-China narrative, as provided by Fox news. Beijing should know better than to engage in intimidation and saber-rattling, especially as such behavior can only backfire and firm up US support for Taiwan. Taipei and Washington have focused exclusively on deterrence policies to ensure peace around the Taiwan Strait as well as freedom and democracy in the island nation, so if China really wants peace, it shouldn't push for conflict.

Predictions