China launches military exercises around Taiwan

FILE -In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, a J-15 Chinese fighter jet prepares to take off from the Shandong aircraft carrier during the combat readiness patrol and military exercises around the Taiwan Island by the Eastern Theater Command of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) on Sunday, April 9, 2023. (An Ni/Xinhua via AP, File) (An Ni/AP)

China on Tuesday sent its army, navy, air and rocket forces to surround Taiwan for drills Beijing said were aimed at practising a blockade of the self-ruled island.

China insists democratic Taiwan is part of its territory and has threatened to use force to bring it under its control.

Beijing has increased the deployment of fighter jets and naval vessels around Taiwan in recent years to press its claim of sovereignty, which Taipei rejects.

Taiwan’s defence ministry said Beijing had deployed its Shandong aircraft carrier group as part of 19 warships around the island.

The exercises are aimed at sending a “stern warning and forceful deterrence” to alleged separatists in Taiwan, Beijing said.

They involve “sea-air combat-readiness patrols, joint seizure of comprehensive superiority, assault on maritime and ground targets, and blockade on key areas and sea lanes”, said Senior Colonel Shi Yi, spokesman of the Chinese military’s Eastern Theater Command.

Beijing’s armed forces “close in on Taiwan Island from multiple directions”, he said.

Taiwan President Lai Ching-te last month called China a “foreign hostile force” and proposed measures to combat Chinese espionage and infiltration.

Lai, who took office last May, has been more outspoken than his predecessor Tsai Ing-wen in defending Taiwan’s sovereignty, angering the Chinese government, which calls him a “separatist”.

The Chinese military’s Eastern Theater Command -- which oversees operations along the Taiwan Strait -- shared a graphic with the title “closing in”.

It showed ships and fighter jets surrounding the island, warning “Taiwan separatists” were “Courting Disaster Upon Themselves”.

Another graphic shared by the military depicted Lai as an insect being roasted over an open fire.

And a video shared by the military on X-like Weibo showed footage of fighter jets, naval vessels, and missile launchers interspersed with animations of Sun Wukong, the legendary Monkey King from the classic Chinese novel “Journey to the West”.

The video climaxes with Chinese forces appearing to use satellites to mark targets across Taiwan, before ending with a flurry of rocket explosions while multiple Monkey Kings attack a giant frog monster.

Potential flashpoint

This week’s drills are the biggest since February, when Taipei said that China staged a “live-fire” combat drill with aircraft and warships in an area about 40 nautical miles (74 kilometres) off the island’s south.

Taiwan’s military responded by sending forces to “monitor, alert and respond appropriately”.

Beijing at the time rejected “pure hype” from Taiwan over what it called “routine training”.

China has carried out multiple drills around the island in recent years, often described as rehearsals for a blockade and seizure of the territory.

It also launched major drills in 2022 after Nancy Pelosi, then speaker of the US House of Representatives, visited Taiwan.

Taiwan is a potential flashpoint for a war between China and the United States, which is the island’s most important backer and biggest arms supplier.

While the United States is legally bound to provide arms to Taiwan -- which Beijing opposes -- Washington has long maintained “strategic ambiguity” when it comes to whether it would deploy its military to defend it from a Chinese attack.

Last week, the island’s deputy defence minister attended a ceremony in the United States unveiling the first F-16V fighter jet built for the island.

The dispute between China and Taiwan dates back to 1949 when Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang nationalist forces fled to Taiwan after losing the Chinese civil war with Mao Zedong’s communist fighters.

Communist China has never ruled Taiwan, where indigenous tribes have lived for thousands of years. The island was partly or totally ruled at various times by the Dutch, Spanish, China’s Qing dynasty and Japan.