When China started six days of unprecedented military exercises around Taiwan, security analysts warned the increase in escalation risk even if Beijing tried to avoid protests over Nancy Pelosi’s visit from a full conflict splash.
China announced training in six locations around Taiwan immediately after the Speaker of the Pelosi DPR – a Chinese Veterans Critic and the most senior US politicians – landed in Taipei on Tuesday night.
Taiwan officials said that fire exercises immediately violated the UN rules, attacked Taiwan’s territorial space and were a direct challenge to be free of air and sea navigation.
The Chinese East Theater Command said multi-strength training involving the Navy, Air Force, Rocket Forces, Strategic Support Troops and Joint Logistics Support Troops, occurred in the air and sea in the north, southwest and southeast of Taiwan on Wednesday.
The Chinese military practices operations including seal and control, attacks at sea and attack land.
Analysts who were spoken to by Reuters said that it was still unclear whether China would fire a shipping or ballistic missile directly on the island, or try a blockade for the first time.
Song Zhongping, a military commentator based in Hong Kong, said it seems that the people’s liberation army wanted to practice blocking the island if it had to be in the next war.
“The purpose of this exercise, frankly, is to prepare for military battles with Taiwan.”
Not as usual, exercise was announced with a locator map circulated by the official Xinhua news agency – Factors for some analysts and scholars showed the need to play for domestic and foreign audiences.
“We can see China’s ambition: to make non-international waters of the Taiwan Strait, as well as making the entire area to the west of the first island chain in the West Pacific, the scope of its influence,” said a senior Taiwan official who is familiar with his safety planning.
If China gets what he wants, said the official, the impact will “be fatal for the safety and stability of regional countries, as well as for regional economy.”
Singapore -based security undergraduate Collin Koh said the pelSi visit had trapped China between having to show a firm and sweeping response while avoiding full conflict.
“Even if they want to avoid the results, there is still a significant possibility for unintentional escalations,” said Koh, from the S. Rajaratnam International Study School.
The exercise map produced by China shows that they exceeded the missile shooting in the Strait in 1996 when Beijing protested the first direct presidential election on the island in what was later known as the third Taiwan Strait crisis.
Significantly, in the north, east and south, the proposed exercise area divided the two taiwan claimed by 12 nautical miles of territorial waters – something that according to Taiwan officials challenged the international order and the same as the blockade of sea and air spaces.
In 1996, the United States Navy sent two aircraft carriers close to the Strait to effectively end the crisis – a step that was considered more challenging analysts now given the Chinese military growth, including a much more capable missile inventory.
A US Navy official confirmed to Reuters on Tuesday that the 7th fleet had deployed USS Ronald Reagan operators and four other warships, including guided missile explorers, in the Philippine Sea in the east of Taiwan as part of “routine distribution”.
The Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii did not immediately respond to Reuters’ questions about Chinese training on Wednesday.
Koh said the sophisticated US and Taiwan surveillance aircraft would see exercise as an opportunity to investigate the Chinese military system and communication, potentially increasing the risk if Chinese aircraft responded.
