Attached is a clip of me talking about China’s latest and largest, measured by the amount of air and maritime areas closed off around Taiwan, and the second largest in terms of the number of ships and planes involved today. It has blocked all maritime traffic into Taiwan’s two largest ports and made most air travel impossible, prompting the cancellation of over 900 foreign and domestic flights affecting more than 100,000 people. You can see why China would do this in a war scenario, given the scale of these disruptions, just over 2 days.
China’s live fire exercise is designed to simulate a blockade. This is actually a more likely war option than a full-scale invasion or would be used as a prelude to an invasion because it would choke Taiwan of fossil fuel and other deliveries, as well as U.S. access to semiconductors, and threats to regional shipping.
There is some indication that the timing of this is because of the US approval of the largest US arms sale to Taiwan ever. But this is being misreported. This is an Approva for future sales. Taiwan doesn’t have the funds to buy more arms right now, and the opposition has blocked President Lai’s defense supplemental spending bill of $40 Billion. Even if this was approved tomorrow, arms sales and deliveries are not near-term propositions. Taiwan is currently awaiting delivery of $20 b in previous purchases that have been delayed by years in many cases. The other rationale is the recent tensions between Japan and China over the PM’s suggestion that Japan might have to engage its self-defense forces should Taiwan be attacked.
Finally, this is a great time for China to push boundaries further because Xi knows that President Trump doesn’t want to rock the boat, given his recent trade truce. Indeed, the President brushed off any significance to this exercise today.
