Colonel Shi Yi, the spokesperson for the Eastern Theater of China’s military, said on August 17 that on the same day, the Eastern Theater sent out warships, anti-submarine aircraft, fighters and other services to organize joint fire assaults and other actual forces in the surrounding seas and airspaces such as the southwest and southeast of Taiwan Island, and the exercise aims to test the “integrated joint operations capabilities of the theater forces”.
For the actual military exercises, the Chinese mainland spokesman stressed that is to respond to the United States and Taiwan “collusion”: “frequent provocations by the United States and Taiwan, sending serious false signals, serious violations of China’s sovereignty, serious damage to peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, has become the greatest source of security risks in the Taiwan Strait. ” Therefore, the exercise is a serious response to the interference of external forces and the provocation of Taiwan independence forces.
Shi Yi also pointed out that the eastern theater will continue to strengthen combat readiness training, emphasizing the determination and ability to thwart all “Taiwan independence” separatist activities, and resolutely defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The sudden change of the situation in Afghanistan has aroused the attention of the outside world to the situation in the Taiwan Strait. At this moment, the Chinese army announced that it would hold joint fire assaults and other real-force drills around the island of Taiwan. For the Taiwanese government, which is like a “horrified bird,” it is tantamount to another shock bomb.
The Chinese military has not yet released the exercise footage, but from the exercise configuration (combat ships, anti-submarine aircraft, and fighter planes), and the exercise area (southwest and southeast of Taiwan Island), the goal cannot be simply to target Taiwan Island, but to use joint air and sea combat forces to block extraterritorial support forces from the southwest and southeast of the island of Taiwan.
From a geopolitical point of view, if something happens in the Taiwan Strait, extraterritorial forces will most likely come from the air and sea to the southeast and the southwest of Taiwan Island. Therefore, the PLA needs to conduct “area denial” in these two areas. In terms of joint forces, it is likely that the PLA Rocket Force missile units located on land will also participate in the exercise.
Given that China has built three major artificial islands in the South China Sea, especially in the Spratly Islands (Yongshun Island, Meiji Island, Zhubi Island), and deployed heavy weapons, extraterritorial forces wanting to reinforce Taiwan Island from the South China Sea would be delayed, so the biggest threat to the unification of Taiwan by force from mainland China still comes from the Western Pacific waters, especially in the direction of Guam.