China’s military continued enormous live-fire drills around Taiwan for a second day Tuesday, with the island’s forces moving onto high alert and its government condemning Beijing as the world’s “biggest destroyer of peace.”
More than 130 Chinese People’s Liberation Army aircraft and 22 vessels were detected near the island in the 24 hours to 6 a.m. local time, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday morning. That was the highest number recorded in a day this year, according to data compiled by the South China Morning Post.
Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te condemned the exercises Tuesday, saying in a Facebook post that China’s “conduct is far from what would be expected of a responsible major power.” He also struck a calming note, adding: “We will act with responsibility — neither escalating tensions nor provoking conflict.”
Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said rapid-response exercises were underway, with forces on high alert. “The Chinese Communist Party’s targeted military exercises further confirm its nature as an aggressor and the biggest destroyer of peace,” it said.
President Donald Trump said Monday night that he wasn’t concerned about the exercises.
“I have a great relationship with President Xi, and he hasn’t told me anything about it,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida of the Chinese leader.
“Nothing worries me,” Trump added. “… They’ve been doing that for 20, 25 years.”
The exercises, dubbed “Justice Mission 2025” and involving the People’s Liberation Army’s navy, air force and rocket force, began on Monday. They are taking place in seven zones around the island and were intended, Beijing said, as a “stern warning” to the island following the U.S. decision to send a landmark $11 billion arms package to Taiwan.
The drills were designed to test Beijing’s ability to rapidly coordinate attacks in a simulated blockade of Taiwan’s key ports, according to notices published on state media outlets and a statement from the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command spokesperson.
Snap exercises showcasing China’s military might usually follow a familiar playbook, with Beijing responding aggressively to what it perceives as overt support for Taiwan’s independence. The live-fire exercises — coming after the largest-ever approved U.S. weapons package for Taiwan and amid escalating tensions with Japan — also arrive as Beijing approaches a self-imposed 2027 deadline for its military to be ready to invade Taiwan by force.
“The drills are a punitive and deterrent action against separatist forces who seek Taiwan independence through military buildup. … Anyone who tries to arm Taiwan to contain China will only embolden the separatists and push the Taiwan Strait closer to the peril of armed conflict,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said at a regular news conference Monday.
Analysts said the drills were also in response to comments last month by Japan’s new prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, who warned that a Chinese attack on Taiwan would represent a threat to Japan’s “survival,” drawing an angry backlash from Beijing.
Shen Ming-shih of Taiwan’s government-funded Institute for National Defense and Security Research noted that the scale of the exercises could also be motivated by domestic and operational motives in the wake of Xi Jinping’s purgesof the upper ranks of the People’s Liberation Army.
“Beijing needs to project a tough posture to avoid the impression that the PLA is too preoccupied with internal issues to focus on external affairs,” said Shen. “It must demonstrate resolve so that outside actors do not underestimate China or increase their support for Taiwan because of China’s internal problems.”
William Yang, the Crisis Group’s senior analyst for North East Asia, went further, arguing that the drills are a vivid demonstration of the progress that the PLA has made in recent years.
This was “especially when it comes to its ability to shorten the interval between when it announces or decides to stage a military exercise and when it is actually able to deploy military assets to strategically important wartime positions around Taiwan,” he said.
Such demonstrations, Yang said, could be designed to plant “seeds of doubt” in ongoing debates in the White House about future Taiwan policy.
“Given Trump’s initial response, which appeared to downplay the seriousness of the Chinese drills,” Yang said, “Beijing may feel encouraged to continue probing Washington’s willingness to make potential concessions on Taiwan ahead of Trump’s highly anticipated state visit to Beijing next April.”
In particular, Yang added, Washington might be forced to consider scaling back both the size and intensity of military support for Taiwan, potentially holding off on approving certain weapons sales that Beijing would view as especially provocative.
Chinese military drills around Taiwan are not unusual, though they have intensified in scale in recent years. This week’s exercises mark the sixth major drill since 2022, when Beijing responded to a visit by then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) with an unprecedented four-day mock blockade of the island.
The PLA did not share how long the drills would run, but it warned that exclusion zones should remain active through Tuesday.
A spokesman for the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command said on Monday that vessels and aircraft would approach Taiwan in “close proximity from different directions” and “engage in joint assaults.” The PLA published coordinates of the drills, showing they would take place over five large stretches of ocean encircling Taiwan, including to the east of the island, where key ports are most likely to receive support from external allies in the event of an invasion.
An additional map from China’s Maritime Safety Administration highlighted two more warning zones, making it the largest such exercise ever measured by total area, effectively encircling most of Taiwan.
Taiwan’s Civil Aviation Administration said more than 100,000 travelers are expected to be affected as the drills disrupt nearly 1,000 flights, with commercial airlines avoiding international airspace designated by the PLA for the drills.
Last week, the Pentagon released a report that said China was escalating its aggression over Taiwan and employing increasingly coercive measures to retake the island, but it noted the goal of stabilizing ties.
Beijing has sought closer defense ties with Russia amid what it sees as a growing consensus among U.S. allies on defending Taiwan.
In a Sunday interview with Russian state media outlet Tass, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reaffirmed Moscow’s support for Beijing’s plans to reunify Taiwan, saying that if China were to invade the island, it would have Russia’s backing.
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