Since 2022, China has held several major military exercises off the coast of Taiwan, and its fighter jets regularly enter Taiwan’s airspace.
The latest exercise has been dubbed Joint Sword 2024-B in Beijing and has been expected since May, when an exercise of the same name and officially designated Part A was held.
The drills, which China called its largest ever, coincided with the inauguration of President Lai, long viewed by Beijing as a “troublemaker” who advocates Taiwan independence.
His latest comments, made on Taiwan’s national day, were condemned by China, which said he had stoked tensions with “sinister intentions”.
But while these exercises were widely expected, when you look at the deployment and how close Chinese ships and aircraft are to Taiwan — as well as the fiery rhetoric — this is very aggressive behavior.
In any other context, this would be seen as a sharp escalation, but it comes against a backdrop of already very high tensions.
The US responded by saying there was no justification for the drills after Lai’s “conventional” speech and that China should avoid further actions that could threaten peace and stability in the region.
