A Chinese air force pilot takes part in joint combat training exercises around Taiwan on August 7, 2022. Photo / Xinhua via AP
A Chinese air force pilot takes part in joint combat training exercises around Taiwan on August 7, 2022. Photo / Xinhua via AP
China has extended its military drills around Taiwan, stoking fears of a drawn-out period of heightened tension that is piling pressure on the US to respond.
Beijing's largest ever military exercises around Taiwan had been expected to wind down after navigation warnings for seven areas around the country expired earlyon Monday.
But the People's Liberation Army Eastern Theatre Command said it "continued joint training under real war conditions". Monday's drills were focused on anti-submarine warfare and naval strikes, and featured multiple destroyers and combat aircraft, it added.
The statement indicated that while the live-fire drills had concluded, the Chinese military would maintain a pressure campaign that had brought its combat aircraft and warships closer than ever to Taiwanese territory.
Taiwan's armed forces said the PLA's exercises were squeezing its space for training and having an adverse impact on international air traffic. "Their intention is to deal a blow to our morale and threaten regional security," the defence ministry said.
Taipei condemned Beijing's push to undermine the Taiwan Strait median line, an unofficial buffer between the two sides.
"The median line has been a tacit understanding between the two sides of the strait since the 1950s. Although it doesn't carry the force of international law, it does exist," said Lieutenant General Shen Shih-wei, head of the ministry's legal department.
Chinese fighter jets around Taiwan on August 7, 2022. Photo / Xinhua via AP
China justified the exercises with its territorial claim to Taiwan. They were "normal" exercises conducted "in waters around our own territory", foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said in a further indication that Beijing was seeking to normalise frequent military operations closer to Taiwan's shores. At the weekend, PLA scholars said the exercises had helped obliterate the median line and the Chinese military would from now on conduct regular exercises on the Taiwanese side.
According to Taiwan's ministry of defence, 21 PLA aircraft operated around the island's airspace on Monday, 14 of which flew across the median line.
Taiwan's president Tsai Ing-wen last week appealed to the international community for support.
The US government has repeatedly condemned China's aggression. The G7 group of industrial nations has pleaded with Beijing to de-escalate the situation. But Washington, which has long acted as Taiwan's unofficial protector, has not revealed whether it would use military force to deter China.
On Monday, US President Joe Biden told reporters he was "not worried" about Beijing's actions. "But I'm concerned they're moving as much as they are," he added.
Colin Kahl, US undersecretary of defence for policy, linked Beijing's latest actions to US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan last week.
"Clearly, they weren't happy with the speaker's visit ... And all I can say is, we're not going to take the bait and it's not going to work," Kahl said.
Duan Dang, a regional security analyst in Vietnam, wrote on Twitter: "If the US doesn't do something militarily to push back China in Taiwan Strait and re-establish a credible red line, it will be very bad! Frankly, no one in the region is going to believe in US commitments anymore."
Apart from military exercises, Beijing has also stepped up a propaganda offensive aimed at eroding the island nation's confidence in its security while satisfying nationalist sentiment on the mainland.
A customer and staff member watch a news report on US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan, at a beauty salon in Taipei, August 4, 2022. Photo / AP
After Chinese online map services began displaying Taiwan in greater detail last week, state media and diplomats began publishing posts and articles highlighting signs of Chinese culture in Taiwanese cities, which they said bolstered Beijing's claim of sovereignty.
A video posted on the Weibo account of state broadcaster CCTV showed street signs in Taipei carrying the names of Chinese cities and provinces such as Tianjin, Shandong, Guiyang and Chongqing.
It was accompanied by a sentimental song with the lyrics: "A cloud from the homeland drifts at the edge of the sky and keeps calling out to me. As a slight breeze rises next to me, a voice keeps calling out: 'Return, return!'"
"Every road leads home!" a caption under the video read. "Here, every street is filled with the yearning for home!"
The propaganda campaign has played on Taiwan's complex national identity, history of Chinese migration and consecutive waves of colonisation.
After the Chinese Nationalist government fled to the island following its defeat in the civil war in 1949, it renamed most streets after mainland cities and traditional Chinese virtues. This was to uphold its claim as the legitimate government of China as well as to sinicise Taiwan after 50 years of Japanese rule and centuries of only loose association with the mainland.
But according to polls that Taiwanese universities have conducted for almost 30 years, the majority of the country's population does not see itself as predominantly Chinese and does not want to become part of China.
Hua Chunying, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, posted screenshots of maps of the Taiwanese capital on Twitter, noting that they showed "38 Shandong dumpling restaurants and 67 Shanxi noodle restaurants in Taipei".
"Palates don't cheat. Taiwan has always been a part of China. The long lost child will eventually return home," she wrote.
The claim that Chinese restaurants proved that Taiwan had been part of the mainland, which was also spread by other diplomats, quickly backfired, however, when Twitter users responded by asking whether the presence of McDonald's fast-food outlets in Beijing demonstrated that China was historically part of the US.
