Taiwan to stage five days of combat readiness drills
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- Taiwan's Defence Ministry announced the five-day exercise will run Monday through Friday, with training built around a scenario in which China suddenly turns a regular exercise around the island into an actual attack.
- The drill emphasizes "actual troops, on actual terrain, in real time, using actual equipment," focusing on rapid peacetime-to-wartime transitions, joint operations command and control, and logistical sustainment.
- On the same day, Taiwan's Defence Ministry reported 21 Chinese military aircraft — including J-16 fighters, KJ-500 airborne early warning and control aircraft, and Y-20 aerial refuelling aircraft — operating near the island, with 19 entering airspace to Taiwan's southwest and the Western Pacific for "long-distance training."
- Taiwan sent its own forces to respond in what the ministry called standard wording for such encounters, and China claims the island as its own territory despite Taipei's objections.
- Earlier this month, Taiwan fired its new U.S.-made HIMARS rocket system into the Taiwan Strait during separate drills, and the main annual Han Kuang war games are expected in August.
- China's Defence Ministry did not answer calls seeking comment outside office hours on Sunday.
Why it matters: Taiwan is replacing setpiece exercises with a scenario in which a Chinese exercise becomes a real attack — a doctrinal shift that treats Beijing's routine drills as the starting gun. Combined with 21 Chinese aircraft detected the same day, including J-16s and Y-20 refuellers in the Western Pacific, the move signals Taipei is training for the most likely flashpoint, not a theoretical invasion.
