China on Monday extended exercises with aircraft and warships around Taiwan, in defiance of calls by the United States and Japan to end the largest military exercises in their history around the island that it considers to be part of its territory.
The exercises, which were supposed to end on Sunday, have severely disrupted air and sea traffic and raised the risk of armed conflict in a region crucial to global trade.
The crisis began last week following the visit to Taiwan by the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, that China considered a provocation and to which it responded with the announcement of four days of military exercises starting last Thursday.
US President Joe Biden, who did not support and even somewhat objected to Pelosi’s visit, expressed concern about the situation but said he did not expect an escalation.
“I’m not worried, but I’m worried that they’re making such a fuss. But I don’t think they’re going to do anything more than what they’re doing.”Biden told reporters in his home state of Delaware, where he spent yesterday.
In China, the Army’s Eastern Command said in a statement that its forces continued “to conduct practical joint exercises and training in the sea and airspace around Taiwan, focusing on staging joint underwater and sea strike operations.”
The exercises were originally due to end at noon on Sunday, according to China’s maritime safety administration.
China estimates that Taiwan, an island of 23 million inhabitants, is a province that failed to reunite with the rest of its territory after the end of the Chinese civil war (1949).
In turn, the Government of Taiwan criticized China for prolonging its military exercises.
“China’s provocation and aggression has damaged the status quo across the Taiwan Strait and increased tensions in the area,” Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement, the AFP news agency reported.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken denounced the “total disproportion” of the Chinese reaction over the weekend and issued a joint statement with his Japanese and Australian counterparts calling on China to end the military exercises.
In response to Pelosi’s visit, second in line to the US presidential succession, China suspended its cooperation with the United States in several key areas, including combating climate change and defense issues.
A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Wang Wenbin, did not formally confirm the organization of new exercises, but stressed that his country’s reaction was “legitimate, rational and legal.”
“This is a warning to troublemakers as well as supporters of Taiwan independence,” Wang said in regular contact with the press.
“We urge the United States to examine its conscience and rectify its mistake as soon as possible (…) as well as to stop playing the Taiwan card to hinder (the development of) China”he added.
The US position
The United States maintains a policy of “strategic ambiguity” about whether it would actually intervene militarily if China invaded Taiwan.
In what is called the “one China” policy, The United States recognizes that there is only one China and that Taiwan is part of China, but leaves it to the two sides to find a solution, while opposing any use of force to change the status quo.
During its exercises, China deployed fighter jets, warships and ballistic missiles around Taiwan in what analysts see as a mock blockade and invasion of the island.
To show how close it was to the shores of Taiwan, The Chinese Army released a video of the island’s coast and mountains shot by a pilot.
Also released a photo that it claims was taken from one of its military ships that was patrolling near Taiwan and in which the coast of the island can be seen in the distance.
Taiwanese Prime Minister Su Tseng-chang said yesterday that “China’s brutal use of military force shakes peace and stability.”
The island’s Army has been on guard during all these Chinese maneuvers and today announced that it will organize its own live-fire exercises this week.
Taiwanese forces will train to face landings tomorrow and Thursday in the Pingtung region in the south. Several hundred soldiers and about 40 guns will be deployed for these exercises, according to the same source.
According to the Taiwanese Army, these maneuvers were already scheduled and are not a response to China’s.
