PLA holds encirclement drills around Taiwan island following US arms sale approval

A J-10 fighter jet attached to an aviation brigade of the air force under the PLA Southern Theater Command takes off for a flight training exercise on August 15, 2023. Photo: China Military

The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) recently conducted another, unannounced large-scale joint exercise encircling the island of Taiwan featuring sudden actions and sophisticated buildups after the US approved a $500 million arms sale to the island.

A total of 32 PLA aircraft and nine PLA vessels were detected around the island of Taiwan from Friday morning to Saturday morning, the defense authority on the island said in a press release on Saturday.

Some 20 of the detected aircraft, a TB-001 armed reconnaissance drone, a BZK-005 reconnaissance drone, two Su-30 fighter jets, eight J-10 fighter jets, a CH-4 armed reconnaissance drone, four JH-7 fighter bombers, a Y-8 anti-submarine warfare aircraft, a KJ-500 early warning aircraft and a Y-9 command and control aircraft, crossed the so-called median line of the Taiwan Straits or entered the island's self-proclaimed southwest, southeast and northeast air defense identification zones, it said.

According to a map illustrated to display the PLA activities, the PLA aircraft's flight paths completely encircled the island of Taiwan.

In addition, two PLA H-6J bombers flew across the Miyako Strait and entered the West Pacific waters to the east of the island of Taiwan on Friday, before returning from the same path, Japan's Ministry of Defense Joint Staff said in a press release on that day.

Japan also detected two PLA drones when they flew from the East China Sea along the east side of the island of Taiwan into the West Pacific on Friday, and their flight paths were similar to those of the TB-001 and the BZK-005 drones reported by the defense authority on the island of Taiwan on the same day, indicating that they were likely referring to the same aircraft.

Since the Chinese Defense Ministry or the PLA Eastern Theater Command did not make any announcement, the latest large-scale exercise is likely a routine one, but it featured more forces and more complex training courses, a Chinese mainland military expert who requested anonymity told the Global Times on Sunday.

Coming only a week after the previous large-scale military exercise around the island of Taiwan in a countermeasure against the island's separatist deputy regional leader Lai Ching-te's provocative "stopovers" in the US, the latest exercise again displayed the PLA's fast reaction and swiftness in launching a sudden large-scale exercise without having the outside world noticing, the expert said.

It came after the US' announcement on Wednesday of its approval of a possible $500 million sale of infrared search and track systemsfor F-16 fighter jets to the island of Taiwan.

Expressing strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition to the planned arms sale, Senior Colonel Zhang Xiaogang, a spokesperson at China's Ministry of National Defense, said in a statement on Friday that the PLA is always on high alert to resolutely defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and safeguard peace and stability in the Taiwan Straits.