Why is Taiwan so important to Beijing? Taiwan is home to Taiwan Semi-Conductor (TSMC), the world’s largest contract chipmaker and Beijing wants to acquire Taiwan’s semiconductor-making capability.
TAIPEI, Taiwan—The Chinese communist regime is accelerating its plans to invade Taiwan, an expert warns, as Beijing ratchets up military maneuvers against the island.
Twenty Chinese military aircraft—including four nuclear-capable H-6K bombers, 10 J-16 fighter jets, two Y-8 anti-submarine warfare aircraft, and a KJ-500 airborne early warning and control aircraft—entered Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) on March 26, according to Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense. It was the largest incursion ever reported by the ministry.
Taiwan’s ADIZ, located adjacent to the island’s territorial airspace, is an area where incoming planes must identify themselves to the island’s air traffic controller.
The incursion was the most serious incident amid a significant increase in hostility by Beijing against Taiwan since 2020. Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, reelected last January, has taken a hard line against threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), while the island has deepened its cooperation with the United States—prompting the regime to escalate its warmongering toward the island.
The CCP sees Taiwan as a part of its territory and has threatened war to bring the island into its fold. The self-ruled island is a de facto independent country with its own democratically elected government, military, constitution, and currency.
The Republic of China (ROC)—Taiwan’s official name—overthrew China’s Qing Dynasty emperor in 1911. After the ROC retreated to Taiwan upon being defeated by the CCP during the Chinese Civil War, the CCP established a communist state called the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, while Taiwan gradually transitioned to democracy. To this day, the Chinese regime has refused to recognize Taiwan’s sovereignty.
Last year, the Chinese air force flew about 380 sorties into Taiwan’s ADIZ, the highest number in a given year since 1996. So far this year, the Chinese military has been sending aircraft into the ADIZ on a near-daily basis.
The island’s coast guard on April 1 announced that Beijing has been flying unmanned drones near Taiwan’s Dongsha Island, located in the northern part of the South China Sea. The authority said it couldn’t rule out that Beijing was using the drones for reconnaissance purposes.
Alongside military actions, the regime has sharpened its rhetoric toward the island. Earlier this year, a Chinese defense spokesperson threatened war against Taiwan if it declared independence.
On March 31, Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of the hawkish state-run media Global Times, wrote on his social media that he would like to order able-bodied men to go blow up bunkers in Taiwan in the event of war.
An unnamed Chinese pilot, who flew one of the Chinese aircraft crossing into Taiwan’s ADIZ on March 29, said, “This is all ours” after being asked to leave the airspace by the pilot of a Taiwanese interceptor aircraft, according to local media, which obtained a recording of the pilot’s remark from the Facebook page “Southwest Airspace of TW.”
