It’s the dénouement of another set of massive drills designed to intimidate the Republic of China and its allies.
A news page of the U.S. Naval Institute gives Japan-relayed details of the movements of several ships of the “People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN)…returning to the East China Sea via the Miyako Strait—a 155-mile-wide passageway between Okinawa and Miyako Island (“Chinese Wrap Drills Around Taiwan, PLA Officials Vow to Never Stop Fighting Taiwan’s Independence,” USNI News, December 13, 2024).
The PLAN ships sighted on Thursday likely are returning from drills conducted around Taiwan since Monday. China’s Ministry of National Defense spokesperson Snr. Col Wu Qian in a Friday press conference was asked about the drills but did not give a direct answer. He stated that it is the PLA’s sacred mission to protect national sovereignty and territorial integrity, safeguard the fundamental interests of the Chinese nation, and defend the shared interests of compatriots on both sides of the Strait. Wu quoted Chinese strategist Sun Tzu, “As water has no constant form, there are in warfare no constant conditions.” He also vowed that whether there is military exercise or not, the PLA will never be absent in fighting Taiwan independence” and promoting national reunification. “Any attempt to split the nation through soliciting external support or resorting to force will be punished, and will never succeed”, warned the PLA spokesperson.
When representatives of China declare that Taiwan will never be politically separated from the mainland, the implication is that the PRC and the ROC are not already separate. They are already separate.
Sun Tzu must say something in The Art of War about the inutility of pretending that circumstances are other than they are. However, Sun Tzu also says “All warfare is based on deception,” and perhaps the Chinese Communist Party has decided that infinite repetition of this silly fabrication is strategically sound.
These are the ships, or some of them, that Japan tracked on part of their way back to China: CNS Liaocheng, CNS Xiaogan, CNS Suzhou, CNS Shaoxing, CNS Zhoushan, CNS Xuzhou, CNS Hebi, CNS Kaiyangxing.
Japan also tracked Russian ships as they concluded “a deployment to the Asia Pacific that began on Oct. 5.”
