The people's liberation army air force
aircraft came in two waves the defense
ministry said 25 PLA warplanes entered
the southwestern corner of the air
defense identification zone (ADIZ) during
daylight hours and another 13 planes
entered the island's southwest adiz on
friday night, the ministry said in a
statement.
While the chinese planes in the
afternoon sortie stayed in the extreme
southwestern part of the ADIZ the planes
involved in the evening flight flew
through the defense zone and hooked up
toward the northeast before reversing
course and returning to the chinese
mainland, the defense ministry said.
The 25 planes involved in the daylight
incursion included 18 J-16 fighters, four Su-30 fighters, two H-6 bombers and one Y-8 anti-submarine warfare aircraft. According to the defense ministry the later flight included 10 J-16s, two H-6s and one KJ-500 airborne early
warning aircraft. It added, the incursions did not violate taiwan's
sovereign airspace which extends 12
nautical miles from its coast.
The u.s
federal aviation administration defines
an ADIZ as a designated area of airspace
over land or water within which a
country requires the immediate and
positive identification, location and
traffic control of aircraft in the
interest of the country's national
security. The previous single day record for PLA flights into taiwan's adiz was in june
when 28 chinese military planes entered.
The incursions on friday came as beijing
celebrates 72 years since the founding
of the people's republic of china in
1949. A chinese J-16 multi-role strike fighter
for the people's liberation army air
force is shown at the 13th china
international aviation and aerospace
exhibition in Zhuhai on september 28th. This is how the PLA chooses to celebrate
its national day, military coercion.
Drew Thompson a former u.s defense
department official and a visiting
senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew school of public policy at the
national university of singapore posted
on twitter people's liberation army air force
sorties are pretty routine at this point
but stepping up bomber flights on a
major PRC people's republic of china. Holliday underscores that this is
political warfare and part of a massive
coercion campaign, thompson told CNN.
Chinese president Xi Jinping has refused
to rule out military force to capture
taiwan if necessary. In the past analysts have said the PLA's
flights likely serve several purposes
for china. Both demonstrating the
strength of the PLA to a domestic
audience and giving the chinese military
intelligence and skills it would need in
any potential conflict involving taiwan.
Xi Jinping has instructed the PLA to
heighten its readiness and prepare for
warfighting under realistic fighting
conditions. Hence it is relatively unsurprising that
the PLA continues to fly into taiwan's ADIZ as part of realistic training and
preparation for armed conflict.
Derrick Grossman a senior defense analyst at the
rand corporation policy think tank told CNN on saturday, Taiwan and mainland china have been
governed separately since the end of a
civil war more than seven decades ago in
which the defeated nationalists fled to
taipei.
However beijing views taiwan as an
inseparable part of its territory even
though the chinese communist party has
never governed the democratic island of
about 24 million people. Taiwan's ministry of foreign affairs
reiterated that point last week after
beijing sent a total of 24 warplanes
into the island's ADIZ in a single day. Taiwan is taiwan and it is not part of
the people's republic of china. The
people's republic of china has never
ruled taiwan for a single day,
A statement from taiwan's ministry of
foreign affairs said this past thursday china's taiwan
affairs office issued a statement and
criticized taiwan's foreign minister Joseph Wu for frantically making taiwan
independent speeches on the
international stage. Taiwan is an inalienable part of chinese
territory and has never been a country.
The statement said we are telling Joseph Wu and his likes that unification is the
right way in taiwan independence is a
dead end. Following the trend of national
rejuvenation and unification various
taiwan independence forces are like
grasshoppers after autumn. All types of
taiwan independent speeches are nothing
but flies buzzing around, it said.
In response taiwan's mainland affairs
council fired back and accused beijing
of using extremely despicable language
to slander and abuse its foreign
minister
and on saturday wooh himself responded
on twitter and one october wasn't a good
day. The people's liberation army air
force flew 38 warplanes into taiwan's ADIZ making it the largest number of
daily sorties on record. Threatening? of course
it's strange the PRC doesn't bother
faking excuses anymore. We tweeted on
taiwan's foreign ministry account.
Despite the increase in pla flights and
the harsh rhetoric from taiwan grossman
the rand analyst doesn't think combat is
imminent. I don't think there is a high
or even medium probability of a chinese
attack or invasion of taiwan, he told CNN. The PLA still has many vulnerabilities
especially when faced with a
near-certain intervention of the united
states with possibly probably. Japanese and australian support. He added, china understands the severe downsides
of a failed attack or invasion of taiwan
and will probably continue to bite its
time.
