COLUMN-China's 'area denial' drills send message to Taiwan and well beyond

Late last month, Taiwan said dozens of warships from China's Eastern, Northern and Southern Theatre commands had begun moving around the island and in ​the Western Pacific, including towards the US territory of Guam, calling it "an obvious threat".

While prior major Chinese regional drills often came ‌with announcements, television ​footage and warnings against "Taiwan independence forces", this time Beijing said it was routine training not directed against any country. On Tuesday, Taiwan's Defence Minister Wellington Koo described Beijing's continuing actions as "area denial drills" - aimed in this case at stopping US or other allied forces from coming to Taipei's aid should Beijing attack.

The Institute for the Study of War in Washington went further: with the US distracted by the aftermath of the midterm elections and conflict in the Middle East and Ukraine, it said China appeared to be demonstrating its ability to blockade Taiwan any time it wished. Although China has never ‌renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan - which rejects its sovereignty claims - under its control, it says it would prefer "peaceful reunification".

For now, few officials or regional analysts predict any immediate direct military action by Beijing: they see China's military command chain as still recovering from the mass dismissal of generals in late 2025 and early this year. But with US President Donald Trump and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinpingexpected to meet next week on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in the Chinese city of Shenzhen, Beijing appears to be sending a clear signal of its military strength.

That show of force has an audience well beyond Taiwan, which is keen to get its message across too. Particularly over the last year, Taiwan's government has stepped up a campaign to persuade policymakers and corporate leaders in the US that Taiwan's ‌position in international supply chains makes it "indispensable" and vital to defend.

Despite repeated efforts by Washington in particular to diversify the supply of cutting-edge microchips away from Taiwan, in part to reduce the impact of any conflict, the AI boom this year has, if anything, further cemented the importance of the island and its industry. Quietly, Taipei is stepping up its relationship with other regional powers, ‌at least those concerned by Beijing's wider increasing assertiveness. On November 6, Australia's senior official in its de facto embassy in Taipei said he had met with Geological Survey and Mining Management Agency Director Hsu Ming-hong to discuss critical minerals.

In the eyes of Taiwan, Beijing's latest moves are a clear effort to intimidate Taipei's potential backers and push back against mounting cooperation between the US Indo-Pacific Command, Tokyo, the Philippines, Australia and other regional players, many of whom also now report increased Chinese encroachment towards and into territorial waters. Beijing rejects such allegations, describing its actions as defensive law-enforcement operations. It has also been infuriated by a more assertive Japanese approach under Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who has described a potential Chinese move against Taiwan as a "survival" issue for Japan and has increased military spending.

US, ALLIES STEP UP COORDINATION While conflict in the Middle East and Ukraine have dominated global headlines this year, within the Indo-Pacific region there are some fledgling preparations for the fallout of a possible conflict over ⁠Taiwan.

Planners at the US ​Indo-Pacific Command have repeatedly said that keeping Beijing deterred from a move against the island is their top ⁠priority, with a new generation of unmanned vehicles intended to create a "hellscape" China cannot cross without prohibitive casualties. Whether or not the US military would respond, though, is a decision for the US president – and Trump has repeatedly questioned why Washington should support the island. It is a shift from the "strategic ambiguity" of previous presidents and from Joe Biden, who said several times he would come to Taiwan's aid if it was attacked.

The Pentagon, however, is keeping up its planning, with each year ⁠bringing larger exercises and military deployments even against the backdrop of US entanglements elsewhere, including nervousness over supply of air defence and strike missiles. Following the meeting of the grouping known as the "Squad" in Manila late last month, the US, Australia, the Philippines and Japan agreed to establish a Combined Coordination Center, a move only announced this week and aimed at easing joint planning between those nations in the event of a fight around Taiwan.

Even without ​a direct invasion by Beijing, a deliberate Chinese naval blockade would be regionally disruptive. Officials and analysts do not expect that to happen until after Taiwan's elections in 2028 and only then if the opposition Kuomintang and its increasingly openly pro-Beijing leader Cheng Li-wun lose.

Between now and then, Taiwan sees Beijing as keen to use various measures to push for a ⁠victory for Cheng, a strategy China denies undertaking. Much depends, too, on the future trajectory of the US after its midterm elections. Across the Indo-Pacific, it is now common to be told that the US simply "lost" its trade war with Beijing last year, in which China responded to massive worldwide US "Liberation Day" tariffs primarily by restricting rare earths and other critical exports to US defence manufacturers and other industries.

Simultaneously, China has moved towards what analysts have described as a "fortress economy". This involves China positioning itself as a ⁠vital ​supplier of increasingly high-performance goods such as electric cars while minimising its dependence on vulnerable energy, resources and relationships. BUSINESSES WARGAME SUPPLY INTERRUPTIONS

Companies in Australia offer training for businesses to assess how they might maintain supply chains during such a conflict or blockade – one that could cut off Europe, Australia and other developed economies from both Chinese and Taiwanese exports as well as perhaps also those of Japan and South Korea. The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd has committed heavily to opening new plants in Germany and Arizona as part of an effort to mitigate that risk – but Taiwanese officials are still pushing the line that both the company and the island are now if anything even more "essential" to its foreign partners.

In a November 3 article in Foreign Affairs magazine, Taiwanese Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung said ⁠the fate of the island would help decide "whether it will be democracies or autocracies that set the standards and values of the new digital age". The article described Taiwan as a "force multiplier for the United States" in the growing battle for artificial intelligence dominance, describing the island's industry as having the "capability, reliability and values necessary to support United States' technological ambitions".

In the eyes of ⁠Taiwan and many in Eastern Europe, the face-offs against China and its "no-limits" partner Russia are increasingly overlapping. This month ⁠Taiwanese drone firm AerosoarX announced a cooperation agreement with Ukrainian-British UFORCE; the European firm said Taiwan was important in moving beyond Chinese-dominated supply chains. Some other Pacific powers, however, are keen to keep their distance. This year Papua New Guinea closed down its relations with Taiwan, while Taiwanese officials suspended technological cooperation with Malaysia after it committed to a stricter interpretation of Beijing's "one China" policy.

Beijing's military posturing is part of the effort to isolate Taiwan – but it can backfire. A Chinese submarine-launched ballistic missile test-fired into the South Pacific in July prompted several island nations to deepen their relations with both the ‌US and Australia. What the naval drills around Taiwan show is that ‌Beijing is intent on ratcheting up the pressure, hoping the US or others will pull back. There is still plenty to play out before this story is complete – and whatever happens, posturing or not, ​it will define the coming world at least as much as anything elsewhere.

(Editing by Philippa Fletcher)