Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to military base puts concern over US intervention in Taiwan conflict in spotlight

Military analysts said Beijing is trying to prepare for the possibility that the US and possibly Japan would intervene in a cross-strait conflict
Xi warned the PLA that the country is facing an ‘increasingly unstable and uncertain’ security outlook

China’s military

Minnie Chan

Published: 6:38pm, 8 Jul 2023

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Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent visit to the Eastern Theatre Command, which oversees the Taiwan Strait, highlights Beijing’s concerns that the United States and Japan would intervene in the event of an attack on the island, analysts have said.

Xi, who also chairs the Central Military Commission, praised the command’s “significant contribution” to safeguarding China’s territory sovereignty and national unity when visiting headquarters of the command in Nanjing, a city in the eastern province of Jiangsu on Thursday.

He also urged People’s Liberation Army commanders to stay alert to potential risks, warning that the county’s security situation was “increasingly unstable and uncertain” as the world entered “a new period of turmoil and transformation”.

Ni Lexiong, a professor at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law, said Xi’s trip had come less than one week after a US congressional delegation led by Mike Rogers, chairman of the House armed services committee, made a three-day visit to Taiwan.

Their visit also came days after the armed services committees of both the House and Senate approved the 2024 US National Defence Authorisation Act, which calls for joint military exercises with Taiwan and comprehensive training of the island’s forces.

“The congressional group’s Taiwan visit is putting more pressure on Beijing and reminding Xi that Washington is escalating military intervention in a possible Taiwan war endorsed by the NDAA,” Ni said.

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“Xi senses strong danger as the US has also learned from the ongoing Ukraine war to be prepared for both short-term and long-term war, and more ammunition and heavy weapon systems are likely to be deployed to Taiwan.”

The Eastern Theatre Command carries out regular combat readiness drills in the Taiwan Strait and has played a central role in multiple live-fire drills encircling Taiwan in recent months.

“This is Xi’s first inspection tour to the command since former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taipei last August, causing theatre troops to stage unprecedented drills as response,” said Zhou Chenming, a researcher with Yuan Wang, a Beijing-based military science and technology think tank.

Beijing saw the visit as a major breach of its sovereignty and it triggered a series of unprecedented exercises, including an effective blockade of the island and missile tests that also covered the southwest Bashi Channel and waters to the east of Taiwan – both routes that foreign warships might use if trying to intervene in any cross-strait conflict.

“Xi hopes that as the frontline theatre and major fighting force in an event of a war over Taiwan, commanders and soldiers in the Eastern Theatre Command will concentrate on combat-ready training and not be disrupted by other noise,” Zhou said.

Lu Li-shih, a former instructor at Taiwan’s Naval Academy in Kaohsiung, said Xi’s remarks were designed to send a “strong warning” to Taiwan.

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Beijing regards the island as a breakaway province and has never renounced the use of force to bring it under its control.

Next year’s presidential elections in Taiwan are a further cause for concern in Beijing as vice-president William Lai Ching-te, from the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, is the current front runner.

Lai recently pledged to “support the cross-strait status quo” in what was seen as an attempt to reassure both Washington and Beijing.

“The significance of [Xi’s recent tour] is similar to his inspection trip in February of 2021 to the Guiyang Neizhuang troop base in Guizhou province in the aftermath of an intense underwater military confrontation between the PLA and its US counterparts near Taipei-controlled Pratas Island,” Lu said.

In May China disclosed for the first time that the incident on January 5, 2021 had prompted the US Navy to destroy its own floating sonars to prevent them from falling into the PLA’s hands.

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Days later General Mark Milley, head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, made an unusual phone call to Beijing in an attempt to dispel fears the US was planning to attack China – although it is not clear whether the two incidents were linked.

“Xi is very clear that once a war takes place, the command needs to fight the US and Japanese militaries, so they should always maintain high vigilance and prepare for the worst at any time,” former PLA instructor Song Zhongping said.

Like most countries, the US does not recognise Taiwan as independent, but it has remained a strong supporter of the island and opposes any forcible change in the status quo.