Recently, the Taiwan Strait has made a comeback! The U.S.-led RIMPAC 2024 military exercise and Taiwan's largest annual Han Kuang-40 military exercise.
One of them is menacing and the other is terrified, what message does each convey, and what deep strategic intentions do they reflect? Today we're going to break it down.
RIMPAC Military Exercise: American-style "Muscle Show"
First of all, let's talk about the "Rim of the Pacific 2024" multinational joint maritime exercise, which is led by the United States and claims to be the world's largest.
This luxury lineup, which began in 1971 and is once every two years, is back to brush up on its presence. This year, they found 29 countries and territories, and gathered 43 ships, more than 150 planes and more than 25,000 people near Hawaii.
It was a pompous "big party", which not only gained momentum, but also planned to "sink" a decommissioned 40,000-ton Tarawa amphibious assault ship with anti-ship weapons.
To put it bluntly, they are ready to use this "quasi-aircraft carrier" target ship to show off their firepower and show China their determination and strength.
However, in recent years, we have seen the real thinking behind these "muscle shows" several times. In fact, the RIMPAC military exercise is nothing more than a joint campaign by the US military and its allies, trying to create military deterrence through scale and momentum, in a vain attempt to introduce foreign forces into the Indo-Pacific region and promote the "Indo-Pacific of NATO".
In this way, it will put pressure on China and wage psychological warfare in the East China Sea, the South China Sea, and the Taiwan Strait. It is a pity that this little trick of the US side is transparent to China, and China has long made it clear that "military exercises cannot scare us".
This time, the game between China and the United States will continue, but it will just change the stage. The United States is conducting exercises in Hawaii, and the mainland People's Liberation Army (PLA) has been conducting exercises in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait in recent days, and the Shandong warship has directly approached 200 nautical miles west of Luzon Island in the Philippines, which is full of deterrence.
Han Kuang exercises: Taiwan's "desire to survive"
Looking at Taiwan's "Han Kuang 40" live military exercise, this time from July 22 to 26, Taiwan's military has prepared a new "big show", it intends to cancel most of the display subjects, no rehearsal, no script, the original soldiers will return to their original positions, and more emphasis will be placed on practicing night operations and decentralized command and control.
To put it bluntly, what does "decentralized finger tube" mean? It is the interference of the other side's electronics and networks, which makes it impossible for the Taiwan military to communicate normally, and each unit can only enter a state of fighting its own battles.
The arrangement of this exercise also specially set up a number of air defense and anti-airplane landing drills to simulate the tense atmosphere of large soldiers pressing the border and being attacked in various places, and finally it will even turn into a full-scale street battle in towns and towns.
The so-called "one soldier fights to the end" is completely an extreme war of attrition strategy and porcupine tactics. Obviously, this style of play is inspired by the US military, and the US Indo-Pacific Commander Paparo has mentioned that turning the Taiwan Strait into a "no man's hell" will largely offset the strength and war potential of the PLA.
However, judging from the comparison of military strength between the two sides of the strait, the actual results of this set of tactics of the Taiwan military may be much worse than expected.
The palace temple into an ammunition depot? The worries of the Taiwanese people!
In addition to the above-mentioned public exercise arrangements, there is also an even more disturbing news recently -- a number of palaces and temples in Miaoli County, Taiwan, have received official documents from the Taiwan military on ammunition advances.
These local religious sites have been required to sign an "agreement on the support of ammunition pre-cantonment sites," and the Taiwan military has prepared to transport ammunition to the open space of the palace and temple for temporary storage before the war.
The choice of temporary hoarding sites has terrified local residents. These munitions are stored nearby, and there are many people entering and exiting those places, and there are often activities such as setting off firecrackers and burning gold paper, which can lead to accidental detonation. So, who is to blame for these risks?
Residents of Miaoli County are unhappy with this, and some people think that this is a "stupid policy", after all, the ammunition placement point should be highly classified, how can it be selected in an obvious location?
What's more, this arrangement shows that the Taiwan army is preparing to fight street battles, is it preparing to fight a protracted war and destroy the city in fierce battles? At present, the Taiwan military has not responded to these questions, which has only intensified the people's uneasiness and indignation.
The Sorrow of Taiwan Independence: Being Used and Abandoned!
Generally speaking, the two current military exercises, one far from the Taiwan Strait and one tense rehearsal of actual combat, are implicit in the conspiracy of the United States and the West to "use Taiwan to contain China."
The purpose of the United States in selling weapons and supporting military exercises is to instigate Taiwan to provoke the mainland and drag the Chinese on both sides of the strait into internal attrition.
The saddest of these is undoubtedly the DPP authorities, who may still naively think that they are "important pawns," but they do not know that they will become "outcasts."
The Taiwan region under the leadership of Lai Ching-te is still running wild on the dead end of "Taiwan independence," but the mainland has not yet given up its last tolerance.
For example, so far Lai Qingde and Tsai Ing-wen have not been officially included in the list of "Taiwan independence diehards," and the mainland has also adopted a relatively relaxed attitude toward those who have changed their stance and are willing to give up "Taiwan independence."
However, if Lai Qingde and his team do not rein in and take an extreme line, then the mainland's methods will no longer be gentle, and wanted, tried in absentia, and even the maximum death penalty are all possible endings.
Regarding the recent tensions, the remarks of Lu Shaye, the Chinese ambassador to France, have also sparked a lot of discussion.
At a symposium on the 60 th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and France, he pointed out that Taiwan has never been a country, but a part of China.
He bluntly said that "the regime on Taiwan is a rebel regime, and the Chinese government has the right to expel this regime at any time and take back the right to govern." These remarks were interpreted by foreign media as a signal that Chinese mainland may use force at any time, causing people in the green camp on the island to be even more panicked.
In the face of this situation, Lai Qingde's reaction was to frantically reorganize the island's armaments, not only to carry out a comprehensive anti-landing and anti-"decapitation" exercise, but also to ask the United States for help, trying to flee Taiwan at a critical moment, first to Japan or the Philippines, and then to the United States?
However, the United States is facing many internal and external difficulties, and it is difficult to expect them to come to their aid at a critical moment. The funniest thing is that Trump, who was convicted by the court, and Biden, who has "health risks", the TV debate between the two is simply wonderful!
So much so that the US media directly called on Biden to withdraw from the election, I have to say that this is a rare and rare thing in the world, and it is also a huge sorrow for the United States!
What the DPP authorities and the people of Taiwan need to understand is, is such a United States really reliable? Stop kidding yourself! Any illusion of escapism from reality will eventually be shattered, and the peaceful reunification of the two sides of the strait is the most promising and feasible solution.
Militarily and politically, the mighty Chinese mainland is ready to meet a variety of challenges. If Taiwan does not come to its senses, it may end up with more turmoil and unrest.