China insisted on Monday it would never renounce the "use of force" to take control of Taiwan, after ending a day of military drills around the self-ruled island that Beijing said was a "stern warning" to "separatist" forces.

Beijing, which claims Taiwan as part of its own territory, deployed fighter jets, drones, warships and coast guard vessels to encircle the island in its fourth round of large-scale war games in just over two years.

The United States said China's actions were "unwarranted" and risked "escalation" as it called on Beijing to act with restraint.

China declared the drills over at around 6:00 pm (1000 GMT), about 13 hours after they had begun.

"We sincerely strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification, but we will never promise to renounce the use of force and will not leave any space for 'Taiwan independence'," Ministry of National Defence spokesperson Wu Qian said soon after.

The exercises, dubbed Joint Sword-2024B, "fully tested the integrated joint operation capabilities of its troops", military spokesperson Captain Li Xi said in a statement.

President Lai Ching-te, who took office in May, has been more outspoken than his predecessor Tsai Ing-wen in defending Taiwan's sovereignty, angering Beijing, which calls him a "separatist".

Lai vowed on Monday to "protect democratic Taiwan and safeguard national security", while the defence ministry said it had dispatched "appropriate forces" in response to the drills.

Taiwan detected 125 Chinese aircraft, including fighter jets and drones from early morning to late afternoon, a defence ministry official said, describing it as a record for a single day. Seventeen warships were also spotted.

Outlying islands administered by Taipei had been put on "heightened alert", Taiwan's defence ministry said.

Beijing said its exercises served as a "stern warning to the separatist acts of 'Taiwan Independence' forces".

The drills took place in "areas to the north, south and east of Taiwan Island", Li said earlier.

Their aim was to focus "on subjects of sea-air combat-readiness patrol, blockade on key ports and areas", Li said.

The previous large-scale drills held in May, three days after Lai's inauguration, were called "Joint Sword-2024A" and lasted two days.

– China coast guard 'inspections' –

China's coast guard was also sent to conduct "inspections", with a diagram released by the coast guard showing four fleets encircling Taiwan and moving anti-clockwise around the island.

The coast guard of the eastern province of Fujian — the closest area on the mainland to Taiwan — also said it conducted "comprehensive law enforcement patrols" in waters near the Taipei-controlled Matsu islands.

Taiwan said four "formations" of China coast guard ships had patrolled the island and briefly entered its restricted waters, but not its prohibited waters.

China has ramped up military activity around Taiwan in recent years, sending warplanes and other military aircraft while its ships maintain a near-constant presence around the island's waters.

"In the face of enemy threats, all officers and soldiers of the country are in full readiness," Taiwan's defence ministry said on Monday.

Lai convened a high-level security meeting over the drills, said Joseph Wu, secretary-general of the National Security Council, who described the exercises as "inconsistent with international law".

He vowed in his National Day speech on Thursday to "resist annexation" and insisted that Beijing and Taipei were "not subordinate to each other".

Lai's Democratic Progressive Party has long defended the sovereignty and democracy of Taiwan, which has its own government, military and currency.

– 'Feel a bit numb' –

Lieutenant Colonel Fu Zhengnan, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Military Sciences, said in a video shared by state media that the drills could "switch from training to combat at any time".

"If Taiwan separatists provoke once, the PLA's operation around the island will make their first move," Fu said, referring to China's People's Liberation Army.

Taiwan's coast guard said on Monday it had detained a Chinese man on one of its outlying islands after a possible "grey zone intrusion", referring to tactics that fall short of a direct act of war.

In Taipei, people appeared to be largely unperturbed.

"I won't panic too much because they quite often have drills," 34-year-old engineer Benjamin Hsiao told AFP.

"It's not the first time in recent years anyway, so I feel a bit numb."

And in Pingtan, mainland China's closest point to Taiwan's main island, one local said she hoped "we can live peacefully".

"I don't believe there will be a war, China is strong enough to prevent it now," Hu Fengping, a restaurant owner, told AFP.

The dispute between China and Taiwan dates back to a civil war in which the nationalist forces of Chiang Kai-shek were defeated by Mao Zedong's communist fighters and fled to the island in 1949.

China and Taiwan have been ruled separately since then.

China's shows of force against Taiwan
Beijing (AFP) Oct 14, 2024 –

China launched military drills around Taiwan on Monday, sending jets and warships in a "warning" to "separatists" on the self-ruled island.

It is the latest show of force by Beijing, which sees Taiwan as its territory and vows to take it back by force if necessary.

AFP takes a look at China's increasing efforts at military intimidation around Taiwan in recent years:

– Warplane incursions –

China has ramped up warplane flights into Taiwan's so-called Air Defence Identification Zone since the 2016 election of former president Tsai Ing-wen, who considers the island "already independent".

Taipei said in April 2023 it had detected the long-range TB-001 Chinese combat drone and 37 other Chinese aircraft circling Taiwan.

Local media said it was the first time Taiwan's defence ministry had reported a Chinese military aircraft circling the island from one end of the Taiwan Strait's median line, which China does not recognise, to the other.

Beijing now deploys planes and naval vessels around Taiwan on a near-daily basis, with Taipei authorities detecting as many as 43 Chinese military aircraft around the island over a 24-hour period last month.

– Pelosi backlash –

Beijing unleashed its largest military exercises around Taiwan in August 2022, after then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi enraged China's Communist Party government by visiting the island.

The drills ran for at least five days and involved what Beijing called a "conventional missile firepower assault" in waters to the east of Taiwan.

They were followed by more drills that month after another delegation of US lawmakers visited Taipei.

A record 446 warplanes entered Taiwan's air defence zone that month, according to Taipei's defence ministry.

Just a month later Taiwanese forces shot down a drone for the first time on tiny Shiyu Islet, which lies between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan's Kinmen islands.

China went on to deploy 71 warplanes in military exercises around Christmas that year, which the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) said were a "strike drill" responding to unspecified "provocations" and "collusion" between the United States and Taiwan.

– Simulated blockade –

Cross-strait tensions spiked again in April 2023, when China held three days of military drills after a meeting between Tsai and Pelosi's successor Kevin McCarthy.

The war games saw Beijing simulate targeted strikes on Taiwan and encirclement of the island, including "sealing" it off. Chinese state media reported dozens of planes had practised an "aerial blockade".

One of China's two aircraft carriers, the Shandong, also participated in the exercises.

The drills were followed by a rocket launch from northwest China that Taiwan authorities said had sent debris falling into the sea north of the island.

In August, a stopover in the United States by then-vice president Lai Ching-te drew Beijing's ire, with the PLA holding new war games intended to serve as a "stern warning to the collusion of 'Taiwan independence separatists' with foreign elements".

– 'Strong punishment' –

Taiwan's defence ministry began regularly detecting Chinese balloons drifting around Taiwan last December, ahead of the island's presidential elections in January.

Taipei initially described the objects as weather balloons but later blasted them as threats to aviation safety.

A record eight Chinese balloons were detected over a 24-hour period in February, with five flying directly over Taiwan.

Tsai's right-hand man Lai was elected president in January in a contest overshadowed by fears of military threats from Beijing.

Following his inauguration in May, Beijing announced two days of drills as a "strong punishment for the separatist acts of 'Taiwan independence' forces".

And in July, Taipei said Beijing had sent 66 Chinese military aircraft in a 24-hour window — the record so far this year.

And this time it is a National Day speech by Lai in which he vowed to "resist annexation" that has sparked Beijing's ire, which has sent fighter jets and warships around the island in a fresh show of force.

Beijing on Monday said the drills were "a legitimate and necessary operation for safeguarding state sovereignty and national unity".