China's People's Liberation Army-Navy conducted live-fire drills in the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday as a way to “safeguard China's sovereignty and integrity,” according to Beijing's Taiwan Office Director Liu Jeyi, China Global Network reports.
“The military drill sends a message to the US that it should stop backing the separatists on the island,” said professor Li Zhenguang of Beijing Union University's Institute of Taiwan Studies.
Cross-strait relations have reached a low point, the professor noted, as a result of those in Taiwan who want “independence of the island,” Li said.
A new Taiwanese political group dubbed the Formosa Alliance was formed in early April to promote an independence referendum vote for April 2019, Japan-based Nikkei Asian Review reported.
Beijing has consistently named Taiwan as one of its most important policy priorities. But for all of the PLA's war drills in the sea and in the air, Sam Roggeveen of the Lowy Institute in Australia argued May 23, “China isn't planning to storm Taiwan's beaches.”
The primary indicator that China will not launch a Normandy-style amphibious invasion, Roggeveen argued, is that its shipyards haven't spit out enough amphibious assault vessels such as tank landing ships. “Why, in the midst of a massive modernization drive, has the PLA-Navy not built the forces to conquer Taiwan,” he asks, especially since building assault vessels…
