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Lawrence Chung

Taiwan will begin its annual war games on Wednesday, testing for the first time its ability to counter a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) maritime blockade in the western Pacific during the 10-day exercise.
The 42nd edition of the Han Kuang exercise, the island’s largest annual military drill, will incorporate US military planning practices to improve coordination and mission command.
It will also test the wartime relocation of weapons production lines to safer locations as Taiwan seeks to strengthen its ability to sustain military operations under attack, according to the island’s defence ministry.
The exercise comes as Beijing steps up military pressure through grey-zone operations, large-scale drills and expanded coastguard patrols around Taiwan, fuelling concerns that any future conflict could begin with a blockade rather than an immediate amphibious assault.
This year’s scenario assumes the PLA has completed preparations for an attack and begun crossing the Taiwan Strait, according to defence ministry officials.
They added that Taiwan’s armed forces would respond by raising combat readiness and conducting counter-landing operations, convoy escorts for critical supplies and joint counter-blockade missions.


For the first time, the Taiwanese navy and coastguard will jointly rehearse maritime law enforcement, coastal strike operations and the protection of critical supply shipments under a peacetime-to-wartime transition framework.
“The navy and coastguard will conduct cargo transfer and convoy escort operations in the western Pacific,” said Major General Lu Wen-yuan, director of the ministry’s joint operations division, at a briefing on July 28.
Analysts said the new counter-blockade mission reflected growing concern that Beijing could seek to sever Taiwan’s maritime supply routes during the opening stages of a conflict.
Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China and has not ruled out the use of force to achieve reunification.
Most countries – including the United States, Taiwan’s main international backer – do not recognise the self-ruled island as an independent state. However, Washington is opposed to any attempt to take it by force.
This year, Taiwan’s military has introduced reforms inspired by recent conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East as well as closer exchanges with the United States.
Among the changes is the adoption of the US military’s “back brief” practice, in which subordinate commanders explain their understanding of assigned missions to senior officers to ensure both sides share the same operational intent before execution, according to officials.
Another new feature is a simulated wartime dispersal of defence production.
Under the scenario, the Armaments Bureau’s 202nd Arsenal in Taipei will relocate manufacturing capacity to safer locations while mobilising civilian factories to maintain production if key defence facilities come under attack, according to Lu.
Reserve mobilisation has also been expanded.
Lu said that two brigade-level reserve formations – the Taipei Reserve Brigade and the army’s 137th Infantry Brigade in southern Taiwan – would be mobilised simultaneously, involving about 5,000 reservists undergoing the military’s new 14-day training programme.
The 137th Infantry Brigade has been equipped with US-supplied M4A1 assault rifles, replacing the locally produced T65K2 rifles previously used by reservists, according to ministry officials.




Taiwan’s army has confirmed that Han Kuang will incorporate the Tamkang Bridge, which opened in May and spans the mouth of the Tamsui River, into its operational planning for the first time.
Unlike previous exercises centred on the nearby Guandu Bridge, this year’s drills will test defensive blockades at Tamkang Bridge, including minefields, physical barriers and designated fire zones, to prevent the adversary from exploiting the crossing after landing at Bali Beach or seizing the Port of Taipei.
Taiwan will also conduct its Urban Resilience (All-out Defence Mobilisation) Exercise, expanded from one day to two and integrated with the Han Kuang exercise under a common wartime scenario.
Officials said the drill would test coordination between the armed forces and local governments through mass evacuations, casualty evacuation, underground hospital operations, cross-county emergency support, joint transport and drone delivery of medical and relief supplies.
Authorities will also deliberately throttle mobile data services across 14 cities and counties during air raid drills, affecting an estimated 17 million people – about 73 per cent of Taiwan’s population – to test emergency communications under degraded network conditions.
Ahead of the exercise, Admiral Mei Chia-shu, chief of the general staff of Taiwan’s armed forces, said the military must prepare for every stage of conflict, from grey-zone coercion to sustained combat operations.
“The real deterrent is no longer symbolic weapons, but the capability and resilience to sustain combat,” Mei said, adding that the military was integrating artificial intelligence, modern command-and-control systems, improved logistics and civilian infrastructure into a more resilient defence framework.
Su Tzu-yun, a senior analyst at the government-funded Institute for National Defence and Security Research, said incorporating Tamkang Bridge reflected the military’s efforts to adapt its defensive planning following the bridge’s completion.
“The bridge itself is already an obstacle,” he said. “Properly prepared, it could significantly delay or even prevent enemy forces from advancing up the Tamsui River towards Taipei.”
Shen Ming-shih, a research fellow at the institute, said the expanded urban resilience exercise reflected lessons from Ukraine, where local governments and emergency services had become indispensable following Russian missile and drone attacks.
“The military cannot respond to everything on its own,” Shen said. “If conflict occurs, local governments, police, firefighters, hospitals and civil defence organisations will all become part of Taiwan’s overall defence effort.”
Analysts said this year’s Han Kuang placed greater emphasis on endurance, logistics and military-civilian coordination, capabilities they said would be vital if Beijing tried to isolate Taiwan before launching a broader military campaign.


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Taipei to move weapons production, prepare for internet outages and adopt US ‘back briefs’ during Han Kuang drills


Taipei to move weapons production, prepare for internet outages and adopt US ‘back briefs’ during Han Kuang drills.


How Taiwan is preparing for a PLA sea blockade in its biggest war games

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Taipei to move weapons production, prepare for internet outages and adopt US ‘back briefs’ during Han Kuang drills

Taipei to move weapons production, prepare for internet outages and adopt US ‘back briefs’ during Han Kuang drills