The army of the Asian giant ends four days of maneuvers around the island that open a new era of militarism in the region
The breeze rocks the tops of the trees and the cicadas stride, but an intermittent mechanical roar dominates both summer sounds. The sound does not come from the wild nature that surrounds Houlincun, “the town before the forest”, but from the location behind the bushes, hidden behind the fence and protected by soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army: the Longtian Air Force Base.
From here, fighter jets like those now heating up their engines have taken off in recent days to engage in unprecedented military maneuvers, with which China seeks to intimidate Taiwan into hosting Nancy Pelosi. The visit of the President of the United States House of Representatives, the most significant in a quarter of a century, has created a conflict that must be settled by arms in the short, medium or long term, but apparently without a cure.
“Yes, I heard them,” replies the employee in charge of using the school holidays to restore the school. “Our country is strong,” he adds with the last brushstrokes to the classroom that occupies him. On the wall are the faces of model citizens like the young recruit Lei Feng, half man, half propaganda, smiling in line. Faults shred the cell phone signal, beeps signaling the safety of the area. A neighbor greets the passing stranger who obliges to get permission from the local head of the Communist Party.
Images taken by satellite observation company Planet Labs prove that China has started expanding the capacity of Longtian and other bases near the Strait of Formosa since last year. Fighters billeted in these hangars would take less than seven minutes to reach the island. But for now, his mission was nothing more than an intimidating show, a simulated suffocation.
During the exercises that concluded this Sunday, the armed forces deployed air and naval forces to six positions around Taiwan, putting into effect for four days the blockade that would precede a hypothetical invasion that could be the largest amphibious assault in history. would require. China has also fired at least 11 Dongfeng ballistic missiles, which flew over the island for the first time before falling to the north, east and south of the coast.
The regime sees Taiwan as a rebellious province that has never renounced submission by force, the indecisive epilogue of the civil war between communists and nationalists; ambition that opposes the US commitment to come to their aid, reiterated this Wednesday by Pelosi. “We will not abandon you,” he declared in Taipei for President Tsai Ing-wen. That is why the area also represents – in the words of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs – “the most sensitive issue in the relationship” between the two powers, which is going through the worst moment since its creation in the 1970s, already in the field of the open confrontation.
The end of the exercises thus marks the beginning of a more military and explicit hostility in the Strait of Formosa. Taiwan announced this Sunday that it will begin its own live-fire drills next week, testing its defensive prowess. China, for its part, will start another round in the Bohai Sea and south of the Yellow Sea, aimed at repelling a theoretical counterattack from allied countries, notably the US and Japan. Not surprisingly, five of the projectiles aimed at Taiwan ended up in the waters of Japan’s exclusive economic zone, also an unprecedented move.
The sun sets over the Chinese coast overlooking the Strait of Formosa. From the breakwater, some people greet the fishing boats returning to the harbor after fishing. The skies crisscrossed by missiles in previous days darkens in peace today, but on the horizon you can still see, crouching, the relief of the Matsu Islands, one of the archipelagos under Taiwanese control closest to the mainland .
The last surprise of the day, however, is yet to come. It’s not that, before the burgundy cover of the Spanish passport, the owner of the only guest house that admits foreigners greets with a “Hello friend”. No: before the revelation that new cases of Covid have been detected this afternoon in the Beijing neighborhood where one of the newcomers lives, two thousand kilometers away, the reception panics. Ms. Zhao, who worked as a seamstress in Barcelona for eight years, is enthusiastically distributing masks everywhere and calling on authorities for instructions. China is indeed embroiled in a war, but one in which warplanes are useless.
Source: La Verdad
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