On Monday, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command abruptly announced a joint drill code-named “Justice Mission 2025,” staging 10 hours of live-fire drills across five maritime and air zones surrounding Taiwan. On the surface, it looked like yet another rapid-fire, high-intensity military demonstration. However, what Taiwanese should pay particular attention to is not the number of shells fired, but rather Beijing showcasing how a blockade could be switched on.
What made this exercise unusual was its “cold start”: announcement one day, live fire the next. In the past, PLA drills aimed at Taiwan were typically preceded by extended political signaling and information priming, allowing outside observers to anticipate escalation.
This time, the compressed warning window was itself the message. Beijing was demonstrating that the PLA can rapidly synchronize joint forces and move straight to live-fire operations with minimal visible buildup. Such sudden announcements place direct strain on Taiwan’s mobilization timeline and complicate allied decisionmaking.
Many international observers see the drills as a political signal amplifier. Beijing needs a military response to Washington’s recent approval of major arms sales to Taiwan. At the same time, rising debate within Japan over Taiwan contingency scenarios has clearly caught China’s attention. The drill spoke simultaneously to Taipei, Tokyo and Washington to define Beijing’s comfort zone and security boundaries.
More importantly, the content of the drill went well beyond symbolic “encirclement.” According to the PLA, forces rehearsed precision strikes against maritime targets and extending into scenarios involving port blockades and “encirclement” operations.
The 10-hour live-fire window forced aviation authorities to reroute civilian air traffic, while shipping and insurance costs climbed. Without triggering full-scale war, military pressure is converted directly into economic and social costs.
Equally concerning was Beijing’s unusually open display of its anti-access and area-denial capabilities. The signal was blunt: Intervention comes at a price.
The drills were also paired with China Coast Guard “law enforcement inspections” near Taiwan’s ports and sensitive waters. The military used live fire to demarcate danger zones; the coast guard pushed forward under the banner of civilian authority. Together, they created a deliberately blurred space where drills, blockade enforcement and the prelude to war become difficult to distinguish. This is precisely the “quarantine” approach long warned about by foreign think tanks. Such low-intensity, high-continuity actions could inflict immediate economic and social shocks — and paradoxically accelerate escalation rather than contain it.
The appropriate response cannot stop at condemnation or military signaling. The real challenge lies in transforming rapid response from a purely military function into a whole-of-society capability. Airspace management, port operations, energy and supply-chain resilience, and cyber and cognitive defense must all function simultaneously. At the same time, maritime “gray zone” pressure must be reframed as an issue of international law, strengthening intelligence-sharing and joint exercises with allies, and denying Beijing the strategic dividends of ambiguity.
Taiwan’s answer must be institutionalized resilience. Predictable, sustainable preparedness — not reactive improvisation — is the only way to pull the crisis back into manageable bounds, rather than being dragged along by a script set by its adversaries
Liao Ming-hui is an assistant researcher at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research.
Translated by Lin Lee-kai
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