Taiwan plans to incorporate lessons learned from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine into upcoming military exercises aimed at practicing fighting off a Chinese attack, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday.
Taiwan has raised its alert level since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, wary of the possibility Beijing might make a similar move, although it has reported no signs that this is about to happen.
What lessons to learn from the war in Ukraine on how the nation could defend itself if China attacked have been widely debated in Taiwan, and discussed with the US, Minister of National Defense Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正) has said.
Photo: CNA
This year’s Han Kuang military exercises would be split into two parts to be held next month and in July, the ministry said in a statement.
Next month’s events would include a tabletop exercise based on “various possible actions of the Chinese Communist Party ... to invade Taiwan, taking into account the lessons of the Russian-Ukrainian war,” the ministry said.
There will also be five days of drills with soldiers, including live-fire exercises that would take place in July, it added.
The Han Kuang exercises would focus on attacking the enemy at sea, preserving combat forces and “integrating the total force of the whole people to support military operations,” the ministry said, referring to civil defense and reservist reforms that aim to improve Taiwan’s ability to fight a war with China.
While Taiwanese officials have seen many parallels in the Ukraine war and their own situation, including having their own giant neighbor with territorial ambitions, they have also pointed to major differences.
For example, Taiwan has talked of the “natural barrier” of the Taiwan Strait, which would make China putting troops on the ground much more difficult than just crossing a land border.
South Korean K-pop girl group Blackpink are to make Kaohsiung the first stop on their Asia tour when they perform at Kaohsiung National Stadium on Oct. 18 and 19, the event organizer said yesterday. The upcoming performances will also make Blackpink the first girl group ever to perform twice at the stadium. It will be the group’s third visit to Taiwan to stage a concert. The last time Blackpink held a concert in the city was in March 2023. Their first concert in Taiwan was on March 3, 2019, at NTSU Arena (Linkou Arena). The group’s 2022-2023 “Born Pink” tour set a
CPBL players, cheerleaders and officials pose at a news conference in Taipei yesterday announcing the upcoming All-Star Game. This year’s CPBL All-Star Weekend is to be held at the Taipei Dome on July 19 and 20.
The Taiwan High Court yesterday upheld a lower court’s decision that ruled in favor of former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) regarding the legitimacy of her doctoral degree. The issue surrounding Tsai’s academic credentials was raised by former political talk show host Dennis Peng (彭文正) in a Facebook post in June 2019, when Tsai was seeking re-election. Peng has repeatedly accused Tsai of never completing her doctoral dissertation to get a doctoral degree in law from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in 1984. He subsequently filed a declaratory action charging that
The Hualien Branch of the High Court today sentenced the main suspect in the 2021 fatal derailment of the Taroko Express to 12 years and six months in jail in the second trial of the suspect for his role in Taiwan’s deadliest train crash. Lee Yi-hsiang (李義祥), the driver of a crane truck that fell onto the tracks and which the the Taiwan Railways Administration's (TRA) train crashed into in an accident that killed 49 people and injured 200, was sentenced to seven years and 10 months in the first trial by the Hualien District Court in 2022. Hoa Van Hao, a