Taiwan is beefing up its military exercises to counter China

The annual Han Kuang exercises are Taiwan’s biggest military drills, focused on countering Chinese invasion. They have also been criticised as being largely a public-relations exercise. In the past Taiwanese special forces and marines would don red hats that marked them as Chinese invaders, then act out attempted beach landings or airport takeovers. Announcers would narrate how Taiwan’s armed forces had repelled them live on television, as the president watched in approval. It was a good show, but poor practice for war. Last year a woman was filmed sunbathing in a bikini on the same beach where Taiwan’s army and navy were enacting a Chinese amphibious landing.

This year was meant to be different. Last month Wellington Koo, the defence minister, and Mei Chia-shu, chief of the general staff, announced that the exercises, which were due to take place from July 22nd to 26th, would be unscripted. The flashy firepower displays usually performed for president and press would be cancelled. So would the role-playing segment. Instead of acting as imaginary enemies, the special forces would “return to their original roles” of practising defending Taiwan, said Mr Mei. For a change, soldiers would respond to surprise scenarios.

The changes to the Han Kuang exercises come on the back of increasing pressure from China, which has condemned Lai Ching-te, Taiwan’s new president, as a “separatist”. China is also ramping up its grey-zone pressures (aggression that falls short of acts of war) in the Taiwan Strait. Meanwhile, Donald Trump, America’s Republican candidate for president, has suggested that he might not defend Taiwan if China attacked it.

All this means that public morale is also low. Polls suggest that nearly half of the Taiwanese have no confidence in their armed forces’ capacity to protect them from Chinese invasion. Taiwanese volunteers returning from the battlefield in Ukraine have criticised their own country’s military training as inept.

Mr Koo is trying to change this. He headed Taiwan’s national security council under the former president, Tsai Ing-wen. She had launched an overhaul of Taiwan’s defences: extending conscription, nearly doubling Taiwan’s defence budget, expanding domestic arms production and increasing training with America. Since becoming defence minister in May, Mr Koo has reduced the ceremonial aspects of Taiwan’s military training.

Even so, an incoming typhoon led to most of the exercises being cancelled this year, and the event being called off a day early. Mr Lai still supervised some disaster-relief drills. And some live-fire scenarios still took place on outlying islands, with narrators encouraging viewers sheltering from the typhoon at home to tune in. “Every drop of sweat in these exercises is a badge of honour for defending the homeland,” one said. Han Kuang may be less scripted. But it is still a show. ■