Nathan Attrill
Analysing China’s military activity around Taiwan often invites a simple question: what triggered it? Analysts tend to assume that spikes in aircraft sorties, naval deployments or coast guard operations must be a reaction to something political in Taiwan, U.S. actions in the region or other international events. But a close examination of 2025 data complicates this assumption. Domestic rhythms inside China—holiday cycles, political security priorities, command availability—shape operational tempo more reliably than events in Taipei or Washington.
Put simply, the scale and persistence of Chinese military activity around Taiwan look less like signalling and more like systematic preparation for the use of force, conducted on Beijing’s own timetable. A review of military coercion data compiled throughout 2025 for ASPI’s State of the Strait—a weekly newsletter tracking Beijing’s coercion of Taiwan—highlights several striking patterns. First, true absences of Chinese military activity around Taiwan are vanishingly rare. Across the entire year, there were only two days—12 and 13 November—when no Chinese military air or maritime assets were detected around Taiwan. This underscores how deeply normalised Chinese military presence has become. Activity levels may rise or fall, but presence itself is now continuous.
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