The Loneliest Island

Foreign Affairs  |  Bonny Lin

China launched the massive "Justice Mission 2025" military exercises in late December 2025, deploying over a hundred air sorties and amphibious assault ships to almost completely encircle Taiwan. This highly provocative operation disrupted international and domestic air traffic, demonstrating Beijing's growing capability to enforce a total blockade of the democratic island.

These maneuvers capped a year of relentless gray-zone pressure, during which Chinese forces conducted daily incursions into Taiwan's air defense identification zone to systematically exhaust the island's military readiness. By normalizing such high-intensity operations, Beijing seeks to erode Taipei's defensive resolve while testing the limits of American security commitments and operational readiness in the Western Pacific. As the threat of a kinetic conflict, quarantine, or economic blockade escalates, Washington faces growing pressure to clarify its long-standing policy of strategic ambiguity and rapidly bolster regional deterrence postures alongside its Indo-Pacific allies.

Comment

The deployment of Type 075 amphibious assault ships during the Justice Mission 2025 exercises reveals a shift in Beijing's blockade mechanics. By positioning these aviation-heavy platforms off Taiwan's eastern coast, the People's Liberation Army demonstrated its ability to sever Taipei's Pacific access points. This eastern encirclement directly threatens the tactical viability of Taiwan's underground aircraft shelters at Chiashan Air Force Base. Consequently, the geographic sanctuary historically provided by the Central Mountain Range has effectively been neutralised.

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