DEFENSE/PLA exercises meant to show strength amid military purges: NSB chief

Taipei, April 9 (CNA) China's latest round of military exercises near Taiwan at the beginning of April was intended to show it could organize large-scale drills despite an ongoing military purge, Taiwan's top intelligence chief said Wednesday.

At a legislative hearing, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) was asked by lawmakers about the significance of the latest People's Liberation Army (PLA) drills held near Taiwan on April 1 and 2.

Tsai said the NSB believed they were held as a countermeasure to the United States Department of Defense's renewed focus on the Indo-Pacific region with the aim of suppressing China.

That was clear, Tsai said, from the timing of the exercises, which were launched right after U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth concluded a trip to Hawaii, Guam, the Philippines, and Japan in late March.

Aside from targeting Washington, however, the two-day military exercises were also meant for domestic consumption amid recent reports of arrests of high-ranking PLA officials.

Tsai did not name the arrested PLA officials, but media reports say they include Central Military Commission Vice Chairman He Weidong (何衛東) and PLA Eastern Theater Command Commander Lin Xiangyang (林向陽), both of whom were seen as loyal to Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平).

The drills were meant to force the PLA to focus on military exercises instead of the ongoing military purge, in which top generals were arrested amid a power struggle and/or corruption allegations, according to Tsai.

Also, the drills showed the world that China was capable of launching large-scale exercises despite the ongoing purge, he said.

At the hearing, ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmaker Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城) also asked Tsai about the nature of the drills and why they did not have a name before they began.

Tsai described the two-day PLA exercises as a series of routine small-scale drills combined into one joint exercise. He acknowledged that it was "quite rare" to see Beijing name its military exercises not on their first day but on their second day.

The PLA's Eastern Theater Command announced on April 1 the beginning of joint exercises around Taiwan, as "a stern warning" to "Taiwan independence" separatist forces.

The next morning, the command, which has jurisdiction over the East China Sea and Taiwan Strait, further announced that it was conducting a "Strait Thunder-2025A" drill in parts of the Taiwan Strait before announcing the conclusion of the two-day joint combat exercises hours later.

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