China carried out assault drills near Taiwan on Aug. 17, with fighter jets, anti-submarine aircraft, and combat ships exercising to the southwest and southeast of the island, in what the country’s armed forces said was a response to “external interference.”
In an Aug. 17 statement, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command said the drills were “using actual troops” and that “recent U.S.–Taiwan provocations ... severely violated the peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”
