Amid extreme military tension in the Taiwan Strait, Taiwan is set to begin its annual Han Kuang joint military exercise on the 5th, simulating a potential invasion by Chinese forces.

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Taiwan's Han Kuang No. 41 exercise, conducted last year. This year's Han Kuang No. 42 exercise is scheduled to begin on the 5th. / Global Times

According to Beijing sources familiar with cross-strait matters on the 4th, Taiwan's military is expected to conduct a nine-night, 10-day outdoor maneuver exercise as part of the annual "Han Kuang No. 42" drills, held in preparation for a potential invasion by Chinese forces. In particular, this year's exercise is expected to run 24 hours continuously without a pre-set script, deepening decentralized command and mission execution while focusing on responding to gray-zone threats, testing new rules of engagement, repelling joint amphibious landings, and honing capabilities for sustained, long-term defense.

According to the sources, Taiwan's military has, since the Han Kuang No. 39 exercise in 2023, moved away from simple firepower demonstrations and routine, showcase-style drills toward greater emphasis on systematic innovation and training. This year's exercise is also expected to implement a procedure similar in concept to the U.S. military's "backbrief," in which a subordinate who receives an order or operational instruction from a superior summarizes and reports it back in their own words to reduce mistakes caused by miscommunication during operations. Adopting this procedure is expected to improve Taiwanese service members' ability to coordinate simultaneous operations on the modern digital battlefield.

An exercise to blockade the Tamsui River waterway — a likely infiltration route for a so-called "decapitation strike" by Chinese forces — is also expected to begin the day after the main exercise starts, at 8 p.m. on the 6th. This drill is set to mobilize around 20,000 reservists, including those from the Army's Taipei City Reserve Brigade and reservists attached to the 137th Infantry Brigade.

For the first time in this year's Han Kuang exercise, the Lai Ching-te government has allowed civilian media to accompany frontline units and observe their mission execution — a move seen as an effort to test how wartime media coverage would be handled.

The Han Kuang exercise is widely known as an annual military drill held since 1984, in which Taiwan's military tests its ability to repel and defend against a potential armed invasion by Chinese forces. It is also notable for having been suspended only once, continuing even during periods when the Kuomintang, which maintained relatively good relations with China, held power.

Related to this, Taiwan's defense chief, Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo, unusually disclosed the fact of U.S. military support for the exercise — something Taiwan has never officially confirmed before. The remark appears to be a deliberate message aimed at China, signaling that ties between Taiwan and the U.S. remain extremely strong.

According to the sources, Koo told a small group of reporters on the 31st of last month that military cooperation between Taiwan and the U.S. is far closer than people imagine. He added that what the public sees is only arms sales, but that in reality, cooperation spans many areas and involves far more than that, saying Taiwan is learning a great deal of real combat experience from the U.S. through military exchanges — remarks likely to provoke a strong reaction from Beijing.

                                                                                                         Hong Soon-do