Taiwan's Taichung city stages drill to rehearse response to hypothetical PRC military offensive
Where?
When?
Apr 13, 2023What’s new?
The municipality of Taichung, Taiwan, staged a safety drill on April 13 to rehearse disaster relief during wartime. Over 1,000 civil servants and first responders were mobilized to respond to hypothetical war scenarios, including airstrikes, chemical attacks, and telecommunication outages. Referring to the latest bout of tensions in the Taiwan Strait, Lu Shiow-yen, Taichung's Kuomintang mayor and the chief organizer of this exercise, said the drill is meant to show to the world the city's "determination to defend the country and civilians" from a People's Liberation Army offensive.
Why does it matter?
Since 2015, major cities in Taiwan have been holding civilian drills annually, by which the Ministry of National Defense (MoND) could evaluate local responses to natural disasters and war scenarios. Taichung's latest drill, however, allocated 70 per cent of training to the latter scenario, up from 50 per cent in past years. While there is unanimous commitment among Taiwan's major political parties on defending the island from a potential 'hot war,' the drill may point to some differences in local and central approaches to current tensions, even within the same party.
More on the issue:
• Ten other Taiwanese municipalities and counties will perform similar drills on designated dates between April and July 2023. Taipei's drill is scheduled to take place on May 4.
• A representative from the American Institute in Taiwan was reportedly invited by MoND to observe first responders' performance. Yu Beichen, a former major general in the Republic of China Army, told Taipei-based SET News that the representative was there to "assess Taiwan's needs and mobilizing abilities in civil defence."
• Lu was a six-time member of Taiwan's Foreign and National Defense Committee, when she served as a Legislative Yuan member from 1994 to 2018. Her approval rate stood at 67 per cent in March 2023 — the highest among all municipal governors — according to a poll conducted by local television channel TVBS.