Reporter Qiu Yunge / Report from Taipei
▲The “Chinese Communist Party Aircraft Carrier Shandong” is now tracked off the coast of Taiwan, and the Ministry of National Defense exposed the monitoring screen (photo/provided by the Ministry of National Defense)
On the 5th, China’s Shandong fleet crossed the Bashi Strait and sailed through the waters southeast of Taiwan. The US nuclear-powered ship USS Nimitz also appeared in the eastern waters of Taiwan. Zhang Yanting, former deputy commander of the Air Force, said that the Shandong ship came out this time to show its strength, which is a kind of political propaganda, and the reason why the USS Nimitz appeared was a routine anti-submarine joint exercise.
Zhang Yanting said in the “Advance Strategic Heights” program yesterday (8th) that the Shandong ship entered the army in 2019 and has been operating around the South China Sea. It is to show strength. Compared with Liaoning, which is training, Shandong ship is in full combat readiness, just to show strength.
Zhang Yanting pointed out that since the United States, Japan and South Korea will conduct a two-day anti-submarine joint exercise off the coast of Jeju Island in South Korea on the 3rd, the appearance of the USS Nimitz, like South Korea and Japan, is routine and completed on Jeju Island. After the exercise, we will leave the Miyako Strait.
Zhang Yanting believes that China has specially selected central and northern Taiwan for joint patrol and inspection operations, which have become patrols in the Taiwan Strait, while in Huadong, mainland aircraft carriers have also gone out to patrol. Although their natures are different, they are all maneuvers, taking Taiwan as their sphere of influence. And this time the Shandong aircraft carrier left the island chain for the first time, passed through the Bashi Strait, and went to the Western Pacific outside the first island chain. The military significance is quite large, and this is also a kind of political propaganda.
