Xi Jinping changes tactics to pressure Taiwan: Fewer military aircraft, more gray-zone strangulation
Bloomberg reported on June 15 that Beijing's approach to pressuring Taiwan has changed this year: the number of sorties by PLA military aircraft harassing Taiwan has noticeably decreased compared to 2025, with March even seeing a period of seven consecutive days without sending military aircraft. However, China has not stopped oppressing Taiwan; instead, it has shifted its focus to gray-zone operations that are harder for the international community to immediately identify.
The core of this tactic is not cooling down, but changing the weapon. In past years, Beijing's most common method was to send military aircraft and warships to approach Taiwan, creating the shadow of war through high-frequency military operations. Now, the military threat still exists, but more actions are dispersed among coast guard, surveying, firefighting, diplomacy, media, congressional exchanges, and internal political operations in Taiwan. The muzzle has not been pulled back; it has simply been put into the skins of administration, law enforcement, exchanges, and goodwill.
The report noted that Chinese transportation-related vessels cruised east of Taiwan for the first time this year, including survey ships and fireboats. Surface-wise, such actions are not as provocative as military aircraft crossing the median line, but their actual value is not low. The waters east of Taiwan relate to channels where the US and Japan might support Taiwan, and also concern submarine activities, undersea topography, maritime blockades, and wartime supplies. Beijing's use of non-military vessels to enter this region mixes military reconnaissance, sovereignty assertion, and psychological warfare all at once. What the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is best at is chopping up aggression into pieces, calling every single piece "not worth making a fuss about," until the entire reality is bitten off by it.
Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense recently continues to report activities by PLA military aircraft, warships, and official vessels around Taiwan. Public data also show that the CCP's gray-zone pressure has never relied solely on military aircraft. The drop in the number of military aircraft cannot be interpreted as Beijing turning moderate. A more accurate statement is that Beijing is reducing the international costs brought by a single military action while expanding the overall oppression area.
After Lai Ching-te took office, Beijing has consistently defined him as a "Taiwan independence" target and made suppressing the international space of the Lai administration a priority. The Bloomberg report stated that China has stepped up efforts to isolate Lai Ching-te, including obstructing his African trips, punishing international media outlets that interview him, and reducing opportunities for Taiwan's president to speak out internationally through diplomatic pressure. Previously, New York Times reporter Vivian Wang was expelled by China, with the New York Times stating that the Chinese side pointed the reason to the newspaper's interview with Lai Ching-te, although Wang herself was not involved in the interview. This detail is very typical: the CCP does not need you to have actually done anything; as long as it wants to make an example of someone, it can casually pick any chicken.
The logic behind Beijing punishing the media is also very clear. Lai Ching-te accepting interviews with international media was originally just an elected president explaining Taiwan's position to the international community. Yet, the CCP regards this matter as a sabotage of the "One China" narrative, because what the CCP wants is not for various countries to acknowledge certain legal phrasing, but to make Taiwan's president disappear from international public opinion. It wants to blockade not only Taiwan's diplomacy, but also Taiwan's voice. To the CCP, Taiwanese people can exist, but the political will of the Taiwanese people cannot exist; Taiwan's president can speak within the island, but cannot be treated by the world as a normal political figure.
New Zealand lawmakers being banned by China from entering mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau for a year after visiting Taiwan also falls under the same line. Beijing used to routinely impose sanctions on US and European politicians, but now it extends its reach to countries like New Zealand that have historically maintained milder relations with China, indicating that it is upgrading "visiting Taiwan comes with a price" into transnational political rules. The CCP is not safeguarding sovereignty; it is establishing house rules for the entire world: whoever interacts normally with Taiwan must accept punishment from Beijing.
Noise reduction at the military level, pressure increase at the political level—this is the more insidious aspect of Beijing at present. Large-scale military exercises easily trigger international alertness, and military aircraft appearing on screens every day will also help Taiwan win external sympathy; whereas gray-zone operations are more suitable for long-term attrition. A ship today, a visa tomorrow, media punishment the day after, and a foreign lawmaker ban a few days later. Each matter viewed individually is not as terrifying as missiles, but connected together, they constitute a set of chronic strangulation.
Bloomberg's report cited analyses suggesting that Beijing may realize past high-intensity military intimidation has damaged its international image and might instead strengthen international support for Taiwan, and thus turned to hoping to isolate Lai Ching-te long-term, lower Taiwan's international visibility, and pinning hopes on Taiwan's 2028 general election to change the political landscape. This judgment matches the CCP's consistent approach: where it cannot take down by force, it infiltrates first; where it cannot scare people into submission, it isolates first; where annexation cannot be achieved short-term, it first creates fatigue among the Taiwanese public regarding resistance.
Kuomintang Chairperson Cheng Li-wun visiting mainland China this April and meeting with Xi Jinping is another puzzle piece in this cross-strait layout. While putting pressure on the Lai Ching-te administration, Beijing is elevating the status of Taiwan's opposition political figures, packaging "peace," "exchanges," and "compatriots on both sides belonging to the Chinese nation" as an alternative route. The problem is that the peace in the CCP's mouth has never been equal coexistence between both sides, but Taiwan gradually accepting the political preconditions set by Beijing. Hong Kong has already demonstrated this once: promises can be written very nicely, but when torn up, it doesn't even blush.
If Cheng Li-wun packages dialogue with Beijing as a peace plan, Beijing will package her as a "negotiable target"; if Lai Ching-te insists on Taiwan's sovereignty and democratic system, Beijing packages him as a "troublemaker." This is not a diplomatic preference, but a united front screening mechanism. The CCP wants to transform Taiwan's politics into a system that rewards surrender and punishes resistance. Whoever is willing to help Beijing digest Taiwanese public opinion can get a red carpet, meetings, news space, and the imagination space of a "historic breakthrough."
The report also mentioned that if Xi Jinping has the opportunity to visit Taiwan in the future, even without a reunification agreement, it might still be packaged by Beijing as a historic breakthrough. This point is especially dangerous for Taiwan. The CCP does not necessarily need to sign a reunification document right away; it can also first create symbolic occupation: leader meetings, reciprocal visits, shared national narratives, economic and trade recovery, youth exchanges, media co-productions, and ultimately making Taiwanese society accustomed to treating Beijing as the highest political existence that must be petitioned, considered, and appeased. The loss of sovereignty sometimes does not begin with the announcement of surrender, but from every single time one voluntarily lowers one's status.
The US factor makes the situation more complicated. Trump once hinted that arms sales to Taiwan could become a bargaining chip in negotiations with China, triggering doubts about US commitments; although US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth denied policy changes, the reality Taiwan faces has not become lighter because of it. Beijing is best at exploiting such gaps: as long as Taiwanese society begins to doubt whether the US is reliable, the CCP will use "the US will sell out Taiwan" as psychological warfare ammunition, and then package "accepting Beijing's arrangements is safe" as a rational choice.
Taiwan cannot pin its security on every single word of US politicians, and even less can it pin its future on the goodwill of the CCP. The CCP's strategy toward Taiwan has never been a single-line offensive, but simultaneous advancement in military, diplomatic, media, economic, electoral, local exchange, and cognitive warfare. Flying fewer military aircraft does not mean the wolf has turned into a dog; it only shows the wolf has started learning to bypass the searchlights.
The most terrifying aspect of Beijing's current strategy toward Taiwan is not a single military aircraft crossing the median line, nor a certain survey ship appearing east of Taiwan, but that it is normalizing aggression. The CCP wants to make Taiwanese people accustomed to being monitored, threatened, isolated, and forced to explain their own existence; it wants to make foreign media accustomed to paying a price for interviewing Taiwan's president; it wants to make foreign lawmakers accustomed to being punished for visiting Taiwan; it wants to make political figures within Taiwan believe that as long as they are soft enough toward Beijing, they can get an admission ticket to "peace."
This is CCP-style peace: military aircraft can be fewer, but the noose cannot be loosened even a bit.