China holds more Taiwan military drills as Trump downplays worry

Eric Martin and Josh Wingrove, Bloomberg News on Dec 29, 2025

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President Donald Trump downplayed China’s latest maneuvers around Taiwan, while the People’s Liberation Army started a second day of drills that included live-fire practice in response to a major American weapons sale.

The PLA conducted live-fire exercises north of Taiwan, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported Tuesday. Beijing has marked out seven large blocks around the self-run democracy of 23 million people, creating room for it to hold its most expansive drills around the island in decades.

Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said 90 military aircraft crossed into sensitive offshore zones it monitors, and 14 PLA vessels were also spotted.

The Chinese exercises have escalated tensions in the region, though Trump has cast them as a continuation of longstanding military activity. Asked about the exercises around Taiwan — which the U.S. backs militarily — Trump touted his ties to Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“I have a great relationship with President Xi and he hasn’t told me anything about it,” Trump told reporters in a press conference alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “I certainly have seen it, but he hasn’t told me anything about it. And I don’t believe he’s going to be doing it,” Trump said without elaborating.

The latest maneuvers come just two months into the one-year truce that China and the U.S. reached in their trade dispute, and as Trump prepares to visit the world’s No. 2 economy in April. Trump’s comments about the exercises indicate the U.S. is keen to keep that deal in place.

China’s “Justice Mission-2025” exercises, the first major drills off Taiwan since April, began on Monday and served, it said, as a “stern warning against ‘Taiwan Independence’ separatist forces and external interference.” The maneuvers come after the U.S. announced one of its biggest arms packages ever for Taiwan: an $11 billion deal for arms that Taipei mostly already had.

China reacted angrily to the U.S. move, saying it raised the chances of a clash between the superpowers. On Friday, Beijing unveiled largely symbolic sanctions against 20 U.S. defense companies and 10 executives.

China views Taiwan as a province that must ultimately be brought under its control, by force if necessary — a position Taipei firmly rejects. Since President Lai Ching-te took office in May 2024, Beijing has stepped up pressure on his government and much smaller armed forces.

The blocks for the PLA maneuvers cut into Taiwanese territorial waters for the first time since 2022. International flights from Taiwan operated normally on Tuesday, according to flight-tracking app Flightradar24, although some apparently changed their routes to avoid the drills.

Domestic Taiwan flights from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday that link the main island with outlying islands off the Chinese coast have been canceled or rescheduled, according to the websites of Taiwan’s major airports.

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(With assistance from Kate Sullivan, Yian Lee, Nectar Gan and Jing Li.)