A Boeing P-8A Poseidon operated by the US Navy has overflown the sensitive waterway separating Taiwan from mainland China.
The sortie occurred on 26 November, according to the US 7th Fleet, which represents Washington’s largest forward-deployed naval force with two Nimitz-class aircraft carriers, 50-70 surface ships and submarines, 150 aircraft and more than 27,000 sailors and marines.
“By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations,” the 7th Fleet said on 26 November. “The United States military flies, sails and operates anywhere international law allows.”
Based at Yokosuka, Japan, the 7th Fleet’s area of operation extends from the International Date Line to the India-Pakistan border.
It is not uncommon for the Pentagon to send aircraft and ships into the Taiwan Strait and other disputed waterways such as the South China Sea, for which Beijing also claims jurisdiction.
Washington calls such actions “freedom of navigation” operations, arguing they put weight behind the USA’s commitment to ensuring a “free and open Indo-Pacific”.
Beijing regards such flights as harassment at best, territorial violations at worst.
China’s Eastern Theater Command acknowledged the recent P-8A flight, saying it deployed unspecified naval and air forces to “follow, monitor and deal with the trespassing US aircraft effectively”.
Senior Colonel Cao Jun with China’s People’s Liberation Army Air Force decried the US Navy’s portrayal of the transit flight.
“The USA’s remarks distorted the legal fact, confused the public and misled the international perception,” Cao says. “We urge the US side to stop distorting and hyping up, and safeguard regional peace and stability.”
The Pentagon did not immediately describe the conduct of Chinese aviators during the intercept.
In the past, Washington has harshly critiqued such intercepts as dangerous and unprofessional. In 2023, the Pentagon released video documenting multiple incidents of Chinese fighters flying within close distance of American aircraft.
The rise of such manoeuvres hearkens to the so-called “Hainan Island incident” of 2001, when a Chinese Shenyang J-8II fighter collided with a US Navy Lockheed EP-3 surveillance aircraft during an intercept over the South China Sea.
One Chinese aircraft went down during that event, with the pilot presumed dead. The damaged USN turboprop was forced to land in Chinese territory, with all 24 crew members detained by Beijing for 10 days.
The American crew were eventually returned to the USA after 11 days in captivity, while the EP-3 was disassembled and shipped back to the USA in pieces, under an agreement between Washington and Beijing.
The surveillance aircraft was eventually reassembled and returned to active service with the navy.
More than 20 years after the unplanned landing on Hainan Island, the incident EP-3 again sparked controversy in China after it was put on display at the Arizona-based Pima Air & Space Museum in October.
The Global Times, a hawkish English-language publication controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, on 25 October described plans to display the EP-3 as triggering “social media outrage” in China.
