China does not plan to invade Taiwan in 2027: US intel report

The Annual Threat Assessment report said that Chinese leaders "do not currently plan to execute an invasion of Taiwan in 2027, nor do they have a fixed timeline for achieving unification".

Chinese ships patrol as the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conduct military drills on Pingtan island,
in eastern China’s Fujian province, the closest point to Taiwan, on Dec 30, 2025.
(Photo: AFP/Adek Berry)

19 Mar 2026 

WASHINGTON: China does not currently plan to invade Taiwan in 2027 but seeks to take control of the self-ruled island without force, said an annual US intelligence report, which drew ire from Beijing on Thursday (Mar 19).

About "Signalgate"

Video: Signalgate. It's Worse Than You Think. || Peter Zeihan

The Atlantic magazine publishes US attack plan mistakenly shared in chat group

MAR 27, 2025

WASHINGTON – The Atlantic magazine on March 26 published what it said was the entire text of a chat group mistakenly shared with a journalist by top US national security officials laying out plans of an imminent attack on Yemen.

Singapore to buy new submarines, infantry fighting vehicles and maritime patrol aircraft for the SAF

Mike Yeo
MAR 03, 2025

SINGAPORE – Singapore plans to procure two new submarines, and new infantry fighting vehicles with anti-drone capabilities, as well as replace its maritime patrol aircraft in the coming years.

These hardware upgrades are part of the Singapore Armed Forces’ (SAF) plan for a military that is fit for Singapore’s security purposes, especially amid a fast-changing global order, said Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen on March 3 during the debate on the Ministry of Defence’s (Mindef) budget.

Lessons from Russo-Ukraine War

Video: Singapore is studying Ukraine conflict very closely: Ng Eng Hen (CNA)

Ukraine is “the most modern fought war in recent times”.

China-US Relations, Taiwan, and ASEAN

China seen as most influential power in Southeast Asia: ASEAN Studies Centre

But survey respondents from the 10 ASEAN states also expressed concern about the country's expanding influence.

Lowy Institute's Asia Power Index 2023: (from first to tenth place) United States, China, Japan, India, Russia, Australia, South Korea, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand.

Chew Hui Min

13 Feb 2023 


SINGAPORE: China is seen as the most influential economic and political power in Southeast Asia, but its expanding influence is not viewed favourably by a majority of respondents in a survey of Southeast Asians.

China’s Lessons from Russia’s War

Jun 17, 2022

KEVIN RUDD

For Chinese President Xi Jinping, a Marxist-Leninist dialectician, the events in Ukraine won’t fundamentally alter China's grand historical ascent. As a cautionary tale, Russia's military failures will simply impel China's leadership to make even more substantial preparations before seizing Taiwan.



MELBOURNE – Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, two views quickly emerged in the West about what lesson China would take from the war. The first suggested that NATO’s failure to deter Russia – or to defend Ukraine directly – would inspire China to advance the timetable for a planned invasion of Taiwan, or even to capitalize on the chaos brought about by the war to attack the island immediately. But after Russia’s military ran into significant and unexpected challenges early on, an alternate line of analysis emerged suggesting that China has now been significantly deterred from ever attempting to take Taiwan.

Singapore to acquire 8 F-35A fighter jets

 

SINGAPORE: The Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) will buy eight F-35A jets, continuing its build-up of a “next-generation” force to serve the country’s security needs.

The aircraft are expected to be delivered around 2030, Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said during the Ministry of Defence’s (MINDEF) budget debate in parliament on Wednesday (Feb 28).

This is on top of RSAF’s existing order of 12 F-35 jets of the “B” variant, expanding its full fleet of the fifth-generation US-made fighter aircraft to 20.

Once operational, the F-35 jets will put Singapore’s air force in the “premier league”, he said.

US intel shows China's army had missiles filled with water instead of fuel in a corruption scandal that led to Xi's military purge: Bloomberg

Matthew Loh

Jan 8, 2024

Chinese soldiers atop mobile rocket launchers in a parade in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 2019 to celebrate the 70th Anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

• US intelligence said China's military purge stemmed from serious equipment issues, Bloomberg reported.
• Examples of these included missiles that had been filled with water instead of fuel, the report said.
• The problems are a blow to Xi Jinping's focus on the Rocket Force, China's main nuclear arm.

Musk undue influence over US policy and the Russo-Ukraine war.

 Elon Musk’s Shadow Rule

How the U.S. government came to rely on the tech billionaire—and is now struggling to rein him in.

By Ronan Farrow


Last October, Colin Kahl, then the Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy at the Pentagon, sat in a hotel in Paris and prepared to make a call to avert disaster in Ukraine. A staffer handed him an iPhone—in part to avoid inviting an onslaught of late-night texts and colorful emojis on Kahl’s own phone. Kahl had returned to his room, with its heavy drapery and distant view of the Eiffel Tower, after a day of meetings with officials from the United Kingdom, France, and Germany. A senior defense official told me that Kahl was surprised by whom he was about to contact: “He was, like, ‘Why am I calling Elon Musk?’ ”

The reason soon became apparent. “Even though Musk is not technically a diplomat or statesman, I felt it was important to treat him as such, given the influence he had on this issue,” Kahl told me. SpaceX, Musk’s space-exploration company, had for months been providing Internet access across Ukraine, allowing the country’s forces to plan attacks and to defend themselves. But, in recent days, the forces had found their connectivity severed as they entered territory contested by Russia. More alarmingly, SpaceX had recently given the Pentagon an ultimatum: if it didn’t assume the cost of providing service in Ukraine, which the company calculated at some four hundred million dollars annually, it would cut off access. “We started to get a little panicked,” the senior defense official, one of four who described the standoff to me, recalled. Musk “could turn it off at any given moment. And that would have real operational impact for the Ukrainians.”

China's aircraft carriers play 'theatrical' role but pose little threat yet: Analysts

A helicopter takes off from China's Shandong aircraft carrier, over Pacific Ocean waters, south of Okinawa
prefecture, Japan, in this handout photo taken Apr 15, 2023, and released by the Joint Staff Office of the
Defense Ministry of Japan, Apr 17, 2023.
(File photo: Joint Staff Office of the Defense Ministry of Japan/HANDOUT via REUTERS)

05 May 2023 

HONG KONG: When China sailed one of its two active aircraft carriers, the Shandong, east of Taiwan last month as part of military drills surrounding the island, it was showcasing a capability that it has yet to master and could take years to perfect.

As Beijing modernises its military, its formidable missile forces and other naval vessels, such as cutting-edge cruisers, are posing a concern for the US and its allies. But it could be more than a decade before China can mount a credible carrier threat far from its shores, according to four military attaches and six defence analysts familiar with regional naval deployments.

Commentary: How to stop a war between America and China

In the militarised rivalry between China and the US, one side’s deterrence is another side’s escalation, says the Financial Times' Gideon Rachman.

The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Milius (DDG 69) conducts a routine Taiwan Strait transit on
Sunday, April 16, 2023. (U.S. Navy via AP)

Gideon Rachman

26 Apr 2023

LONDON: Visiting Washington last week, it was striking how commonplace talk of war between the United States and China has become. That discussion has been fed by loose-lipped statements from American generals musing about potential dates for the opening of hostilities.

Singapore, China hold joint naval exercise, amid routine port call by US submarine

Personnel from the Republic of Singapore Navy and People’s Liberation Army (Navy) conducted joint training at the
Damage Control Training Centre in Changi Naval Base. Ministry of Defence

• Singapore and China are holding a joint naval exercise between April 28 and May 1
• This comes after a US submarine made a routine port call in Singapore this week
• The Sino-Singapore drills will consist of a shore and sea phase at Changi Naval Base and the southern reaches of the South China Sea respectively

SUFIYAN SAMSURI

April 28, 2023


SINGAPORE — The Singapore and China navies are holding a joint maritime exercise from April 28 to May 1, which consists of a shore and sea phase, the Ministry of Defence (Mindef) said in a press statement on Friday (April 28).

This year’s drills will be the second in the bilateral series, called Exercise Maritime Cooperation, between the two countries, with the first taking place in 2015.

This comes as a United States submarine — the USS Columbia — made a routine port call at the Changi Naval Base this week.

PM Lee outlines 3 geopolitical storms Singapore faces

Jean Iau
19 April 2023

SINGAPORE - While Singapore’s relations with its immediate neighbours Malaysia and Indonesia are stable and encouraging, the situation further afield has become troubling and even dangerous.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said this in Parliament on Wednesday as he outlined three major geopolitical tensions that make the current global situation graver than what Singapore has faced in a long time.

Singaporeans need to realise the gravity of the situation, he said. “We are facing not just one storm, but several.”

China has some doubt on ability to invade Taiwan: CIA chief

Taiwanese Mirage 2000 fighter jets taxi along a runway during a drill at an airbase in Hsinchu, Taiwan, on Jan 11, 2023.
(Photo: AP/Johnson Lai)

27 Feb 2023

WASHINGTON: US intelligence shows that China's President Xi Jinping has instructed his country's military to “be ready by 2027" to invade Taiwan though he may be currently harbouring doubts about his ability to do so given Russia's experience in its war with Ukraine, CIA Director William Burns said.

Burns, in a television interview that aired on Sunday (Feb 26), stressed that the United States must take “very seriously” Xi's desire to ultimately control Taiwan even if military conflict is not inevitable.

Commentary: Why taking a long view on Singapore’s defence spending will reap security dividends over time

Defence Minister Ng Eng Heng viewing an F35 aircraft at Luke Air Force Base in Glendale, Arizona in December 2015.  
Raj Nadarajan/TODAY

GRAHAM ONG-WEBB

February 28, 2023


Defence planning, expenditure, and acquisition are necessary tasks that require exercising “the art of the long view”, to use the term by famous futurist and scenario-planner Peter Schwartz.

This year’s debate on the Ministry of Defence’s (Mindef) budget serves to reinforce once again that our defence spending remains prudent and balanced, and is based on “the long view”, to ensure that Singaporeans can continue to enjoy adequate security from external threats, as they have in the past.

This is a dividend which, unfortunately, cannot be consistently derived in many countries, particularly those across Europe.

One need not look further than the current situation in Ukraine, which marked the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion on Feb 24.

Against this backdrop, it’s important that Mindef and the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) remain committed to the course of transformation to stay ahead of evolving threats.

'We are not in a comfortable place': Singapore defence minister warns of 'disastrous' consequences of war in Asia

Singapore Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen speaking at the Maritime Security Roundtable during the 59th Munich Security Conference on Feb 17, 2023.

18 Feb 2023 

Singapore's defence minister on Friday (Feb 17) warned that war in Asia would be devastating not just for the continent, but for the rest of the world.

Speaking at the Maritime Security Roundtable at the 59th Munich Security Conference, Dr Ng highlighted that world powers have been increasing their military presence in Asia, concluding that "pre-positioning for deterrence is alive and well".

He cited the formations of strategic groupings like the Quad (United States, India, Australia, Japan) and AUKUS (US, Australia, United Kingdom), the US gaining more access to bases in the Philippines, as well as missile defence drills in South Korea as examples of what China would construe as "preparatory moves".

Similarly, Beijing has also increased its military presence in the region, said Dr Ng - from patrols in the disputed South China Sea to Chinese jets regularly crossing the median line in the Taiwan Strait.

US four-star general warns of war with China in 2025

29 Jan 2023 

Crew members signal to a F/A-18E Super Hornet fighter jet preparing to take off for a routine flight on board the
USS Nimitz aircraft carrier during a routine deployment to the South China Sea, Mid-Sea, Jan 27, 2023.
(Photo: REUTERS/Joseph Campbell)

WASHINGTON: A four-star US Air Force general said in a memo that his gut told him the United States would fight China in the next two years, comments that Pentagon officials said were not consistent with American military assessments.

Need for speed: Xi's new generals offer cohesion over China's possible Taiwan plans

Visitors stand in front of a giant screen displaying Chinese President Xi Jinping next to a flag of the Communist Party of
 China, at the Military Museum of the Chinese People's Revolution in Beijing, China, Oct 8, 2022.
(File photo: REUTERS/Florence Lo)

27 Oct 2022 

HONG KONG: Chinese President Xi Jinping's new generals may have been selected for their political loyalty to him, but those ties could serve at least one vital military purpose in any Taiwan invasion plan: ensuring cohesion and decisiveness.

Although the Politburo's seven-man Standing Committee would make the ultimate decision on any Taiwan action, the Central Military Commission would forge and execute the battle plan, eight Asian and Western military attaches say.

Commentary: Xi cements power at Chinese Communist Party congress, but is still exposed on the economy

For Chinese President Xi Jinping, getting the numbers to endorse himself and his underlings in leadership roles is one thing; shifting the economy back on track is quite another, says this writer.

A screen shows live news coverage of China’s President Xi Jinping speaking after introducing China’s new Politburo
Standing Committee, at a restaurant in Foshan city, in China’s southern Guangdong province on Oct 23, 2022.
(Photo: AFP/Jade Gao)

Tony Walker

25 Oct 2022

MELBOURNE: Xi Jinping’s clean sweep in elevating trusted allies to the commanding heights of the Chinese Communist Party is a political outcome that has implications beyond China’s borders.

Xi sits virtually unchallenged, for the time being, at the apex of a political organisation that oversees a country with the world’s second-largest economy, a rapidly modernising military and, perhaps most importantly, global ambitions to match its growing economic and military strength.

China sees 'much faster timeline' on taking Taiwan, Blinken warns

Blinken made his comments on China at Stanford University (Photo: POOL/AFP/JOSH EDELSON)

18 Oct 2022

SAN FRANCISCO: Beijing wants to seize Taiwan "on a much faster timeline" than previously considered, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday (Oct 17), warning that President Xi Jinping was leading China in a more aggressive direction.

Xi is on the cusp of securing a third five-year term at the helm of the world's most populous nation, delivering a landmark Communist Party Congress speech on Sunday that hailed his decade in power and restated his vow to one day "reunify", or forcefully take, Taiwan.

"We've seen a very different China emerge in recent years under Xi Jinping's leadership," Blinken told a forum at Stanford University with former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.

"It is more repressive at home; it's more aggressive abroad. And in many instances that poses a challenge to our own interests as well as to our own values," he added.

Blinken accused Xi of "creating tremendous tension" by changing the approach toward self-ruled Taiwan, which China's Communist Party has never controlled but claims as its own.

He said China had made a "fundamental decision that the status quo was no longer acceptable, and that Beijing was determined to pursue reunification on a much faster timeline", though he gave no hard estimate or date.

Senior US military figures have previously sounded the alarm that China has expanded its military forces to the point where it could soon have the capability to pull off an invasion of Taiwan.

China's stance has long been that it seeks "peaceful reunification" with Taiwan but reserves the right to use force if necessary, especially if the island ever formally declares independence.

But the rhetoric and actions towards Taiwan have become more pronounced under Xi, China's most assertive leader in a generation.

He has tied taking Taiwan to his landmark "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" and has previously said the goal of reunification cannot continue to be passed indefinitely from generation to generation.

In Sunday's speech, he repeated similar themes, saying the "wheels of history are rolling on towards China's reunification" and that "we reserve the option of taking all measures necessary".

SHARED INTERESTS

Russia's recent invasion of Ukraine, which China has not condemned, has also raised fears that Beijing might try something similar against Taiwan's 23 million people.

Ties between Washington and Beijing have been at a decade-low ebb under both the administrations of Donald Trump and his successor Joe Biden, over a range of issues from trade to security and human rights.

But Blinken said the world's two largest economies should be willing to cooperate on shared interests.

He said the world "fundamentally expects" the two powers to work together on climate change, global health and possibly drug trafficking.

Beijing "just has to be responsive to demand signals that it's getting from countries around the world to be a positive actor, not a negative actor, on issues that concern them".

China cut cooperation with the United States on climate change and drug trafficking in August as part of its protest against a visit to Taiwan by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, which also saw Beijing launch its biggest military drills yet around the island.

Xi is widely expected to meet President Biden on the sidelines of a Group of 20 summit next month in Bali, their first meeting since the US leader took office.


Source: AFP/vc