← WW3 RISK TRACKER / THEATER: China – Taiwan Tensions
China – Taiwan conflict
- The U.S. State Department urged Beijing to cease military pressure following China's announced joint naval exercises with Indonesia east of Taiwan.
- Taiwan authorities condemned the planned China-Indonesia naval drills, citing concerns over maritime security in waters near its eastern coast.
- Taiwan's defense ministry detected up to 12 PLA Navy vessels and nine aircraft operating around the island during recent 24-hour monitoring windows.
- Taiwan continued its annual Han Kuang exercises, conducting anti-blockade drills and simulations of communication disruption during hypothetical airstrikes.
- PRC state media published commentaries criticizing Japanese defense posture and historical rhetoric amid ongoing regional maritime security friction.
The Taiwan Strait theater remains in a state of heightened gray-zone pressure and posture competition, with military readiness drills and diplomatic friction balancing without immediate kinetic escalation. Both sides continue to rehearse defense and strike scenarios, while regional naval maneuvers extend operational focus toward waters east of Taiwan.
Operational activity during this period was characterized by routine yet elevated PLA presence and ongoing Taiwanese exercise maneuvers. Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense reported multi-vessel naval formations and aircraft sorties operating in proximity to its air defense identification zones. Concurrently, Taiwan pushed forward with its annual Han Kuang exercises, integrating anti-blockade defense scenarios and civil-defense simulations such as communications throttling in response to theoretical aerial strikes.
On the diplomatic front, international fallout intensified following China's announcement of joint naval exercises with Indonesia east of Taiwan. The U.S. State Department called on Beijing to halt military pressure around Taiwan, while Taipei officially condemned the planned drills as detrimental to regional stability. Beijing maintained its public framing of military posture as routine defense measures while criticizing allied security coordination.
The broader strategic environment reflects expanding PRC gray-zone operations designed to project authority beyond the first island chain. By engaging in maritime security diplomacy and exercises in adjacent waters, Beijing seeks to complicate Taiwan's defense planning and signal presence in international waterways. In response, Taiwan and its partners continue to prioritize resilience, deterrence, and internationalized opposition to unilateral maritime posture shifts.
Despite sharp rhetoric and active exercise cycles on both sides of the strait, operational conduct remains within managed thresholds of gray-zone signaling without evidence of imminent conflict execution. Assessment: The theater is expected to remain anchored in sustained military posturing and political friction as Taiwan completes its exercise cycle and Beijing expands maritime pressure across surrounding waters.
- 2026-08-12
China announces a joint naval exercise with Indonesia in waters east of Taiwan.
- 2026-08-11
Taiwan simulates invasion defense and communications throttling during major military exercises.
COMMON QUESTIONS
Are China and Taiwan at war?
No. There is no armed conflict. China claims Taiwan and applies sustained military and economic pressure — air and naval activity around the island, exercises, and coercion short of force — while Taiwan builds its defences. Not an armed conflict under international humanitarian law: none of the 102 conflicts in Geneva Academy's classification involves China and Taiwan. The index tracks the risk, not a war. The index reads 50/100 as of 1 January 1970 (buildup), on a scale where 50 and above is reserved for fighting actually under way.
How dangerous is the China and Taiwan situation right now?
The index reads 50/100 — buildup. The scale is anchored on 22 historical episodes from 1914 to 2005, so the number means the same thing from one theater to the next. It is a measurement of what is reported, not a forecast.
How is the China and Taiwan risk index calculated?
By fixed formula from open-source reporting: events are extracted and graded by how well evidenced they are, scored across weighted factors, and the model never picks the number. How the index works, and what it does not measure, is explained at wwiii.report/methodology.
How often is this updated?
Every day. The report is rebuilt from that day's reporting and the index re-judged from it, and a fall is published only once the evidence confirms it.
Timeline events — hover the chart to read them
Timeline events — hover the chart to read them
Timeline events — hover the chart to read them
This run predates the split into war and war-risk indices; its number was a single tension score and is labelled as what it was then.
Why it moved, under the chart, names what changed in the latest move: the day’s readings — strikes, casualties, talks — and, when the conflict’s stage was re-judged, what was graded differently and the events behind it. Open it for the detail.
Re-judged from open reporting by fixed formula — the model never picks a number — and a fall publishes only once the evidence confirms it. A dot on the line is a day the stage itself moved. How it is made →
Direction — which way the week pushed. Severity — where the index sits. Connections — how much of the rest a shock here reaches. Cascade — that reach combined with how ready this theater is to go off.
The index reads the state of the conflict, not the volume of news. Each run grades the factors listed below against fixed rubrics, and the score follows by formula.
So a dramatic headline moves nothing unless it changes a grade. A theater already graded for recurring incursions absorbs one more without moving — it is priced in.
Open How this was measured for every grade, its movement since the last run, and the events behind it. Full construction →
A different measurement from the score above, from a different source. This line counts how much of the world's news reports conflict between these two states, against their own long-run normal: 100 is normal, 200 is twice the usual level.
It is computed mechanically from the GDELT Project's open event stream every 15 minutes and never touches the assessed index above — when both move together, that agreement is the signal. A day with too few events shows no reading rather than a guess. Click the chart for the full history.
Data: the GDELT Project.