← WW3 RISK TRACKER / THEATER: China – Taiwan Tensions
China – Taiwan conflict
- United States defense personnel will embed at Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense to conduct 130 joint planning sessions and war games through 2028. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026US defence experts to work inside Taiwan military HQ under reported pactTaipei Times · 6 Oct 2026US defense experts to participate in meetings, war games in Taiwan joint assessment program
- Taiwan Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung opened a de facto consulate in Phoenix, Arizona to expand bilateral semiconductor cooperation. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026Days after Xi-Trump summit, top Taiwan diplomat opens de facto consulate in US
- People's Liberation Army pilots conducted shipborne trials with Z-10 attack helicopters to expand maritime assault capabilities. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026Why the PLA’s Z-10 attack helicopter is taking a bigger role at sea
- China's consulate in Munich pressured the Literaturhaus München cultural center to cancel a reading by Taiwanese novelist Yang Shuang-tzu. Latest | FOCUS TAIWAN - CNA ENGLISH NEWS · 5 Oct 2026China pressured Munich institute to cancel Taiwan author event: Diplomat
- Eswatini's ambassador presented credentials to Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te in Taipei to reaffirm bilateral diplomatic ties. Taipei Times · 6 Oct 2026New Eswatini envoy pledges support for Taiwan’s int’l participation
Joint Defense Planning
The United States Department of Defense is embedding an official from the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy and an analyst from the Institute for Defense Analyses at Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense headquarters in Taipei. This expanded joint cooperation program runs through 2028 to integrate American operational planners into Taiwanese strategic evaluations. United States defense liaisons will take part in 130 meetings, frontline inspections, and simulation war games evaluating Taiwan's defense procurement and annual Han Kuang exercise blueprints. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026US defence experts to work inside Taiwan military HQ under reported pactTaipei Times · 6 Oct 2026US defense experts to participate in meetings, war games in Taiwan joint assessment program
Diplomatic Representation
Taiwanese Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung arrived in Phoenix, Arizona to establish a de facto Taiwanese consulate and inspect advanced semiconductor production facilities. Lin completed the visit after conducting bilateral meetings in Belize and Guatemala, two of Taiwan's twelve remaining official diplomatic partners. In Germany, the Chinese consulate in Munich unsuccessfully pressured the Literaturhaus München cultural institute to cancel a public lecture by Taiwanese author Yang Shuang-tzu, offering alternative funding for a Chinese replacement. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026Days after Xi-Trump summit, top Taiwan diplomat opens de facto consulate in USLatest | FOCUS TAIWAN - CNA ENGLISH NEWS · 5 Oct 2026China pressured Munich institute to cancel Taiwan author event: Diplomat
Amphibious Aviation Trials
People's Liberation Army ground forces expanded maritime flight training for Changhe Z-10 attack helicopters operating from civilian and naval vessels. Operating from coastal positions such as the Yuanqian helicopter base in Fujian, the aircraft are being configured to overcome overland range restrictions. Shipboard trials permit Z-10 units to escort amphibious assault formations across the Taiwan Strait and deliver direct rocket fire against coastal fortifications. News - South China Morning Post · 5 Oct 2026Why the PLA’s Z-10 attack helicopter is taking a bigger role at sea
Assessment
Bilateral operational coordination between Washington and Taipei is expanding inside Taiwan's defense ministry, accompanied by continued Chinese amphibious aviation training without active kinetic escalation.
BOTTOM LINE // United States defense personnel embedded inside Taiwan military headquarters while Chinese aviators conducted maritime helicopter trials, maintaining an elevated cross-strait posture.
Jamestown Foundation analysts expect the Chinese Communist Party to ramp up overseas Chinese affairs related to Taiwan in the months and years ahead. Jamestown also notes PLA veteran removals could lead to replacements less likely to push back on Xi's demands. Jamestown Foundation · 4 Oct 2026Overseas Support for Unification BuildsJamestown Foundation · 2 Oct 2026Xi’s Purge and the War Over TaiwanThe Diplomat · 2 Oct 2026Taiwan’s New F-16s: Why They Still Matter
- 2026-10-06
United States embeds defense liaisons inside Taiwan's military headquarters for joint war games
Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense confirmed that Pentagon and Institute for Defense Analyses personnel will participate in 130 meetings and simulation drills through 2028. The program places American liaisons directly inside Taiwanese headquarters to advise defense planning and war games.
- 2026-10-05
Taiwan receives first two F-16V fighter aircraft delivered from United States
The two single-seat aircraft landed at Chihhang Air Base in Taitung, marking Taiwan's first delivery of newly built F-16 airframes since 1997.
- 2026-10-03
United States plans first deployment of NMESIS anti-ship missiles to Yonaguni island
The United States military arranged to deploy the Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System to Japan's Yonaguni island during Exercise Keen Sword. The deployment stations mobile anti-ship strike systems approximately 110 kilometers east of Taiwan.
4 more
- 2026-09-30
US Navy creates dedicated drone command for Taiwan Strait operations
The U.S. Navy established a dedicated drone command to counter potential PLA amphibious assaults in the Taiwan Strait.
- 2026-09-27
US and China agree to pursue military crisis-communication pact
China's Foreign Ministry announced that Beijing and Washington agreed to pursue a bilateral military crisis-communication memorandum of understanding.
- 2026-09-25
Xi Jinping and Donald Trump meet at the White House
Chinese President Xi Jinping met U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House to address bilateral competition over trade, technology, and Taiwan.
- 2026-09-22
Taiwan transfers decommissioned coast guard vessel to the Philippines
Taiwan's Coast Guard Administration transferred a decommissioned 500-tonne patrol vessel to the Philippine Coast Guard.
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 28.8/100 as of 1 January 1970 (coercive pressure), 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 28.8/100 — coercive pressure. 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
One 0–100 scale for the whole conflict. 0–49 is escalation before war; 50–100 is active war and how far it has gone.
50 is not a threshold the number can cross on its own. Which side a theater sits on is decided by whether verified belligerents are fighting there, so war onset always moves the score up across 50 — the number never declares a war by climbing.
It is a stage, not a probability: 42 is not a 42% chance of war. Below 50 it grades movement toward war, above 50 the war itself.
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.