Marines join Taipei defense exercise

The military yesterday began a joint defense exercise featuring Marine Corps units mobilizing to reinforce the Taipei metropolitan area. The five-day exercise simulates scenarios including the detection of hostile vessels entering Taiwan’s territorial waters, focusing on integrating the capabilities of the separate military branches and improving joint operations, testing decentralized command structures, and command-and-control mechanisms. A key component of the exercise involved Marine Corps units conducting mobile reinforcement operations, with dozens of military vehicles, including trucks, field ambulances and communications vehicles deploying from southern Taiwan to Taipei’s Nangang District (南港) and New Taipei City’s Sijhih District (汐止) to establish temporary command posts and conduct reconnaissance. Photo: Screen grab from the Internet The exercise is designed to test whether operation commands can maintain independent operations while using distributed and decentralized command mechanisms, said Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the government-funded Institute for National Defense and Security Research. It requires a higher level of engagement than regular combat readiness drills conducted separately by individual services because it is cross-service, although it is less expansive than the annual Han Kuang exercise, he said. The Marine Corps has significantly modernized and broadened its capabilities, including the use of uncrewed aerial vehicles and portable Stinger surface-to-air missiles, while upgrading individual equipment and improving interoperability with partner countries, Su said. A source familiar with the matter said that under Taiwan’s defense strategy, such units are not tied to a single operational area, but instead tasked with protecting key government and economic centers. The goal is to build a defense line for the greater Taipei area through cross-regional reinforcements to enable the forces to respond and attack rapidly shifting threats, the source added. The Ministry of National Defense said in a statement on Sunday that the five-day drill is aimed at training participating units to conduct joint operations under a decentralized command-and-control system while tightening coordination and cooperation among the military branches. Last month, the defense ministry held a five-day “Immediate Combat Readiness Exercise,” with the main objective being to train units at all levels to become familiar with combat practices and the battlefield environment during the readiness deployment phase. The exercise would streamline rapid peacetime-to-wartime transitions and priority deployments, the ministry said, with “actual troops, on actual terrain, in real time, using actual equipment and through actual implementation.” BAVI: Taipei, New Taipei City, Taoyuan and others announced work and class closures today, with the storm expected to affect Taiwan through tomorrow The outer rain bands of Typhoon Bavi would begin affecting Taiwan today, with its storm circle reaching land this evening and its level-10 wind radius covering all of northern Taiwan by noon tomorrow, an official said yesterday. The Central Weather Administration (CWA) issued a sea warning for the storm at 2:30pm yesterday, advising of heightened danger in eastern areas and in the Bashi Channel south of Taiwan. Typhoon Bavi is expected to bring strong winds, extremely heavy rainfall and rough seas to Taiwan today and tomorrow, with the heaviest rain forecast for mountainous areas and sustained winds of up to 12 on Typhoon Bavi was expected to have its strongest impact on Taiwan from last night through daytime today, with its storm circle forecast to reach areas from New Taipei City’s northeast coast to Yilan and Hualien counties early today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 6pm yesterday, the center of the typhoon was about 590km east of Taiwan’s southernmost tip at Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), moving northwest at 26kph, the CWA said. The storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 155kph near its center, with gusts reaching 191kph. It had a radius of 380km. A land warning, issued at 5:30am yesterday, remains in Typhoon Bavi lashed Taiwan yesterday, injuring 113 people, prompting the evacuation of 14,605 residents and knocking out power in 234,481 households, the government said. Most of the injuries were due to people falling off motorcycles or bicycles due to strong winds and slippery roads, and others occurred during the typhoon preparations, Central Emergency Operations Center (CEOC) data as of 8pm yesterday showed. No fatalities or severe injuries had been reported as of press time last night. Due to flooding and landslide risks, 14,605 people had been evacuated nationwide, led by 5,182 people in Hualien County, 2,096 in Taichung, 1,700 in New Taipei, As Typhoon Bavi approaches Taiwan, the government has mobilized disaster relief personnel nationwide and concluded preparations in areas vulnerable to isolation during severe weather, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said today. Nationwide, authorities have ensured 6,662 disaster response personnel, 4,497 rescue vehicles, 1,254 boats and 24 helicopters are on standby, Cho wrote on Facebook. Preparations completed in 173 locations considered at risk of becoming isolated during the storm include stockpiling supplies, ensuring communications capabilities and arranging evacuation shelters, he said. The military has also placed 28,922 troops on standby for potential disaster response operations, Cho said. As of the end of last month, the Ministry