Taiwanese island on high alert after Chinese drones filmed soldiers

Soldiers on one of Taiwan’s smaller islands are on high alert after Chinese drone provocations. The Taiwanese army reported this in a statement on Tuesday.

The army has asked its soldiers on Erdan island to “increase their vigilance” in response to “provocations by Chinese internet users who often use drones.” The island is located just five kilometers from the Chinese coast and is part of the Kinmen archipelago.

Taiwan lives under a constant threat that China will attack the island. Beijing regards Taiwan, which is de facto autonomously governed, as a Chinese province and has systematically increased political and economic pressure on Taiwan in recent years.

Drones

In addition to the almost daily threat from the Chinese air force and navy off the island’s coast, Taiwan also has to contend with unidentified civilian drones that surveil and harass its troops.

The military commander of Kinmen said in a statement that soldiers will receive further training in the use of drones and also in “countermeasures according to the level of threat.”

Video

The statement comes a week after local media reported that a video showing Taiwanese soldiers and certain military installations on Erdan was circulating on YouTube. The title of the video was: ‘Taiwanese soldiers on Erdan island are scared by a Chinese drone’.

In 2022, Taiwanese soldiers shot down an unidentified civilian drone on Kinmen after tensions with China rose following a visit to Taipei by Nancy Pelosi, then Speaker of the US House of Representatives.