At the very end of 2025, China held massive military drills surrounding Taiwan. Operating in all directions from the island, China deployed at least 14 warships, another 14 Coast Guard vessels, an “amphibious assault strike group,” and 130 fighter jets, drones, and other military aircraft. As if that wasn’t enough, the PLA fired at least 27 rockets into waters near Taiwan.

China’s military explicitly said the two-day drills were preparation for a blockade of Taiwan, and claimed to have successfully blockaded the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung. The PLA also released drone footage showing the skyscraper Taipei 101. The footage, China claimed, has been taken by its military during the drill – although Taiwan’s government called that “fake news.”

Despite taking place in the holiday lull just before New Year’s Day, China’s military drills were widely covered in the international media. But in Taiwan, the reaction was a collective yawn.

Headlines in major news outlets from various ends of Taiwan’s political spectrum focused on more important matters: the death of Taiwanese singer and variety show personality Tsao Hsi-ping, and the year-end stock market reports for TSMC.

It turns out that people in Taiwan aren’t all that bothered by China’s military drills around the island. There have simply been too many of them. “Justice Mission 2025” – the name China gave to the December drills – was the seventh major military exercise held around Taiwan since August 2022, when then-U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi visited Taipei. 

Visits by U.S. dignitaries always cause consternation in China, and Pelosi was the highest-ranking U.S. politician to make the trip in 25 years. Since then, massive Chinese military drills around Taiwan have become a new normal.

The world looks at the PLA maneuvers and thinks of World War 3. Taiwanese, for the most part, think: “same old, same old.”

Today, we’re looking at how Taiwan’s people actually feel about Chinese military moves near their homeland, and what that tells us about Taiwanese preparation for the unthinkable: an actual Chinese invasion.