Record-Breaking Chinese Military Aircraft Incursions into Taiwan's ADIZ

Beginning on 01 October 2021, China's National Day, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) flew an unprecedented surge of military aircraft into the southwestern sector of Taiwan's air defence identification zone (ADIZ). Taiwan's Ministry of National Defence reported 38 aircraft on 01 October, followed by 39 the next day, each briefly the largest single-day total since Taipei began publishing daily tallies in September 2020.

The surge peaked on 04 October. According to Taiwan's defence ministry, the PLA sent 52 aircraft in a daytime sortie, including 34 J-16 fighter jets and 12 H-6 bombers, which are nuclear capable, alongside other types. Four more J-16s flew toward the southwestern ADIZ that night, bringing the day's total to 56, which remained the highest single-day figure on record. Across the first four days of October, close to 150 PLA aircraft entered the zone, more than during all of September.

Taiwan's air force scrambled fighters, issued radio warnings and tracked the incoming aircraft with its air defence systems, as it does during such incursions. Premier Su Tseng-chang said Taiwan had to stay on alert, stating that China was being more and more over the top and warning that the activity risked regional peace and stability.

The flights are openly tracked PLA activity, attributable to China, and form part of a sustained pattern of grey-zone military pressure on Taiwan rather than a single isolated act. The timing around National Day points to coercion and political signalling, both to a domestic audience and to Taipei and its partners. The ADIZ is a self-declared monitoring zone, not sovereign or territorial airspace, so the incursions were not a breach of Taiwan's national airspace, but they raised the risk of miscalculation and normalised escalating displays of force.