My Legal Insurrection colleague Elizabeth Stauffer reported that recent U.S.–Israeli strikes on Iran, coupled with Trump’s earlier move against Venezuela, have dealt China a major strategic setback by cutting cheap oil, exposing the weakness of its military tech, and jeopardizing key AI-linked contracts tied to those regimes.
She logically concluded that these blows undermine Beijing’s influence and force many developing countries to reconsider alignment with China, making the once “inevitable” rise of China look far less certain.
I would like to add one more data point to underscore her assessment. As our readers may recall, I have been following developments related to China’s interest in Taiwan. Late last year, amid a diplomatic row with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, a staunch conservative, the Japanese scrambled aircraft after detecting a suspected Chinese drone near its southern island of Yonaguni, which is located near Taiwan.
The incident occurred shortly after Takaichi said Japan would be willing to defend Taiwan from Communist China.
Apparently, rising costs and declining reliability in oil supplies are prompting China to reassess the importance of those demonstration flights.
Chinese air force activity around Taiwan has fallen sharply in recent weeks, with no flights at all in the past week, a sudden drop in what had been daily military manoeuvres that could signal Beijing is recalibrating its pressure on Taipei.China has dispatched 460 military planes – from fighter jets to drones – into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone so far this year, a 46.5% drop compared with a year ago, according to Taiwan government data compiled by research group Secure Taiwan Associate Corporation (STA).
However, there are other possible explanations. To begin with, the Chinese leader and President Donald Trump are planning to meet soon.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) might be toning down visible pressure tactics to create a better atmosphere ahead of his anticipated meeting with US President Donald Trump at the end of this month, two Taiwanese officials said.Facing Trump, “Beijing might be trying to create a false impression: I am peaceful, I am moving toward peace, so you should stop selling weapons to Taiwan,” a senior Taiwanese security official said, requesting anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter…. China has not dispatched any military planes near Taiwan since Friday last week, marking an unprecedented six-day lull in such operations that coincided with the war in Iran, STA researcher Tristan Tang (湯廣正) said.Unlike this extended lull, past pauses were brief, usually tied to typhoons or Chinese holidays.
Alternatively, it is possible that the Chinese pilots are done with “training” for a possible Taiwan incursion.
Chinese military flights into a sensitive area near Taiwan in January fell to their lowest since Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te took office, an indication Beijing is tweaking its training focus.The People’s Liberation Army sent an average of 5.4 aircraft per day across the median line of the Taiwan Strait during the month, according to data compiled from the Defense Ministry in Taipei. That marked the fewest since just before Lai assumed the presidency in May 2024.The decline may be a sign that over the past few years the PLA has finished most of its basic long-distance flight training, said Chieh Chung, an adjunct researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a Taiwanese military think tank.
Finally, the military purges Xi is conducting could be taking their toll.
Thirty-six generals and lieutenant generals have been officially purged since 2022, while another 65 officers are listed as missing or potentially purged, the report published Tuesday by the Center for Strategic and International Studies found….[T]he scope of this “unprecedented purge of China’s military,” raises questions about its readiness to carry out complex operations, the report’s authors say.When accounting for positions that have been purged more than once, 52% of the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) 176 top leadership positions have been affected, said the report.“This figure is striking and extraordinary, demonstrating the depth of Xi’s campaign and the unprecedented churn in the PLA leadership,” wrote M. Taylor Fravel, director of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the report’s nine authors.
With the EPIC FAILURE of Chinese military defense systems, I suspect the purging will continue until moral improves.
Taken together, the decapitation strikes on Iran and Venezuela, the sudden collapse in Chinese air harassment of Taiwan, Xi’s grinding purges, and a hurried charm offensive before the Trump–Xi summit all point to the same blunt reality: in 2026, the shortest path to buying Taiwan breathing room did not run through Taipei or even the Taiwan Strait. It ran straight through Tehran’s bunkered-down mullahs and Iran’s shattered air defenses, where American power quietly clipped China’s wings long before they ever reached the island.
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY