TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense (MND) tracked seven Chinese military aircraft and eight naval vessels around the country between 6 a.m. Sunday (Oct. 29) and 6 a.m. Monday (Oct. 30).

The defense ministry said that seven People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) military aircraft and eight People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) vessels were detected. It said that one of the aircraft had entered the southwest sector of Taiwan's Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ).

The aircraft tracked in the ADIZ was a Shaanxi Y-8 anti-submarine warfare aircraft (Y-8 ASW). The Y-8 ASW flew off the southwest edge of the median line and entered the southwest ADIZ to the northeast of the Dongsha Islands.

The MND said it monitored the situation with its intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance system and, in response, scrambled combat patrol aircraft, dispatched naval vessels, and deployed land-based air defense missile systems.

Since September 2020, Beijing has increasingly employed gray zone tactics in the form of military aircraft and naval vessels deployments over the median line and inside Taiwan's ADIZ.

According to CSIS, gray zone tactics are “an effort or series of efforts beyond steady-state deterrence and assurance that attempts to achieve one’s security objectives without resorting to direct and sizable use of force."

Flight path of Y-8 ASW aircraft in southwest ADIZ. (MND image)