China says PLA monitored two U.S. ships transiting Taiwan Strait

China’s People’s Liberation Army said it monitored the transit of two U.S. naval vessels through the Taiwan Strait from Jan. 16 to Jan. 17, an episode that Chinese state media framed as routine vigilance amid heightened military activity in the waters around Taiwan.

The PLA Eastern Theater Command published a statement carried by state outlets saying it “deployed naval and air assets to monitor and track the movements of the two vessels,” identifying them as the guided-missile destroyer USS John Finn and the oceanographic survey ship USNS Mary Sears. A theater command spokesperson, Senior Colonel Xu Chenghua, was quoted saying the command “organized naval and air forces to monitor and track the US vessels’ movements, ensuring effective response and management,” and that it “remains on high alert to resolutely safeguard national sovereignty and security, as well as regional peace and stability.”

Taiwan’s defense ministry reported overlapping activity that it said it monitored up to 0600 local time on Friday. The ministry cited detections of 26 PLA aircraft, eight People’s Liberation Army Navy vessels and one “official ship” operating around the island during that period. It said seven aircraft sorties crossed the Taiwan Strait median line and entered Taiwan’s northern, central and southwestern air defense identification zones, and that its forces “responded” to those incursions. The ministry also reported that a PLA unmanned aerial vehicle left the area after Taiwan issued radio warnings and that it continued to track the situation.

The PLA Southern Theater Command separately described recent operations as routine, with spokesperson Tian Junli telling state media the command had carried out “routine drone flight training” over Dongsha Island and that the training was “completely justified and lawful.” Chinese outlets also noted that Beijing staged a large-scale exercise around Taiwan in the previous month, providing context for sustained activity in the area.

The episode highlights the recurring pattern of close encounters in the Taiwan Strait that test tactical boundaries and strategic signaling between Washington, Taipei and Beijing. U.S. warship transits through the strait are broadly framed in U.S. diplomatic and military practice as assertions of freedom of navigation in international waterways; Beijing treats increased PLA presence and monitoring as necessary measures to defend sovereignty and deter what it views as destabilizing external interference.

No U.S. official comment or independent verification of the PLA’s account, the specific tactical interactions or the exact ship tracks has been released alongside the Chinese and Taiwanese statements. That absence of outside confirmation leaves key operational details open to differing interpretations, while underscoring the risks of miscommunication when military units operate in proximity across contested maritime and airspaces.

For Taipei, the reported scale of sorties and naval movements reinforces longstanding concerns about Beijing’s ability to pressure the island through coercive military maneuvers short of open conflict. For other regional capitals, the incident is another reminder that the Taiwan Strait remains an axis of strategic competition with spillover effects for regional security, commercial shipping and alliance management. As both sides maintain high readiness, the challenge for diplomats will be to manage tactical incidents so they do not become strategic crises.