Is This China’s New War Tactic? Strategic Ambiguity Playbook On Taiwan, Why India Can’t Ignore It

Last Updated:January 02, 2026, 11:34 IST

For decades, tensions over Taiwan followed a familiar pattern. China would issue warnings, conduct occasional military exercises, and reiterate its claim over the island. Taiwan would respond with defensive drills and diplomatic outreach, while the US and its allies maintained a careful balance designed to prevent war without fully committing to one side. This uneasy stability rested on a concept known as “strategic ambiguity".

That balance is now being quietly, but decisively altered. China’s military activity around Taiwan has grown so frequent, expansive, and realistic that the line between a drill and a real conflict is becoming dangerously blurred. The December 29, 2025, abrupt launch of a large-scale military operation around Taiwan by the Eastern Theater Command of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is one such example.

What was once signalling has begun to resemble rehearsal. The ambiguity that once reduced the risk of escalation is now being used as a tool of pressure.

What Is ‘Strategic Ambiguity’?

Strategic ambiguity is a deliberate policy of uncertainty. In the Taiwan context, it traditionally meant that China did not specify exactly when or how it would use force, while the US did not clearly state whether it would defend Taiwan militarily in every scenario. This lack of clarity was not a flaw; it was the system’s safety valve.

The logic was simple. If China could not be sure how the US would respond, it would hesitate before attacking. If Taiwan could not be certain of unconditional US military backing, it would avoid provocative moves like formally declaring independence. Ambiguity discouraged bold actions on all sides.

For decades, this arrangement kept the peace, even as tensions simmered beneath the surface.

China has not abandoned strategic ambiguity. Instead, it has re-engineered it. In recent years, Chinese military exercises around Taiwan have become larger, closer, and more complex. Warships encircle the island, fighter jets cross median lines that once served as informal boundaries, and missile units simulate blockades. These drills are announced as exercises, but they increasingly resemble real-world combat operations.

This ambiguity is paired with psychological warfare, designed to create fear, tension inside Taiwan, suggested a report published in the National Review. As Sun Tzu argued in The Art of War, the highest form of victory is to defeat an enemy without fighting.

By conducting these actions regularly, China is normalising them. What would once have been treated as a crisis is now framed as routine. Each new exercise pushes the threshold of what is considered “normal" military behaviour.

This is an ambiguity weaponised. Taiwan, the US, and regional actors are forced to constantly ask: Is this just a drill, or has something irreversible begun? The uncertainty itself becomes a form of coercion.

Military analysts describe China’s approach as “grey-zone warfare". This refers to actions that fall between peace and full-scale war. They are aggressive enough to change realities on the ground, but calibrated to stay below the level that would trigger a major international military response.

Grey-zone tactics thrive on hesitation. Because no single action clearly qualifies as an act of war, responses are delayed, debated, and often diluted. Over time, the status quo shifts without a decisive confrontation.

China has used this method before. In the South China Sea, it gradually turned disputed reefs into militarised islands through incremental steps. Each move was small enough to avoid immediate retaliation, but collectively they transformed the region’s strategic landscape.

Around Taiwan, Beijing is applying the same logic, this time in the air and at sea.

Ironically, a strategy designed to avoid war may make it more likely. When military forces operate in proximity with unclear intentions, the margin for error shrinks. A collision, a misinterpreted manoeuvre, or a technical malfunction could escalate rapidly. With exercises so realistic, even decision-makers may struggle to distinguish signalling from execution.

Ambiguity also compresses response time. If an actual attack were launched under the cover of an exercise, Taiwan and its partners might lose precious hours debating whether the crisis is real. In modern warfare, those hours can be decisive.

This is why many security experts argue that the greatest danger today is not a planned invasion, but an unintended escalation driven by misjudgement.

For Taiwan, the psychological impact is as significant as the military one. Living under constant military pressure drains resources, strains personnel, and creates a sense of perpetual crisis. Air defence systems are activated repeatedly. Pilots are scrambled. Naval patrols intensify. Over time, fatigue sets in.

This pressure is deliberate. China’s aim is not necessarily immediate conquest, but erosion of confidence, readiness, and international support. By making coercion routine, Beijing hopes the world will gradually accept it as the new normal.

For the US and its regional partners, China’s strategy creates an uncomfortable choice.

Respond too forcefully to every exercise, and the risk of escalation grows. Respond too cautiously, and China’s actions become entrenched. Either way, ambiguity works in Beijing’s favour.

Washington has attempted to counter this by increasing its own military presence and signalling support for Taiwan, while still avoiding an explicit security guarantee. But the more China tests the boundaries, the harder it becomes to maintain that balance.

This uncertainty extends to US allies such as Japan, Australia, and South Korea, all of whom would be affected by a Taiwan conflict but must calibrate their responses carefully.

From New Delhi, Taiwan may appear geographically remote. Strategically, however, the implications are immediate.

China’s behaviour around Taiwan mirrors patterns India has already experienced along the Line of Actual Control. Incremental pressure, unclear thresholds, denial of escalation until facts are established on the ground — these are familiar tactics. The lessons China draws from Taiwan will shape how it approaches future stand-offs elsewhere.

“China selectively varies the method of signalling its territorial claim. This is done sometimes by denying visas, sometimes by asserting they are unnecessary, and sometimes by issuing stapled visas. This variation is not the result of confusion or goodwill, but a deliberate attempt at maintaining strategic ambiguity," said Tarun Joshi, PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne, in a report by the Observer Research Foundation. This is in the context of China’s long-standing visa practices towards residents of Arunachal Pradesh, which Beijing refers to as “Zangnan" or South Tibet.

In January 2011, a weightlifting coach and an athlete from Arunachal received stapled visas for a sports event in Fujian. Indian immigration officers at the Delhi airport refused to clear him for travel. In June 2011, members of an Indian karate team from Arunachal Pradesh faced visa issues with China when officials from the Chinese Embassy issued them stapled visas for an Asian Championship in Guangzhou, preventing them from traveling. The most recent case was in 2023, when three wushu players from Arunachal Pradesh were issued stapled visas by the Chinese embassy in July, preventing their participation in the World University Games in Chengdu.

If ambiguity-based coercion succeeds in the Taiwan Strait, it reinforces a model that can be applied along land borders, maritime zones, and contested regions across Asia.

A major crisis around Taiwan would reshape the Indo-Pacific security environment overnight. Trade routes would be disrupted, naval deployments would surge, and regional alliances would be tested. For India, which increasingly sees the Indo-Pacific as central to its strategic outlook, this would demand recalibration.

India’s role in groupings like the Quad rests on maintaining a balance between deterrence and strategic autonomy. A Taiwan conflict would intensify pressure on New Delhi to align more openly with one side, potentially complicating relations with China while redefining ties with partners like the US and Japan.

Beyond security, the economic consequences would be severe, and India would not be insulated.

Taiwan sits at the heart of the global semiconductor supply chain. Advanced chips used in smartphones, cars, defence systems, and industrial equipment largely originate there. Even limited disruption could ripple through global manufacturing.

India’s ambitions to become a major electronics and defence manufacturing hub depend on stable access to these components. A prolonged crisis would raise costs, delay production, and complicate supply chain diversification efforts.

This is not a story about predicting war tomorrow. It is about recognising how power is exercised quietly and persistently. China is not rewriting the rules on Taiwan through declarations or invasions, but through normalisation. Each drill, each patrol, each simulated blockade nudges the system closer to a tipping point.

For India, the strategies tested in the Taiwan Strait will not remain confined there. They will inform how China manages disputes, pressures neighbours, and shapes the regional order.

Seeing Taiwan as “someone else’s problem" is no longer a viable option. In an Asia where ambiguity itself has become a weapon, understanding these shifts is the first step towards preparing for their consequences.

News explainers Is This China’s New War Tactic? Strategic Ambiguity Playbook On Taiwan, Why India Can’t Ignore It