Taipei, Taiwan (CNN) — Taiwan’s president and top officials late Wednesday practiced how they would respond to an attempted “decapitation strike,” an operation to take out the island’s leadership, like the US capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro earlier this year.
An armored personnel carrier whisked President Lai Ching-te and members of his staff from their offices in the capital Taipei to a fortified command center near the Defense Ministry, a statement from the president’s office said.
“The drill was intended to review the command structure, inter-agency coordination, and emergency-response mechanisms, so as to ensure that the government can continue operating effectively and safeguarding national security” during any possible action against the island, Karen Kuo, the presidential spokesperson, said in a statement on Thursday.
A government handout video showed the armored vehicle speeding through Taipei streets on the way to the command center. Lai was also seen donning a flak jacket, listening to briefings and issuing instructions during the drill.
Dubbed the “Wan Chun,” the drill was part of the 10-day Han Kuang exercises, the island’s largest annual military drills, which began on Wednesday.
The Wan Chun drill simulates the evacuation of Taiwan’s leader to a safe place in the event of war or other emergencies.
While it was the first known time for Lai to participate, previous leaders like Tsai Ing-wen and Ma Ying-jeou have done so. It’s been around since the Cold War era, when then leader Chiang Kai-shek became wary of an attempt on the island by the Chinese Communist Party, which claims Taiwan as part of its sovereign territory, despite never having controlled it.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping has vowed to bring Taiwan under party’s control, and has not ruled out the use of force to do so.
Images from China over the years have shown a mockup of the presidential office, other government agencies and street layouts in Taipei built in the Chinese desert and troops attacking it in exercises.
Meanwhile, Beijing keeps almost constant pressure on the democratic island with its own military exercises and gray-zone activities, tactics employing non-military assets like law enforcement and administrative units, in areas surrounding the island.
But the global security situation has brought new urgency to the Taiwanese exercises this year.
The US capture of Maduro in early January and the US-Israeli decapitation strikes on Tehran’s leadership in the early stages of the war against Iran have demonstrated a need for prudent preparation.
“Taiwan needs to ready itself for the scenario now unfolding in Iran – and fast,” Charles Lyons-Jones, a research fellow at Australia’s Lowy Institute’s Foreign Policy and Public Opinion Program, wrote in March.
A senior Taiwan defense official told reporters ahead of the drills that they are no longer a “lab-like exercise in a vacuum.”
Bridge drills
Late Thursday night, Taiwanese troops practiced defending the Danjiang Bridge at a critical chokepoint that could give Chinese forces a shortcut to capture Taipei, as annual war games entered their second day of testing the island’s ability to repel an attack.
The nearly one-kilometer-long bridge, which opened earlier this year, hovers above the Tamsui River, potentially giving adversaries direct entry to the heart of Taipei. The area is considered strategically significant for its proximity to the Taipei port and beaches in Taiwan that could serve as a valuable staging area for the Chinese military.
To simulate thwarting advances by enemy forces using the bridge, soldiers erected layers of barriers and rolled barbed wire.
During the first two days of the island’s largest war games, some 20,000 reservists were mobilized to practice the defense of critical infrastructure such as ports, power plants and bridges. Air defense missile systems like the Patriots and Tien-Kung could also be seen on the streets in downtown Taipei.
Next week, for the first time ever, Taiwan will deliberately slow its mobile internet speed, testing how citizens would communicate if bandwidth becomes scarce in emergencies ranging from disasters to a Chinese invasion.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.