TENSE

China Unleashes 71 Fighter Jets Near Taiwan Over U.S. ‘Provocations’

The warplanes flew near Taiwan on Monday in an apparent response to a U.S. funding bill.

Dozens of Chinese warplanes flew into Taiwan's air defense zone on Monday, escalating tensions between the two countries in an apparent response to a United States bill funding Taiwan. Seventy-one Chinese planes entered the Taiwanese air defense zone as part of what the Chinese government described as a drill, including 47 planes that crossed the center of the Taiwan Strait to get closer to Taiwan.

The incursion comes three days after U.S. President Joe Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act, a mammoth defense spending bill that included funding for Taiwan and supportive language about the republic, whose territory the Chinese government has longed claim as its own. In a statement, the Chinese People's Liberation Army claimed the drills were a response to "provocation" from the United States and its Taiwanese allies.