In April, I asserted that the lessons learned from Russia’s war in Ukraine might influence China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to “accelerate the timetable for a smaller scale conflict” in the Taiwan Strait, short of a full-scale amphibious invasion (China Brief, April 8). On August 4, the PLA began a series of joint live-fire exercises in six exclusion zones surrounding Taiwan, including some that imposed on Taiwan’s territorial seas (81.cn, August 6). These exercises signal Beijing’s extreme pique that U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi led a Congressional delegation to meet with the leadership of Taiwan on August 2 and 3 (People’s Daily, August 3). Longtime students of PLA doctrine and military thought will recognize that these exercises have been in the works for the better part of two decades. In The Science of Joint Training, military deterrence is described as an essential objective of joint live-fire exercises:The essence of military deterrence is to attack the will and sap the purpose, to win without fighting. It is manifest mainly in demonstrating military strength during peacetime, achieving the effect of "we must fight or we are an army of cowards". Joint training particularly entails joint exercises involving real troops, real equipment, and live ammunition, and can directly demonstrate military strength, bringing into play the utility of military deterrence. [1]The latest drills are ostensibly reminiscent of the live-fire exercises that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) conducted in 1995 and 1996 during the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis, but the surface resemblances belie deeper transformations within the PLA and their implications for the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) menu of options with regards to Taiwan. The Third Taiwan Strait Crisis was a contest of force posturing, first by the PRC to convince the Republic of China (ROC), or Taiwan, and the United States that Beijing was willing to employ the full scope of its military power to prevent moves by Taiwan toward greater international recognition. The United States struggled to calibrate an appropriate response to China’s actions, but eventually opted to send a second carrier battle group into the area. After the USS Nimitz group joined the USS Independence group, China curtailed further missile tests, in a move that appeared to be, “moderating [its] coercive posture.”[2] The aftermath found a belligerent, but chastened China, and led to a reprieve for the United States and Taiwan. Yet, in appearing to succumb to U.S. pressure, “Beijing’s civilian and military leaders had resolved that such a humiliation would never happen again.” [3] The currently unfolding series of diplomatic and military maneuvers may be seen as an epilogue to that episode from a quarter century earlier. China may now have sufficient confidence in its armed forces to resist countervailing posturing by the United States.