Even before Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's recent visit to Taipei, China and the United States had entered a fraught escalatory action-reaction cycle regarding Taiwan.

Beijing had been chafing at the Taiwanese public's increasing support for independence and perceiving growing American backing for the island. Recently, it bolstered its campaign of economic coercion of Taipei and increased the cadence of cyber-attacks and intrusions into the island's air defence identification zone.