TAIWAN's military displays its strength and power in a series of drills which simulates an invasion by China.
These incredible pictures show fighter jets and tanks in action along with rockets being launched during two days of drills at the Tainan Air Force base in the south of the country.
According to the Taiwanese Military News Agency, the government carried out the public display of military muscle to reassure its people amid rising tensions with its neighbour China.
In late November, the Chinese Air Force carried out drills in the Western Pacific, flying through a channel that separates Taiwan and the Philippines.
The air force described the exercises as part of normal annual planned drills that comply with international law and practice.
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But they come as China has been increasingly asserting itself in territorial disputes in the South and East China Seas.
And last month, President-elect Donald Trump took a congratulatory phone call from the President of Taiwan Tsai Ing-wen – a breach of diplomatic norms which infuriated China.
The emerging communist superpower hit back at Trump through a series of damning front pages on government-affiliated newspapers.
The front page of the People’s Daily read: “Provoking friction and messing up China-US relations won’t help ‘make America great again.”
Likewise, warnings of Trump’s “inability to keep his mouth shut” and his “provocation and falsehoods” were the subject of a front-page article in the Chinese edition of the Global Times.
Following the backlash, Trump took to Twitter to insist he did not need China’s permission to engage with Taiwan – which Beijing views as a breakaway province.
He accused Beijing of currency manipulation and flexing its military might in the South China Sea.
Trump tweeted: “Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency (making it hard for our companies to compete), heavily tax our products going into their country (the U.S. doesn’t tax them).”
He added: “Or to build a massive military complex in the middle of the South China Sea? I don’t think so!”
His outburst came just hours after his team tried to downplay the fact that Trump could threaten a diplomatic rift with Beijing.
But Trump’s critics pointed out the call was the first time a US president or President-elect has spoken to a Taiwanese leader since 1979.
The US has not formally recognised Taiwan as an independent state since it re-established diplomatic ties with the communist mainland over 40 years ago.
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