Justice Mission-2025: the largest exercise since 2022, and the closest

Why it mattersThis is the reference point against which every later statement about the 2026 activity baseline is measured, and three things about it are load-bearing. First, the Eastern Theater Command's own stated objectives included "blockading key ports and territory" alongside combat-readiness patrols and deterrence of outside intervention — Vigil records that as declared exercise language, not as evidence that any blockade occurred or was attempted, and no interference with commercial shipping was reported. Second, the announced areas sat closer to Taiwan than in previous exercises, with several overlapping waters Taiwan claims as territorial sea; no PRC vessel entered that territorial sea, and roughly ten rockets are reported to have impacted within the contiguous zone twelve to twenty-four nautical miles out — the first such firings since 2022. Declared zone geometry, actual vessel entry and munition impact are three different facts and secondary reporting routinely collapses them. Third, coast guard vessels operated inside a military joint exercise, which is the clearest documented instance of the law-enforcement instrument and the military one being used together.