Army extends Lu Sheng 2 brigade drill to 10 days with M1A2T tanks

Taiwan's Army will run its second nationwide brigade-level force-on-force exercise from 14 to 23 October 2026, extending the drill to 10 days and nine nights, the Ministry of National Defense said at a planning briefing. The event, designated Lu Sheng 2, will pit the Taoyuan-based 269th Combined Arms Brigade against the Kaohsiung-based 564th Combined Arms Brigade in unscripted simulated combat across northern Taiwan.

Army Education and Training Command Deputy Commander Major General Lin Shih-wei said the exercise is the service's annual brigade-level tactical certification. It will test brigade and battalion command and control, fire-support coordination, delaying actions, joint air-land operations, drone employment and special-operations use, with no scripted maneuvers or predetermined outcomes from the opening deployment day through the final engagements.

Officials said Lu Sheng 2 will also serve as a field certification for recently fielded systems, including M1A2T Abrams main battle tanks, the Taiwan Tactical Network, Eutelsat OneWeb satellite communications as a backup path, and uncrewed aerial vehicles already in service. The longer schedule replaces last year's seven-day format so units can sustain round-the-clock operations without pause.

Deployment begins on 14 October, when the 564th moves north to probe defensive positions established by the 269th. From 15 to 23 October the two brigades will fight through continuous day-and-night engagements intended to stress situational awareness, endurance and logistics under immersive conditions that the Army says more closely match wartime tempo.

The exercise area has been shifted to northern Taiwan to familiarise units with terrain and fire-support geometry assessed as strategically important for defence of the capital region. An Army Corps-level headquarters will form a higher command post for joint coordination, while reserve commands will send liaison officers to link military logistics with local governments during the fight.

Central News Agency reporting of the same briefing said the Army Training and Education Command will umpire the fight and use a live simulation engagement system to score contacts. Commissioned officers will review performance afterward so lessons can feed into doctrine, umpire standards and future brigade evaluations across the force.

The inaugural Lu Sheng exercise in 2025 matched the 542nd Armored Brigade against the 234th Mechanized Infantry Brigade in central Taiwan for seven days. This year's edition keeps that force-on-force model but lengthens the timeline, adds new combat systems to the certification list, and relocates the battle space northward to match current defence priorities.

Together, the planning details portray Lu Sheng 2 as an end-of-year readiness gate for Army brigades rather than a scripted demonstration. By combining Abrams tanks, resilient communications, drones and continuous operations against a peer opposing force, the ministry is asking units to prove they can fight and sustain under the same pressures Taiwan expects in a high-intensity defence scenario.

Taipei Times and Taiwan News accounts of the briefing align on the dates, opposing brigades, extended duration and the systems under test, giving a consistent multi-outlet record ahead of the mid-October start. For readers tracking ground-force modernisation, the exercise is the clearest near-term public test of how Taiwan intends to fight with M1A2T tanks and networked sensors at brigade scale.

This report was produced through TaiwanDefence’s automated publishing system and includes links to its supporting sources.