Taiwan coast guard drives four Chinese ships from Kinmen waters in rough seas

TAIPEI — Taiwan's Coast Guard Administration said four China Coast Guard ships entered Kinmen restricted waters on the morning of 6 November 2026 and were driven out after roughly two hours of one-to-one shadowing in rising northeast monsoon seas. Central News Agency, citing the Kinmen-Matsu-Penghu branch, said patrol boats detected the formation about 9 a.m. Taipei time and that the ships left at 11:13 a.m.

The branch identified the hull numbers as 14604, 14530, 14608 and 14531. Liberty Times and UDN both reported the same four-ship line-up and said Kinmen patrol boats took station alongside each vessel, kept continuous visual and radio contact, and broadcast departure orders in Chinese and English until the formation cleared the restricted zone.

ETtoday, also citing the Kinmen-Matsu-Penghu branch, framed the sortie against a worsening sea state. Northeast monsoon winds had already built short, steep seas around Kinmen, yet the China Coast Guard formation still closed on the restricted waters. Coast Guard crews kept the one-to-one escort through the rough conditions rather than breaking contact, the outlet reported.

Liberty Times noted that local observers have counted five Kinmen-water intrusions by China Coast Guard ships between 30 October and 6 November 2026: two on 30 October, then one each on 2 November, 4 November and 6 November. That cadence is separate from the Coast Guard Day tally Taiwan released a day earlier, which counted 618 Chinese-vessel expulsions nationwide so far in 2026.

The Coast Guard Administration, as relayed by CNA and UDN, said operating in poor weather raised risk for both patrol crews and other traffic and urged Beijing to stop similar harassment. The agency described the pattern as an attempt to expand control under the cover of law-enforcement claims and said it would keep monitoring Kinmen waters under a no-provocation, no-retreat posture.

Kinmen sits less than 10 kilometres off China's Fujian coast and has become a regular stage for grey-zone coast-guard pressure short of naval combat. Today's expulsion did not involve Taiwan Navy warships or reported use of force beyond radio warnings and close escort. The value of the release is the open accounting of hull numbers, times and tactics on a day when weather already complicated small-boat work.

For Taipei, the Kinmen sequence matters because it pairs a concrete same-day incident with a short multi-day pattern rather than a single anonymous sighting. Publishing the 6 November hull list, the 11:13 a.m. exit time and the one-to-one escort method keeps a public record of pressure that can rise on even-numbered calendar days without waiting for a larger named exercise.

The Kinmen branch has used the same one-to-one escort script in earlier November incidents, including the 4 November afternoon entry by hulls 14608, 14531, 14604 and 14530 that left after about two hours of close shadowing. Today's morning window and monsoon framing mark a fresh phase of the same grey-zone pattern rather than a re-write of that earlier expulsion.

The coast guard still has not released which Kinmen patrol hulls made the intercepts, nor whether China Coast Guard boats crossed into prohibited versus restricted water at every stage. What the branch did confirm through multiple Taiwanese outlets is that four named China Coast Guard ships closed on Kinmen waters in monsoon seas on 6 November and left after a sustained escort.