Days after Taiwan President Lai Ching-te and Vice-President Hsiao Bi-khim were sworn in, Beijing has made its feelings about the pair widely known.

The duo are even more despised by the superpower than Taiwan’s outgoing leader Tsai Ing-wen, whose eight years in office was characterised by closer ties with the United States and growing tensions with China.

But the Taiwanese public defied Beijing by delivering Mr Lai the presidency, granting his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) an unprecedented third term.

Many expected China would respond and within days of the inauguration, Taiwan had its answer.

On Wednesday, an editorial for Chinese Communist Party mouth-piece The Global Times, referred to Mr Lai as a ‘”thorough ‘peace disruptor’… with an extremely arrogant attitude”.

Then a day later, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) launched two days of military drills in the air and sea around Taiwan, as well as some outlying islands, which are close to the Chinese coast.

Chinese state media reported dozens of jets were carrying live missiles.

By late Thursday evening, Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defence (MND) said it had spotted 49 Chinese military aircraft, 35 of which crossed the median line, which is the unofficial halfway point between Taiwan and China.

There were also 15 navy ships and 16 coast guard boats in the area.

The spokesperson for the Eastern Theater Command of the PLA said the exercises were a “strong punishment” for the activities of Taiwanese independence forces, and warned against external interference.

Beijing’s response has prompted analysts to warn it could be a sign of bigger things to come.

Why did this recent action happen?

Analysts say there are a couple of reasons behind the timing of Beijing’s military exercises and why it has made its condemnation of Mr Lai so well known.

“I think the purpose of carrying live weapons, but conducting simulated attacks is twofold,” says Ben Lewis, co-founder of PLATracker, a research organisation that tracks Chinese military activity.

“First, I think it is in line with PLA’s goal of practising how they plan to fight, which means carrying the weapons you’re going to use.

“Second, I think it’s a clear case of signalling to Taiwan. Beijing is saying, ‘This time we aren’t using these, next time we might.'”

Some of Beijing’s fury at the new president was sparked by Mr Lai’s inauguration speech on Monday, in which he said China needed to stop its military and political threats.

Beijing has previously described Mr Lai as a “dangerous separatist”. For some years now, Mr Lai has stepped back from his previous description of himself as a “pragmatic worker for Taiwan independence”, seemingly in an effort to appease Beijing.

While Mr Lai made his commitment to maintaining the status quo clear in his address, he also said he hopes China “will face the reality of the Republic of China’s [Taiwan’s] existence [and] respect the choices of the people of Taiwan”.

“So long as China refuses to renounce the use of force against Taiwan, all of us in Taiwan ought to understand, that … China’s ambition to annex Taiwan will not simply disappear,” Mr Lai said.

China responded by saying Mr Lai had sent “dangerous signals” that sought to undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.

“In the 24-hour global news cycle, Beijing feels it needs to visually demonstrate its displeasure against Taiwan’s new Lai Ching-te presidency immediately, lest any narrative that Beijing is setting a new precedent that it can ‘swallow’ [the] Taiwanese leader’s statements that Beijing usually claims to find unacceptable,” says Wen-Ti Sung from The Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub.

“But this is just the ‘signal’ — the real ‘punishment’ may be yet to come.”

China has been growing bolder towards Taiwan

Until 2022, the median line, which was devised with the help of the US during the Cold War but never formally recognised by China, was largely respected as a general boundary by the PLA.

Taiwan’s MND publishes daily updates on PLA activity in the waters and airspace around Taiwan, noting whether any ships or aircraft cross the median line or enter its Air Defense Identification Zone.