The 2025 Whole-of-Society Defense Resilience Committee field exercise will be held in Tainan on Thursday, which national security experts explain differs from previous well-known drills in that they are as close to reality as possible. Further, these "urban resilience exercises" (城鎮韌性演習) focus on civilian rather than military responses– Thursday’s drills will be the first to be fully in-line with the “full resilience policy”.
The "urban resilience exercises" integrate the Wan An air raid drills and Min An disaster response exercises as announced by President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) last year.
The Interior Ministry explains the biggest difference between the two and the new singular exercise boils down to the size, and modularity of what was practiced: As separate exercises, the Wan An and Min An drills were pre-arranged, smaller in both participating groups and scope, and focused in one place. Whereas the previous separate drills tested 20 scenarios in one go within 2 to 3 hours, the resilience exercises will test fewer items but look at the processes, and interactions as a whole.
The "urban resilience exercises" will not be arranged ahead of time, with the goal of observing the interaction between the 900 total official and private participants. While this may be a more chaotic drill environment, it will also be closer to the actual situations being tested for.
In an example of the resources being put to the test, these drills will be the first to expand emergency medical care beyond simple medical stations in shelters– incorporating civilian use of the Defense Ministry’s newly acquired Forward Resuscitative and Surgical Detachment medical sets. They will also be testing the mobilization, and collaboration of resources from nearby cities including Kaohsiung, and Chiayi City, among others alongside 400 separate civilian forces.
National Security experts say there will be "urban resilience exercises" from April to July of this year, with Han Kuang drills taking place as normal in July. As for Thursday’s drill, it is scheduled to take place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Tainan Municipal Nan-Ning Senior High School, Anping Port Visitors' Center, and the square across from the Tainan Yuping Post Office, with the scenario being a complicated “compound disaster” test– involving the overlapping threats of natural disasters with destruction of critical infrastructure.