Japan sends destroyer through Taiwan Strait for first time under Takaichi, Beijing protests

Analysis
JS Ikazuchi's Taiwan Strait transit, the first under Takaichi and immediately preceding US-Philippine joint exercises in the South China Sea, very likely codifies a Tokyo-Manila-Washington maritime-signaling cadence Beijing has not found an effective counter to. Guo Jiakun's protest is pro-forma; a PLA coast-guard intercept or near-miss with a Japanese hull is unlikely within 30 days, though the probability rises with each repeated transit. The indicator to watch is whether a second JMSDF transit occurs within 60 days; periodicity is what converts a single transit into doctrine. The Takaichi cabinet may instead have intended Ikazuchi as a one-off credibility marker, in which case the trilateral cadence read overstates institutional commitment.