There is nothing intrinsically wrong with politicians calling for peace: Countries of the world should seek ways to coexist. This does not mean, however, that we should seek peace in blind fashion or by neglecting to take account of reality.
But this is what New Party Chairman Yok Mu-ming (郁慕明) suggested last week when he called on President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to uphold his promise not to use force across the Taiwan Strait. Days ahead of the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Kinmen, in which close to 600 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Chinese bombardment, Yok, whose party is a strong advocate of unification with China, turned reality on its head and asked the victim to stop threatening the aggressor.
It was like asking Belgium to stop threatening Germany on the eve of World War II.
It is true that the situation today is drastically different from that in 1958, when Taiwan under dictator Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) had a threatening posture toward China and sought to retake it by force. But though events that occurred half a century ago should guide us, they should not freeze us in time. The fact remains that it is China, not Taiwan, that advocates violence. The People’s Liberation Army has continued to modernize at a worrying pace and has a substantial deployment of aggressive weapons. Despite Ma’s efforts at cross-strait rapprochement, none of Beijing’s policies regarding its response to a unilateral declaration of independence by Taipei have changed.
What makes Yok sound even more unrealistic is the fact that he is calling on the head of a state equipped only with defensive weapons to refrain from using force against China. With the exception, perhaps, of its fighter aircraft, Taiwan’s military is meant to defend the land until help arrives. It has very little projection capabilities outside its area of responsibility. Aside from making absolutely no sense politically, launching an attack against China would be nothing less than suicidal.
Gone are the days when a messianic dictator like Chiang sought nuclear weapons or advocated their use against China and later, to prove his mettle as a Cold Warrior, in Vietnam. With democratization in Taiwan came the overdue admission that China could not be “retaken” by force and soon afterwards, as Taiwanese consciousness blossomed, all but the most hardcore members of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) old guard accepted that China and Taiwan were two very distinct entities that should seek to live peacefully side by side. This is the accepted paradigm in Taiwan today, which makes Yok’s call sound completely hollow, if not foolish.
In his misguided appeal, Yok seems to have failed to distinguish between a power-projecting military and the need for national defense. While an argument can be made against developing an aggressive military, a purely defensive military such as the one Taiwan, with US assistance, has developed over the years not only threatens no one but also gives it the wherewithal to negotiate peace on a more level playing field. None of the weapons systems included in the delayed US arms package, which perhaps Yok would like to see mothballed, would change that.
No matter how one paints it, Taiwan is the victim here, not the aggressor.
The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has sent the vast Asian chemicals industry into a tailspin. Deprived of the likes of Qatari natural gas and Saudi Arabian oil, the region’s fertilizer and plastics plants are slowing production or even shutting down. Everywhere except China, that is. In petrochemicals, China is unique. As well as a traditional industry that uses oil and gas as feedstock, it has parallel output that relies on its abundant domestic coal. Unsurprisingly, India and other regional powers want to copy and paste the Chinese method. This would not be easy — or climate friendly. The
KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun’s (鄭麗文) recent visit to Beijing and her upcoming visit to Washington will serve as a high-level test of her diplomatic mettle. In Beijing, Cheng was received with symbolic gestures, a warm reception, and high-level access. In Washington, she will receive far less pomp and far sharper questions about the KMT’s vision for the future of Taiwan. Her challenge will be to persuade Washington that the KMT’s engagement with China can coexist with strong deterrence. Cheng’s April 7-12 visit to mainland China coincided with an intense period of conflict in Iran. Despite the strategic significance of Cheng’s trip,
History might remember 2026, not 2022, as the year artificial intelligence (AI) truly changed everything. ChatGPT’s launch was a product moment. What is happening now is an anthropological moment: AI is no longer merely answering questions. It is now taking initiative and learning from others to get things done, behaving less like software and more like a colleague. The economic consequence is the rise of the one-person company — a structure anticipated in the 2024 book The Choices Amid Great Changes, which I coauthored. The real target of AI is not labor. It is hierarchy. When AI sharply reduces the cost
US President Donald Trump recently repeated his claim that “Taiwan stole America’s chip industry,” reigniting public debate on the issue. As a former Taiwanese minister of economic affairs and an entrepreneur deeply involved in semiconductor supply chain development, I feel a responsibility to clarify this misunderstanding. From the perspective of global industrial evolution and the economic principle of comparative advantage, such a statement appears overly simplistic and risks obscuring the essence of the issue. The rise of Taiwan’s semiconductor industry was not built on “replacing America,” but rather emerged as a result of countries pursuing different development paths within the
RSS