Where is civil defense?
The summary of the Parameters article that the Taipei Times printed ("US expert warns of early Taiwan Strait war," Sept. 1, page 1) is both plausible and frightening. It is plausible for two reasons: China has the missiles (and adds 50 or more a year) to make a surprise attack work and secondly, China's leaders lack any compunction about killing their countrymen.
It's worth remembering the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s ended because Iran could neither deter, stop, nor retaliate against Iraq's poison-gas missile attacks. Teheran's population, without any means of defense whatsoever, sued for peace.
Would Taipei's population hang any tougher? We are equally defenseless. Defenseless populations, when given the chance, do as the men of Harfleur did upon hearing Henry V's ultimatum; they surrender.
Taiwan's capitulation after a few days of missile bombardment should come as no surprise. What is surprising is that Taiwan has failed to develop its own deterrent in the decades since the Mutual Defense Treaty with the US lapsed. What is even more surprising is Taiwan's failure to develop a comprehensive civil defense system.
How many of your readers know the name and number of their local civil defense warden? How many could find their designated shelter under blackout conditions without power? Would anyone even try?
The most common response to emergencies like earthquakes and typhoons is to sit tight and ride them out -- at least until your home is coming down around you ears.
Given that Taiwan has long suffered earthquakes, typhoons, torrential rains, flooding, mud-slides and the threat of missile bombardment, why is there no civil defense organization prepared to evacuate people living in flood areas before the boulders crash through the walls and able to guarantee evacuees that surviving homes will not have been looted?
Surely some of those delicate young people who object to carrying a gun in defense of their country could do alternative civil defense service helping their friends and neighbors survive emergencies. With a competent civil defense service, the air raid drills wouldn't be so lame. Perhaps buildings could really be evacuated, perhaps schoolchildren could actually be taken to shelters. Perhaps shelters could really be prepared to shelter humans rather than cars. Perhaps parking garages could really be converted into tenable shelters.
A government of a frontline state that is not serious about civil defense is a government of clowns.
Bruce Franklin
Taipei
Enough of Chinese thuggery
Texas Representative Tom DeLay recently accused China of "international thuggery," following China's decision to adopt punitive measures against Credit Suisse First Boston merchant bank because of the latter's high profile links with Taiwanese officials. As usual, China's action makes a mockery of its commitment to be a responsible inter-national player (and this is a clear foretaste of things to come after China joins the WTO), but this one really should be the last straw. Enough is enough!
It is time to show that international thuggery does not pay, and to ensure that is does backfire. Time to stop uttering empty words of condemnation and start taking real action. International business must be able to operate without any fear of retaliation by capricious Chinese officials.
Perhaps DeLay should have talked about taking real action against rogue China, such as introducing legislation calling for heavy measures against Chinese companies operating on US soil, to be adopted every time China unfairly punishes US companies for political reasons. Such measures might include: forced de-listing for a certain period (say one year) from all US stock exchanges for all Chinese companies already quoted; no new IPOs for a certain period for Chinese companies; forcing Chinese companies to wind up their US operations.
George Dukes
Dublin, Ireland
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