Mon, May 03, 2004 page8

• `The 7-day coup d'etat' and its real meanings

  • By Chin Heng-wei 金恆煒
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  The "seven-day coup d'etat" that lasted from March 20 through March 27 is a major incident in Taiwanese history.

  The first reason it is so important is that the party-state system of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) boldly attempted to alter the results of a democratic election with this "coup," failing by a hair's breadth, and thereby signalling the end of the party-state.

  The other reason is that the consolidation of Taiwan's democracy is no longer in doubt, and from now on we can work on deepening it.

  Future historians are sure to add their bit to this incident, perhaps even in the style of the historian Jonathan Spence.

  Spence might have written about the former chairman of the Democratic Progressive Party, Hsu Hsin-liang (許信良) announcing at the scene of the coup "I declare Lien Chan (連戰) and James Soong (宋楚瑜) as the 11th president and vice-

  president, according to the wishes of the Taiwanese people." Such an account certainly would spotlight the absurdities of Lien, Soong and the pan-blue camp.

  This attempted "coup" is neither a fabrication nor an unfounded accusation, and it is not hard to see why both former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) and President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) brought it up.

  Chen actually said: "It has been said that there was an abortive coup d'etat between March 21 and 27."

  Notice the judicious use of the words "It has been said that." To put it more finely, Chen approached the "seven-day coup d'etat" with a political solution in mind.

  The pan-blues apparently became livid upon hearing these comments. The People First Party demanded an apology from Lee and Chen within 24 hours, and the KMT asked for evidence to justify use of the coup label.

  It's possible that neither man has substantial evidence to offer, but it could also be that they are just not willing to reveal it.

  If they do, in fact, have such evidence, and wanted to do something about it, they could throw Taiwan into turmoil. This would be of no obvious advantage to the authorities, and they may well be keeping mum about it for this reason, preferring not to take it any further.

  Do I have any basis for saying this? Yes, I do, in the infamous Watergate scandal.

  This scandal started when US president Richard Nixon was campaigning for re-election in 1972, and people working for him broke into Democratic Party offices in the Watergate Hotel.

  It appears that during his 1968 campaign Nixon had used his "secret emissary" Anna Chennault (陳香梅) to persuade South Vietnamese president Nguyen Van Thieu not to attend the Paris Peace Talks with North Vietnam.

  This effectively crippled then US president Lyndon Johnson's foreign policies. Nixon's intention was to demonstrate Johnson's inability to end the war in Vietnam. In return, Nixon promised to help the South unite Vietnam after he was elected. Johnson kept quiet about Nixon's treasonous behavior, even keeping it under wraps when Nixon won the election. He did, however, force Nixon to stop the US war in return for his silence.

  In 1972 Nixon sought re-election, and put his neck on the line with the Watergate burglary to find out whether the Democrats were planning to use the stick of his past deeds to beat him with.

  Nixon's behavior was in fact treasonous, but Johnson kept it under wraps for the good of the country. Is this the situation facing Chen?

  Chin Heng-wei is editor in chief of Contemporary Monthly.

  TRANSLATED BY PAUL COOPER
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