The Crimean Peninsula formerly of the Ukraine has been a focal point for the international community recently.
Some people have compared the Crimean situation to Taiwan’s position and expressed worries that pro-China activists in Taiwan might learn from the pro-Russia activists in Crimea.
They fear a fifth column may help Beijing invade the nation by force.
Russian novelist Alexandr Solzhenitsyn was the first person who compared the situation of Crimea to that of Taiwan.
In a speech entitled “For Free China” given at the Taipei Zhongshan Hall on Oct. 25, 1982, the Nobel laureate, sometimes described as the “conscience of Russia,” said:
“For 33 years, Taiwan, I believe, has attracted, by its specific fate, the attention of many people throughout the world. I myself felt that way long ago. Three score countries have already fallen under the yoke of communism. Scarcely one of them has been fortunate enough to retain even a tiny patch of its independent national territory, where its state authority could continue to develop despite the disruption, and through comparison, show the world the difference between itself and communist disorganization. In Russia, such a patch of land could have been Wrangel’s Crimea, but lacking any external support and abandoned by its unfaithful former allies, it was soon crushed by the communists.”
The Wrangel mentioned in the speech was general Pyotr Wrangel, the last general to lead the Crimean White Army in the fight against the communist Red Army at the end of the Russian Civil War.
Due to the reluctance of the US and European countries at the time, the White Army was isolated, without support and eventually expelled from Crimea.
Through the example of the anti-communist hero from his hometown who failed to reverse the situation, Solzhenitsyn showed his respect to late dictator Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), who opposed communism all his life, and the novelist was glad that the Crimean experience was not repeated in Taiwan.
Now, Crimea has for a second time become a part of Russia. Fortunately, Taiwan has not yet been annexed by communist China.
Surprisingly, Solzhenitsyn seemed to have foreseen that Taiwan would meet with another challenge years later, saying at the end of his speech:
“Your economic successes, your living standards and well-being are of a twofold nature. These are the bright hope of all the Chinese people, but they also can become your weakness. All prosperous people tend to lose the awareness of danger, an addiction of the good living conditions of today, and consequently lose their will for resistance. I hope and I urge you to avoid such a weakening. Don’t permit the youth of your country to become soft and placid, to become slaves to material goods, until finally they will prefer captivity and slavery to the struggle for freedom.”
Luckily, the Sunflower movement has allowed us to clearly see that our youth are not soft and placid, although our shameless politicians and businesspeople have forgotten integrity at the sight of profits.
So, it appears that Solzhenitsyn was wrong, but hold on a minute: The ones he worried about in his speech were those who were young at that time, 32 years ago. Perhaps he said what he did because he happened to see a certain Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) sitting in the front row that night. If that were the case, then he really did foretell the future like a true prophet.
Chen Shih-meng is a former secretary-general of the Presidential Office.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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