Just as a controversial report by Nihon Keizai Shimbun alleging that many retired Taiwanese military officers had visited and spied for China has run its course, another event threatens to deal a second blow to the military’s image. Reports say that several veterans’ associations are organizing tours for more than 500 veterans to attend the 99th anniversary of the Whampoa Military Academy in China.
Veterans Affairs Council Minister Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) admonished veterans that the event is a thinly veiled attempt to promote unification and urged them not to attend. The council also called on the academy’s alumni not to fall for the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “united front” tactics.
The hearth and home of Whampoa Military Academy is at the Republic of China (ROC) Military Academy, headquartered at Kaohsiung’s Fongshan District (鳳山), Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Tai-san (邱太三) said, adding that most, if not all, Taiwanese veterans were trained at home, not in China.
Defending the veterans’ plan, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator-at-large Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷), a retired lieutenant general, said that the Constitution protects people’s right to travel.
On many levels, no veteran should harbor thoughts about attending the event in China, be it in terms of history, political affiliation or patriotism.
To back up its claim that Taiwan is an inseparable part of its territory, China is using the Whampoa Military Academy to assert its connections with Taiwan. Founded on June 16, 1924, the ROC Military Academy, previously known as the Whampoa Military Academy due to its location in China’s Huangpu District, was established at a time of CCP-KMT alliance to train troops to counter local warlords and unite China. It was re-established in Taiwan after Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) retreat, yet China is latching on to this flimsy connection to claim kinship and blood ties. What is worse is Taiwanese veterans have failed to see through China’s ploy and insist on identifying as alumni of an alien academy.
This incident illustrates why foreign media have said “identity” is one of the major concerns plaguing Taiwan. An article in The Economist said: “A plurality of Taiwanese are undecided on either party affiliation or on independence versus unification.” This is even more unnerving when veterans — people who should be the epitome of unwavering loyalty to one’s nation and its people — demonstrate such ambiguous attitudes.
Mao Zedong (毛澤東) once said: “Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is a question of the first importance for the revolution.” Some Taiwanese veterans, whether because they subscribe to the ideology that “both sides of the Strait are one family” or because of self-interest, suffer from an inability to differentiate between friend and foe, and are facilitating a third CCP-KMT alliance to undermine Taiwanese independence and promote unification.
It is a great shame that these veterans, whose pensions are paid out of taxpayers’ money, are turning their backs on Chiang’s founding belief of countering communism and have become China’s walking advertisement for unification.
Perhaps, the greatest culprit is the KMT. As the founder of the academy, its party members have had a long history of pandering to China — from its acceptance of the so-called “1992 consensus” to former KMT chairpeople visiting China to talk about “one country, two systems,” and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) meeting in Singapore. If a head of state could demonstrate such a pro-China attitude, it is not surprising that veterans or members of the military could show wavering allegiance.
As a nation on the front line of Chinese aggression, Taiwan cannot afford to suffer from an identity crisis, let alone its veterans. The KMT should also reflect on the motto set down by its founding fathers.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) has repeatedly voiced concern over the weakening cost competitiveness of its US fabs and challenged the US’ “on-shore” policy of building domestic semiconductor capacity. Yet not once has the government said anything, even though the economy is highly dependent on the chip industry. In the US, the cost of operating a semiconductor factory is at least twice the amount required to operate one in Taiwan, rather than the 50 percent he had previously calculated, Chang said on Thursday last week at a forum arranged by CommonWealth Magazine. He said that he had
The Twenty-Four Histories (中國廿四史) is a collection of official Chinese dynastic histories from Records of the Grand Historian (史記) to the History of the Ming Dynasty (明史) that cover the time from the legendary Yellow Emperor (黃帝) to the Chongzhen Emperor (崇禎), the last Ming emperor. History is written by the victors. These histories are not merely records of the rise and fall of emperors, they also demonstrate the ways in which conquerors embellished their own achievements while deriding those of the conquered. The history written by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is no exception. The PRC presents its
In August 2013, Reuters reported that Beijing had been gaining soft power with investment commitments and trade with countries in Latin America. However, instead of jumping on the chance to make new allies, China stalled requests to establish diplomatic relations with the countries to avoid galling Taiwanese voters. Beijing was also courting then-president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), and the tactic left China with a trump card if cross-strait relations turned cool. China had rebuffed at least five countries’ requests to switch diplomatic recognition to Beijing, the report said, quoting a China analyst. Honduras could become the ninth diplomatic ally, and also the fifth
The International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant issued on Friday last week for Russian President Vladimir Putin delighted Uighurs, as Putin’s today signals Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) tomorrow. The crimes committed by Xi are many times more serious than what Putin has been accused of. Putin has caused more than 8 million people to flee Ukraine. By imprisoning more than 3 million Uighurs in concentration camps and restricting the movement of more than 10 million Uighurs, Xi has not only denied them the opportunity to live humanely, but also the opportunity to escape oppression. The 8 million Ukrainians who fled
RSS