Parents and politicians on Tuesday were infuriated when they found a government-sponsored educational Web site to promote national defense concepts showing a video of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on parade, along with about 40 World War II movies that were produced by the Chinese government.
The controversy also riled opposition legislators at the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee meeting yesterday, who accused top military officials of negligence for helping Chinese propaganda materials reach Taiwanese.
The Web site that broadcast the videos is among the programs managed by the National Defense Education Center, a collaboration between the Ministry of National Defense and the Ministry of Education, and is based at Hsinchu Senior Girls’ High School in Hsinchu City.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taichung City councilors Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) and Hsieh Chih-chung (謝志忠) on Tuesday said it was egregious that the Ministry of Education is apparently unable to distinguish between our own military and enemy troops.
“If our students’ education on national defense has to depend on China to supply the materials, then our national security is in trouble,” Hsieh said.
Their sentiments were echoed by DPP Legislator Hsu Tain-tsair (許添財), who questioned Minister of National Defense Kao Kuang-chi (高廣圻) at the legislature over the matter.
“Our nation is facing a perilous situation with the threat of force from China. However, we are also facing real dangers of subversion from within, and cooperation with the enemy by Taiwanese who are bought off to work for China. This Web site is helping China to promote their military might and to destroy our national identity,” Hsu said.
He demanded that Kao and his military officials make a full investigation, since the Web site and the education center are part of a defense ministry program.
After the issue was raised on Tuesday, the Chinese video materials in question were removed, and officials at the education ministry promised to beef up the Web site’s internal monitoring and checks mechanism.
School principal Lu Shu-mei (呂淑美) said that the videos were uploaded by an assistant at the National Defense Education Center, which provides materials for teachers.
“Maybe the assistant believed those videos would help teachers to better understand China’s military threat against Taiwan, so she decided to put them online for viewing. We understand it could cause controversy, due to people’s different interpretations, so the videos have been taken off,” Lu said.
However, National Federation of Teachers Unions president Chang Hsu-cheng (張旭政) suspected a hidden agenda by the Ministry of Education.
“China’s military parade with PLA troops on display to mark victory over Japan in World War II demonstrated only China’s viewpoint. It is totally different from the Taiwanese historical view,” he said.
“We see the adjustment of the high-school curriculum guidelines was led by pro-China academics. So I suspect this is also the case — that a few officials’ political concepts and ideology now have full influence over the education ministry,” he said.
MISINFORMATION: The generated content tends to adopt China’s official stance, such as ‘Taiwan is currently governed by the Chinese central government,’ the NSB said Five China-developed artificial intelligence (AI) language models exhibit cybersecurity risks and content biases, an inspection conducted by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The five AI tools are: DeepSeek, Doubao (豆包), Yiyan (文心一言), Tongyi (通義千問) and Yuanbao (騰訊元寶), the bureau said, advising people to remain vigilant to protect personal data privacy and corporate business secrets. The NSB said it, in accordance with the National Intelligence Services Act (國家情報工作法), has reviewed international cybersecurity reports and intelligence, and coordinated with the Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau and the National Police Agency’s Criminal Investigation Bureau to conduct an inspection of China-made AI language
LIMITS: While China increases military pressure on Taiwan and expands its use of cognitive warfare, it is unwilling to target tech supply chains, the report said US and Taiwan military officials have warned that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could implement a blockade within “a matter of hours” and need only “minimal conversion time” prior to an attack on Taiwan, a report released on Tuesday by the US Senate’s China Economic and Security Review Commission said. “While there is no indication that China is planning an imminent attack, the United States and its allies and partners can no longer assume that a Taiwan contingency is a distant possibility for which they would have ample time to prepare,” it said. The commission made the comments in its annual
DETERMINATION: Beijing’s actions toward Tokyo have drawn international attention, but would likely bolster regional coordination and defense networks, the report said Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s administration is likely to prioritize security reforms and deterrence in the face of recent “hybrid” threats from China, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said. The bureau made the assessment in a written report to the Legislative Yuan ahead of an oral report and questions-and-answers session at the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The key points of Japan’s security reforms would be to reinforce security cooperation with the US, including enhancing defense deployment in the first island chain, pushing forward the integrated command and operations of the Japan Self-Defense Forces and US Forces Japan, as
‘TROUBLEMAKER’: Most countries believe that it is China — rather than Taiwan — that is undermining regional peace and stability with its coercive tactics, the president said China should restrain itself and refrain from being a troublemaker that sabotages peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday. Lai made the remarks after China Coast Guard vessels sailed into disputed waters off the Senkaku Islands — known as the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) in Taiwan — following a remark Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made regarding Taiwan. Takaichi during a parliamentary session on Nov. 7 said that a “Taiwan contingency” involving a Chinese naval blockade could qualify as a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, and trigger Tokyo’s deployment of its military for defense. Asked about the escalating tensions
RSS