Taiwan moves up press freedom index

The nation's ranking may have improved over last year, but serious questions remain, and its position today is still 12 spots below its showing during Chen Shui-bian's last year in office

Taiwan and South Korea made solid bounds in Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) 2010 World Press Freedom Index released yesterday, rising 11 and 27 places respectively, while China languished in 171st place.

“Taiwan and South Korea rose … after noteworthy falls in the 2009 Index,” Paris-based RSF wrote, placing Taiwan in 48th place and South Korea 42nd.

“Although some problems persist, such as the issue of the state-owned media’s editorial independence, arrests and violence have ceased,” RSF said.

In a press release on Oct. 1, the media watchdog called on Taipei to respect the independence of public media and said it was “disturbed” by Sylvia Feng’s (馮賢賢) ouster as president of Public Television Service (PTS).

It reminded the government “of its undertakings to respect the state-owned media’s independence.”

Explaining its decision to rank Taiwan 59th last year, RSF had said: “The new ruling party [Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)] in Taiwan tried to interfere in state and privately owned media while violence by certain activists further undermined press freedom.”

In its latest report on Taiwan released earlier this year, US-based Freedom House also raised questions over the independence of state-owned media and the impact of media conglomerates on freedom of expression.

During the last two years of the administration of former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), Taiwan ranked 36th (2008) and 32nd (2007).

This article, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Selling out to the ‘almighty dollar’

China does not make concessions on human rights; the rest of the world does. The latest victim is Canada, whose prime minister in 2006 had vowed never to sacrifice human rights to the 'almighty dollar'

It didn’t take long for the Canadian government to show its displeasure with Beijing’s knee-jerk reaction to dissident Liu Xiaobo (劉曉波) being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this month.

No sooner had Liu’s wife in turn been placed under house arrest by the Chinese security apparatus than Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper was telling an audience: “The friendship between Canada and China has ... grown in recent years in the context of a frank and respectful dialogue on the universal principles of human rights and the rule of law.”

Right. Harper also told the conference celebrating 40 years of official Sino-Canadian relations that Canada could now talk to Beijing about human rights in a “respectful” manner that (hold your breath) would not harm trade relations.

It should be mentioned at the outset that Harper’s remarks came as he was hailing the “strategic partnership” (here Ottawa is plagiarizing Beijing’s favorite terminology) that has developed between the two countries — and by this he means Canada starting to look more and more like a source of energy for the Asian superpower.

Not so long ago, Harper was getting heat from the Canadian business community for taking too firm a stance on human rights in China, for vowing, less than four years ago, not to sell out Canadian values to the “almighty dollar.”

My unsigned editorial, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

‘Peace’ with China has ugly caveats

Any military confidence-building mechanism between Taiwan and China will be asymmetrical, because only one side threatens the other militarily

Taipei may have turned down Beijing’s offer this time around, claiming the time was not propitious, but it is becoming increasingly evident that at some point between now and the 2012 presidential election, the two sides will sit down and discuss military matters in the Taiwan Strait.

Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Yang Yi (楊毅) on Wednesday made headlines with his proposal that, when the conditions are right, Taipei and Beijing should sit down and discuss military confidence-building mechanisms and the possible dismantlement of the more than 1,500 ballistic missiles that continue to threaten Taiwan, despite allegedly warming ties.

Although the Mainland Affairs Council and, somewhat surprisingly, Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said the same day that mutual trust had yet to reach a point where such talks would be feasible, pressure is likely to mount in the coming months on President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration to come to the table and discuss “peace.” In that respect, Yang’s announcement was again proof of how cannily Beijing can play the political game. After all, which peace-loving nation — including the US, Taiwan’s main ally — could, in its right mind oppose “peace” talks in what remains one of the world’s most dangerous flashpoints? (Never mind that confidence building creates a moral equivalence in the Taiwan Strait that simply does not exist, as only one side, China, is the aggressor.)

As the expected pressure mounts, the ball will be in Taipei’s court, with Beijing’s peace overture once again portraying the latter as the “rational” actor in the equation and Taiwan as the reluctant partner. Deferral on Taipei’s part, meanwhile, will likely be blamed on the “anti China” elements in Taiwan — in other words, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and anyone who supports Taiwanese independence. That deferral will mostly stem from electoral considerations by Ma’s Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), which is cognizant of the fact that rushing into political negotiations with China will open a Pandora’s box of controversies that can only cost it votes.

My op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Taiwanese Air Force turns to indigenous UAVs

With Taiwan unlikely to request drones from the US, the logical alternative is to turn to the Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology, which has been working on unmanned aerial vehicles for more than a decade

A Ministry of National Defense (MND) spokesman yesterday confirmed that Taiwan was developing an unmanned surveillance aircraft, a move that provides further confirmation of a continuing arms race despite closer political and economic ties with China.

Ministry spokesman Major General Yu Sy-tue (虞思祖) said the Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (CSIST, 中山科學研究院), which falls under the ministry’s Armaments Bureau, had initiated research on drones.

According to defense analysts, research on indigenous reconnaissance unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) has been going on for at least a decade. The institute unveiled a number of UAVs in August last year — including an operational version of the Chung Shyang (中翔) — during the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition and Conference in Taipei.

A CSIST representative told Defense News at the time that the first Chung Shyang was built in 2007, with five prototypes already operational.

Asked by the Taipei Times whether the air force was seeking to obtain the Chung Shyang, which appears to be the institute’s most advanced prototype, a ministry spokesman said that “new models” were still in the research and development phase, without elaborating.

This story, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

‘Children’ of Yan and Huang: So what?

President Ma Ying-jeou, the chairman of the party that time and again accused the Democratic Progressive Party of playing the ethnic game uses ... ethnicity to justify closer ties across the Taiwan Strait during his national address on the 99th anniversary of the Republic of China

During the portion of his Double Ten National Day address that focused on cross-strait relations, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) turned to ethnicity to play down the differences between the two countries.

“The people on the two sides of the Taiwan Strait are ethnic Chinese — descendants of the legendary emperors Yan and Huang,” Ma said.

While many would dispute this contention, emphasizing ethnicity and ancestry as a means to encourage reconciliation or, conversely, foster alienation misses the point completely. The reason is simple: The longstanding conflict across the Taiwan Strait has nothing to do with ethnicity and lies instead in the political, ideological and imaginary spheres.

History is replete with examples of leaders who used ethnicity to stoke nationalistic fervor, often with devastating consequences. When it comes to Taiwan, this device has two fundamental flaws that make it unsuited as an element of political discourse.

The first is the exclusionary nature of nations built on race or ethnicity. In an increasingly mobile world, genetics have lost relevance in terms of buttressing one’s nationality. Consequently, nationality is no longer predicated on ethnicity, but rather on one’s association to a land or people. That is why the concept of “foreign,” a term often used in Taiwan, has an entirely different, and in many cases irrelevant, connotation in multi-ethnic countries such as the US, Canada or the UK. That is why immigrant societies — and Taiwan is such a society — embrace peoples of all backgrounds as participants in the national experiment. That is why a person of Haitian background, for example, could serve as the representative of Queen Elizabeth in Canada, or why a man with Kenyan ancestry can sit in the White House.

My unsigned editorial, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Analysis: PRC belligerence brings Taiwan in from the cold

Beijing has been surefooted in its diplomacy and Washington appears to be considering conceding Taiwan, but now our neighbors feel threatened

As tensions in the Asia-Pacific region heat up amid disputes involving China and a number of countries over contested islands and sovereignty over the South China Sea, there have been signs in recent months that the US may be on the brink of reassessing its strategy for the region in ways that raise questions about Taiwan’s place in it.

For almost eight years under former US president George W. Bush and the first year-and-a-half or so of the administration of US President Barack Obama, the US, preoccupied with counterinsurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq and severe economic downturn, adopted a hands-off approach to Asia, for the most part limiting itself to assuaging Beijing’s fears that Washington was seeking to contain it.

Recognizing an opportunity when it saw one, Beijing played along and, for most of that period, crafted a policy that managed to reassure the neighborhood of its “peaceful intentions” even as it continued to modernize its military. In doing so, it also successfully isolated Taipei during the eight years of former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) time in office, capitalizing on Washington’s wariness regarding an administration it saw as a potential “troublemaker.”

Beijing’s policy remained quite skillful after the election of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in 2008, unveiling a series of carrots to an administration in Taipei that was all-too-willing to please China and foster rapprochement. Not only had Taiwan been neutralized during the Chen era, but since 2008, it was pulled ever closer into its embrace, so much so that doubts emerged as to Taipei’s willingness to remain part of the unofficial US-Japan security alliance.

Then, just as Taiwan was signing the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) with China in late June, Tokyo announced it was extending its Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) so that it now overlapped with sections of a zone controlled by Taiwan.

My analysis of the changing dynamics in the Asia Pacific. published today in the Taipei Times, continues here, with comments from Richard Bush III, Arthur Waldron, David Arase and Hisahiko Okazaki.

PRC official targeted Tibetans: reports [updated]

Shortly before his secret meeting with Taiwanese security agencies, Chen Zhimin was in Nepal ordering stronger action against Tibetans

Chinese Vice Minister of Public Security Chen Zhimin (陳智敏), who led a delegation on a secret visit to Taiwan in the middle of last month for meetings with officials from various security-related agencies, was in Kathmandu weeks before, where he sought to strengthen Sino-Nepalese cooperation against Tibetan activists, reports showed.

During a visit on July 26, Chen, who headed a delegation of 11 officials, announced new financial assistance to Nepalese security agencies to better monitor and prevent Tibetan refugees from engaging in “anti-China activities” on its soil, Nepalese media reported.

Chen called the “anti-China activities taking in Nepal in the name of religion and human rights unacceptable to China,” adding that they posed “grave threats to the sovereignty and integrity of China.”

The meeting, held at Beijing’s behest, covered issues including border security, Tibetan refugees and collaboration on security matters, Nepalese media said.

During the visit, Chen announced an extra annual contribution by Beijing of US$1.47 million to the Nepalese Ministry of Home Affairs to strengthen its security apparatus to curb Tibetan activities.

Earlier this week, the Taipei Times asked Taiwanese officials whether the topic of “anti-China activities” was raised during Chen’s Sept. 13 to Sept. 18 visit to Taiwan.

“We didn’t discuss politics and we didn’t discuss religion. Our understanding was that we would stay on the topic at hand as outlined under our agreement to combat crime,” said Hsu Jui-shan (許瑞山), the chief administrator of the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB), which organized the trip’s itinerary.

Hsu was referring to the Joint Cross-Strait Crime Fighting Agreement signed in the third round of discussions between Taiwanese and Chinese negotiators in April.

However, it is now clear that Chen, who is also a committee member of the Chinese Communist Party, has become Taiwan’s point man on police matters with the Chinese government. Information from the Chinese Ministry of Public Security shows that Chen is also responsible for maintaining senior-level contacts with police officials in Hong Kong and Macau.

This article (continues here) was published today in the Taipei Times and is a follow-up to our initial reporting on Chen Zhimin's visit to Taiwan. The rest of the article reveals troubling information about certain clauses of the cross-strait agreement on crime-fighting, as well as comments by representatives of the Tibetan community in Taiwan.

UPDATE!

I have since received the following information about Chen Zhimin from a source in Hong Kong:

On Aug. 18 and Aug. 19 in Lhasa, the largest meeting in recent memory was convened to discuss security issues as they relate to Tibet. Almost every province of China and every large city in the country was represented including — for the first time — Hong Kong. Chen Zhimin delivered the initial situation report at this meeting. The meeting however was chaired by Yang Huanning (杨焕宁), China’s foremost expert on counter-terrorism and Chen’s superior in the Public Security Ministry. The trip to Nepal by Chen could therefore be seen as only a prelude to the big meeting in Lhasa.

Also, Chen Zhimin is ranked 11th in the Public Security Ministry, making him its lowest-ranking vice minister. He quite naturally is a member of the Ministry’s Party Committee (all senior officials will be Party members and thus members) but he certainly is not a member of the Communist Party Central Committee (Minister Meng Jianzhu (孟建柱) and Vice Minister Yang mentioned above are however members of the Central Committee).

Liu Xiaobo wins 2010 Nobel Peace Prize

Imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo (劉曉波) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize today for his defense of fundamental human rights in China. As expected, the announcement in Norway sparked a furious response from Beijing, which accused the Nobel committee of honoring a “criminal.” Chinese state media reportedly immediately blacked out the news and the authorities blocked Nobel Prize reports from Web sites. In a statement on Friday evening, the Presidential Office in Taipei congratulated Liu for the honor, calling it a “historic” Nobel win that not only honored the 54-year-old, but also all other human rights activists in China.

In 2008, Liu helped organize the “Charter 08” petition, a manifesto signed by hundreds of Chinese intellectuals that called for sweeping political reforms. He was sentenced in December to 11 years in prison for “subversion.”

Beguiled by Wen’s missile promise

Speculation has been rife in recent months that Washington might reconsider its policy on arms sales to Taiwan if Beijing agreed to dismantle, or at a minimum redeploy, the about 1,500 ballistic missiles pointing in Taiwan’s direction.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶), in New York to attend the UN General Assembly meeting late last month, added grist to the mill when, asked by reporters for his thoughts on withdrawing the missiles, he said: “I believe the issue you mention will be realized one day.”

Coincidentally, little more than a week later experts on Taiwanese and Chinese security gathered at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington to discuss the feasibility of such a scenario. Though unconventional in itself, what is particularly worrisome about the meeting is the fact that the fine points raised by participants could easily be missed, misconstrued, or conveniently ignored, as appears to be the case.

On paper, the idea of disarmament in the Taiwan Strait is worthy of serious consideration. However, if not handled carefully, talks on the matter could very well play into Beijing’s hands and end up hurting Taiwan.

Here are some of the problems associated with the recent enthusiasm surrounding the idea of demilitarizing the Taiwan Strait:

For one, there is less to Wen’s Sept. 22 remarks than meet the eye and nothing that he said justifies the positive reception they received in the media and from President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration. By not providing a timeline or context to his answer, “realized one day” could mean just about anything. In fact, Wen would not be lying if his “one day” meant the day when Taiwan is annexed by China, at which point deploying the missiles would be nonsensical.

Other Chinese officials and academics who have discussed the matter have also done so in general terms, an age-old tactic by Chinese officials that leaves too much room for interpretation for a problem of this magnitude.

Although a full redeployment — including the “entire infrastructure” of five missile brigades belonging to the Second Artillery’s 52 Base, as the Project 2049 Institute’s Mark Stokes, a speaker at the talks and a longtime advocate of arms sales to Taiwan, proposed at the conference, would represent a measure of “goodwill” and diminish the immediate threat to Taiwan, such a move would come with its own set of challenges.

My op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Security experts warn on China threat

In the morning session of the International Symposium on 50 Years of US-Japan Security Alliance and the Security of Taiwan organized by the Taiwan National Security Institute and the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy on Tuesday, former Japanese minister of defense Gen Nakatani, now a member of the House of Representatives, said that with a rising China at loggerheads with Japan, the best way to resolve disputes in East Asia would be to establish a regional security system.

Beijing’s recent stance on the disputed Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) has raised apprehensions in Japan about the growing military imbalance with China, Nakatani said, adding that if the issue was allowed to fester, it could deteriorate.

Nakatani called for the creation of an Asian equivalent of NATO, which he said would provide regional powers with a platform for conflict resolution.

In the meantime, a relatively weakened US would have to rely more on Japan and Taiwan to ensure security in the Asia Pacific, he said.

Dan Blumenthal, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, said the US-Japanese security alliance in the 21st century would likely be as important as, if not more, than the US-UK alliance was for Europe during the Cold War.

“China poses problems for the US-Japan alliance probably not seen since 1945,” Blumenthal said.

Full coverage of the conference was published today in the Taipei Times, with me covering the morining session and my colleague Ko Shu-ling taking over in the afternoon (where Arthur Waldron was the main speaker).

Intelligence treason in the making

The systematic efforts by our government, uncovered by this newspaper last week, to keep secret a visit by a top Chinese security official last month raise questions that go far beyond secrecy and involve matters pertaining to the very nature of our society.

Though alarming in itself, it is not unusual for senior security officials from different countries to meet behind closed doors. In some cases, such meetings even involve cooperation with countries that have poor human rights records. In the “war” against terrorism launched after Sept. 11, for example, Western intelligence agencies began working closely — and secretly — with their counterparts in pariah states like Pakistan, Syria and Saudi Arabia.

Controversial — and at times disastrous — though this cooperation may have been, there are fundamental differences between that type of cooperation and what is developing between Taipei and Beijing. For one, it involves countries that recognize each other. Also, there are independent, institutionalized oversight mechanisms in democratic systems that ensure a certain degree of transparency, which plays a crucial role when operations involve intelligence sharing with repressive regimes.

In the case of Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen who was deported from the US and tortured by Syrian security officials, oversight and a subsequent inquiry helped expose the controversy, shamed Canadian authorities and made it more difficult for similar mistakes to be repeated.

Cooperation with China on cross-strait crime fighting, ostensibly the purpose of the visit by Chinese Vice Minister of Public Security Chen Zhimin (陳智敏), is not overly worrying. What makes the visit so problematic, rather, is the context in which it happened, at a time when the credibility of oversight mechanisms under President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), beginning with the judiciary, are now under question. It is also occurring at a time when Beijing is intensifying its campaign against Taiwan, seemingly with the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) acquiescence.

My unsigned editorial, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Is Wen Jiabao playing with fire?

In what has been called his “boldest-ever call for liberalization,” Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) in late August created a bit of a stir among Chinese liberals and conservatives when he raised the issue of political reform in his country’s modernization program.

That he would raise such a topic on what pundits have described as his “southern tour” — a veiled reference, if at all, to Deng Xiaoping’s (鄧小平) visit to Southern China in 1992, ushering in a new era of economic development — on the eve of the 30th anniversary of the establishment of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, was probably no accident. The sheer symbolism of the anniversary, combined with the fact that Wen, a Deng protege, will be stepping down two years from now, must be weighing on the premier’s mind as he ponders his legacy.

Wen again raised the issue of political liberalization on a visit to the UN General Assembly in New York on Sept. 22, this time while answering questions from overseas Chinese media.

“I’ve previously said economic reform without the protection of political reform will not achieve complete success, and might even lose what’s been gained,” he said, adding, if perhaps vaguely: “Of course, we are trying to build a China with democracy and rule of law.”

What he had previously said, in his August speech, was that without the “guarantee” of political reform, “the fruits of the reform of the economic structure may be lost and it will be impossible to realize the goal of modernization.”

This op-ed, published in the Taipei Times on Saturday, continues here.

Chinese security chief’s visit kept secret

A visit to Taiwan by Chinese Vice Minister of Public Security Chen Zhimin (陳智敏) and his delegation earlier this month was shrouded in secrecy and intentionally unpublicized, even as talks were held with senior government officials, an investigation by the Taipei Times showed yesterday.

This important story, co-written with my colleague Vincent Y. Chao and others at the Taipei Times, continues here.

It baffles me that no Chinese-language media in Taiwan — including our sister paper, the Liberty Times — has picked up on the story. Some international media have, however, and they all source us:

星島 Sing Tao (Toronto)
Straits Times 
聯合早報 Zao Bao
南洋視界 Nan Yang Post

Shameless opinion poll shenanigans

It’s no secret that politicians often use opinion polls to support, rather than determine, policy decisions. Knowing this, the public is well advised to always approach such polls released by government agencies with skepticism, as numbers can be massaged to fit predetermined policy, just as intelligence can be used to buttress just about any plan, however frivolous.

One need only turn to an opinion poll on cross-strait relations released on Thursday by the Mainland Affairs Council for a perfect example of a politicized survey masking self-serving purposes.

The third question in the poll — “Stance on status quo, reunification, independence” — seems innocuous enough, until one looks at the answer categories: “Maintaining the status quo in the broadest sense” (86.2 percent), “Maintain the status quo forever” (30.5 percent) and “Maintain the status quo, and then reunify [sic] with the mainland or seek independence” (34.6 percent).

While on the surface there’s nothing wrong here, a hypothetical scenario can enlighten the situation.

Imagine a group of 20 judges is asked to decide whether a man caught stealing a goat should be (a) stoned to death for his crime; (b) allowed to walk free; (c) that further deliberation on the matter is necessary, though the end decision must be death or freedom; or (d) that deliberation should go on indefinitely. Unbeknownst to most but his closest aides, the village chief has already made up his mind and wants execution, no matter what. However, as he rules over a democracy, he orders an opinion poll to give the decision some veneer of legitimacy.

My unsigned editorial, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Six decades of made-up politics

Aside from the business and geopolitical imperatives that stem from the international community’s desire to interact with the People’s Republic of China (PRC), another reason why Taiwan remains in political isolation is that its history and domestic conditions are misunderstood, not only globally, but also in China and by many of the foreign correspondents who cover Taiwan.

Routine references to Taiwan and China “splitting” after the Chinese civil war, for example, or the mention that Taiwan and China have been ruled separately for “more than six decades,” are not only misleading — they are wrong. Beyond failing to get the facts right (disunited entities cannot split, and Taiwan was ruled separately for at least 11 decades, counting Japanese rule), these facile insertions tend to reinforce the view that Taiwan and China are one and the same — or rather, that one ought to be subsumed into the other.

These generalizations also fail to take into account the political fabric of Taiwanese society, which rather than being the monolith it is often portrayed as (a mistake that has equal implications when it comes to coverage of China), is far more complex and diversified.

Ironically, the external view of Taiwanese politics tends to attribute to the 23 million people in Taiwan the position of a tiny minority on the island. This has been the true since Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) forces fled to Taiwan after their defeat by the communists in 1949. Soon afterwards, this government-in-exile imposed itself on Taiwanese and arrogated upon itself the right to rule the 7.39 million people who lived in Taiwan at the time, 1.37 million, or 18.55 percent, of whom were refugees from China.

This op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Who said China must be ‘rational’?

Data recently released by the nation’s main spy agency, the National Security Bureau (NSB), put a new dent in President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) claims that his administration’s overtures to Beijing have helped reduce tensions in the Taiwan Strait.

Ma’s gambit, though initially hailed by many pundits as a brilliant move, has long puzzled experts who have been unable to account for Beijing’s failure to reciprocate. Indeed, its accelerating military buildup should only exacerbate fears in Taiwan.

The list of threats includes a growing arsenal of short and medium-range missiles that, perhaps even more importantly, are becoming increasingly accurate, as well as cruise missiles deployed further inland. To this we can add, among others, anti-ship ballistic missiles that would threaten any naval fleet coming to Taiwan’s assistance during a conflict and plans to acquire aircraft carriers, which would allow China to encircle Taiwan or extend its area of maritime denial.

While those developments have been apparent for a while, no one has managed to explain why Beijing would engage in what, prima facie, looks like self- defeating behavior. After all, why does China need such a large military, given that it faces no threat of invasion? Rather than reassure its neighbors, Beijing’s military buildup and increasingly aggressive positioning in the region are awakening some to the possibility that the paradigm by which we gauge China’s intentions may have been flawed all along.

There is a precedent for this, in the form of Mao Zedong’s (毛澤東) decision to enter the Korean War after US and South Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel. At the time, the consensus in Washington was that Mao, who had just emerged victorious in a protracted and costly civil war against Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) Nationalists, would not expose China’s ruined economy to the risks of armed conflict with the US. This, however, is exactly what he did, and the West was caught off guard because analysts failed to think like a Chinese and assumed “rationalism” in the way it is understood in the West.

Although decision-making in China has become more complex and institutionalized since Mao’s time, this does not mean that how Beijing calculates costs and benefits has entirely changed or that what we think of as “rational” is seen as such at Zhongnanhai. Consequently, what might come across as paradoxical in our eyes could make perfect sense from a Chinese perspective.

We should keep this in mind as Taiwan develops closer economic, cultural and social ties with China. Case in point: The NSB reports that for the first half of this year, Taiwan was the target of 2.38 attacks by Chinese hackers every hour, or 10,346 attacks altogether, accounting for nearly one-third of all attacks directed at the country.

Cross-strait liberalization and “peace” notwithstanding, this shows that as with the military threat, China has maintained its aggressive posture vis-a-vis Taiwan. In turn, this reinforces the view that how decision-makers in Beijing evaluate costs and benefits can differ drastically from our own, resulting in acts that, from a business perspective, may make no sense whatsoever.

In this environment, the more Taiwan opens itself to Chinese investment, the more sectors will be exposed to the threat of espionage by Chinese individuals, firms and government agencies. This may seem equally self-defeating, but the danger to Taiwan, albeit more subtle, is no less severe.

Underfunded though it may be, the Ministry of National Defense has not been deceived by Ma’s window-dressing and continues to warn us about the threat posed by the Chinese military. Let us hope that the NSB and other agencies charged with protecting civilian and corporate infrastructure are equally aware that we are a long way from peace in the Taiwan Strait.

This editorial was published today in the Taipei Times.

Of nukes and men

The recent publication of a memoir by former US negotiator Jeremy Stone re-ignited a controversy last week over alleged plans under the former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) administration to launch a nuclear weapons program.

Stone’s allegations, which ostensibly were sourced from and corroborated post facto by former National Security Council secretary-general Su Chi (蘇起) — who at the time the controversy emerged was a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator — are hard to substantiate. That the Chen administration, for all its faults, would have engaged in nuclear adventurism stretches credulity. Though it has the technical know-how to do so (and inside sources say a turnaround could take as little as one year), Taiwan could hardly have launched a nuclear weapons program without the US, let alone China, becoming aware of it.

One does not have to read Stone’s self-aggrandizing book too closely to realize that the views of the former president of the Federation of American Scientists-turned-cross-strait-troubleshooter are wildly skewed in Beijing’s favor. Nothing makes this more evident than the many variations he uses to portray the Chen administration as a “troublemaker,” which may account for Stone’s credulity on the alleged nuclear program.

Unbeknownst to Stone, this very bias against Taipei — not his alone, but that of the international community — lies at the very heart of Taiwan’s defense malaise. In fact, the inherent imbalance was the main reason behind this newspaper’s decision, in August 2004, to publish an editorial that put the nuclear option on the table (despite what Su and Stone may believe, however, the Taipei Times did not and does not have a direct line to the Presidential Office or Democratic Progressive Party headquarters).

More than six years have elapsed and the balance of power in the Taiwan Strait has only continued to shift in Beijing’s favor. Furthermore, nuclear-armed China continues to threaten Taiwan, the would-be “troublemaker” who at no point under Chen adopted anything that could have been interpreted as a belligerent posture.

Given that this situation appears to be a comfortable “status quo” for the likes of Stone, is it not conceivable that Taiwanese would ponder various means to oppose China militarily and present it with a credible deterrent? In and of themselves, peace and democracy (which other publications have advocated as the surest defense) will be of little help against an opponent who plays by different rules, as highlighted by Beijing’s refusal to renounce the use of force against Taiwan amid supposedly warming ties. While nuclear weapons may be an extreme recourse — and an unadvisable one at that — Taiwan cannot afford the gullibility that has marked the course adopted by President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration in cross-strait rapprochement.

(Side note: media have repeatedly referred to “warming ties” and “rapprochement” in the Taiwan Strait. It should be noted, howeverm that those “warm ties” have occurred mostly on a party-to-party basis — that is, between the KMT and the CCP — rather than among individuals, which means that any conclusion to the effect that relations between Taiwan and China are peaceful would be premature at best.)

While Ma’s Cabinet has rightly stuck to less problematic, though by no means inconsequential, matters like economics in its dialogue with Beijing, there is no doubt that in the months ahead — especially as we get closer to Chinese President Hu Jintao’s (胡錦濤) stepping down as head of state — talks will touch on more controversial issues such as identity and sovereignty. Once those topics are tackled, friction is bound to emerge, which could quickly escalate and spin out of control. Any outcome to the 2012 presidential poll in Taiwan that isn’t to China’s taste could also serve as a catalyst for a military option.

In such a situation, Beijing, seeing a weakened opponent, could calculate that it can get away with the use of force at little cost, making military action more likely.

That is why, even amid untested signs of rapprochement, Taiwan must continue to acquire and develop not only the means to protect itself, but solid deterrent capabilities so that any military adventurism on Beijing’s part to fulfill its irredentist dreams would come at great cost. 

A strong Taiwan means less risk of war, not the other way around. Does Taiwan need nuclear weapons for this? Probably not, but it certainly needs more than naivety and Ma sloganeering, and more than the dishonest diplomacy exercised by the likes of Stone.

It is interesting to note that Jeremy Stone is the son of maverick reporter I. F. “Izzy” Stone. 

This unsigned editorial appeared, in slightly different form, in the Taipei Times today.

Sucked into the Chinese Civil War

There is no knowing whether an editorial in the People’s Daily on Friday that for all intents and purposes removed the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) as the principal defender of China against Japanese invasion during World War II was simply out-of-control Chinese nationalism, or a more sinister attempt to blur the lines in the Taiwan Strait.

For years now, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propaganda has played down the KMT’s role in the war of resistance and elevated that of the communists to one that defies the historical record, a form of revisionism that, sadly, continues to be swallowed and reproduced by a number of Western academics, one of the latest being Martin Jacques in his influential book When China Rules the World.

While, for reasons of historical accuracy, the CCP’s claims should be countered with factual information (in many instances, CCP forces avoided directly confronting the Japanese, preserving their strength and weapons for the continuation of the Chinese Civil War after the war), the editorial comes at an odd moment in cross-strait relations, at a time when we would expect Beijing to play nice with the KMT as it gets ever closer to accomplishing the annexation it has long coveted.

At its most innocuous, this could be yet another example of Beijing shooting itself in the foot by failing to rein in its brimming nationalism. That it would downplay the KMT’s leading role in the war against Japan would be par for the course for the Chinese propaganda apparatus. However, that it would ignore the KMT’s role altogether gives the impression that it is attempting to pick a fight, and that it is doing so with an ulterior motive.

This op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here. 

Invading Taiwan through investment

The Financial Supervisory Commission’s rejection last week of a bid by a Hong Kong consortium to acquire Nan Shan Life Insurance Co was a welcome development because it demonstrated the government can, when it wants, protect the interests of Taiwanese.

Commendable though the decision was, however, the outcome was far from certain. The commission’s examination of the bid, spearheaded by China Strategic Holdings and Primus Financial Holdings, took several months and a final decision was delayed a number of times.

Admittedly, the case was a major one, as it affected about 4 million policyholders, 4,000 employees and more than 34,000 insurance agents. Questions surrounding the bidder’s ability to ensure operational continuity at Nan Shan, coupled with uncertainties about the nationality and political connections of the ever-shifting shareholders and board members in the consortium, made the bid an altogether problematic one. Over the months, the many reports prepared by Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Pan Men-an’s (潘孟安) office on the matter were helpful in highlighting the scope of the problem.

Celebrations among those who opposed the deal could be short-lived, however, as the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), which is set to come into force imminently, will usher in a new era of cross-strait investment. The combination of China’s substantial investment power, Beijing’s long-term political objectives via investment in Taiwan, and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration’s hankering for foreign investment, could present the commission with an insurmountable challenge simply by virtue of the workload it may face.

In other words, even with the best intentions in the world, the commission’s finite resources could be overwhelmed by a sudden bombardment of Chinese investment bids, some of which could be equally, if not more, problematic than the one involving Nan Shan, especially after Taiwan opens more, and increasingly sensitive, sectors to Chinese investment.

It is no secret that under Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) many “private” Chinese companies have either been renationalized, become dependent on loans by state-owned banks or have their board of directors controlled by former or current Chinese Communist Party officials loyal to the party. It is also well known that tracing a Chinese firm’s money to its source or determining who the real decision-makers are, is a daunting task requiring tremendous amounts of effort and time.

The combination of these two phenomena — an upsurge in Chinese investment bids in a number of sectors and the lack of transparency in the Chinese corporate system — could make it impossible for the commission or other regulatory bodies to handle future cases with the same level of professionalism it did throughout the Nan Shan case.

Added to the political pressure from an administration that gets high on good relations with Beijing, the commission could in certain cases be forced to cut corners or, for political considerations, look the other way. Intelligence agencies preparing threat assessment face this dilemma on a daily basis, where finite resources must tell signal from noise and consciously de-prioritize some information. In many instances, mere fatigue amid a constant barrage of threat information makes it possible for important information to slip through the cracks, sometimes with catastrophic outcomes.

There is a very high likelihood, therefore, that some Chinese investments that endanger national security, just as the one for Nan Shan did, will nevertheless be allowed — not because nothing untoward was found or because the threats were not apparent, but because regulatory authorities were overwhelmed.

Taiwan may have won this battle, but this war by other means is far from over.

In all honesty, I never thought I would get to write an editorial about the Nan Shan bid that opens on a celebratory note. Having spent a lot of time researching and writing about the Hong Kong consortium (thanks to Legislator Pan's office sharing documents with me), I am convinced that this was the right decision, especially in light of what I have also discovered in terms of Chinese espionage and the infiltration of the business sector by the CCP. Richard McGregor's book The Party has a good chapter on this. 

Our soldiers deserve better

The Ministry of National Defense last week took a group of reporters on a tour of the nation’s three military services, an event meant to highlight their ability to defend the nation from foreign aggression.

The visits, which included stops at an air defense base in Chiayi, an Army base in Penghu and a Navy base in Zuoying, Kaohsiung, drove home a few points about the state of the nation’s military: While the services are filled with dedicated men and women, and although every effort was made to showcase their high morale, there is no denying that the equipment they use is aging — fast.

This situation would not be so alarming if Taiwan did not face a strong adversary or was not facing the all-too-real threat of invasion. Nor would it make one apprehensive if the enemy had maintained a pace of modernization similar to that of Taiwan. However, the reality is that the frontline systems presented during the media tour — battle tanks, mine hunters, fighter aircraft — seem increasingly antiquated when compared with the weapons fielded by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in recent years. Some are, in fact, museum pieces kept operational for lack of newer equipment.

From the German-built minehunter ship boarded by reporters and the lone submarine submerging in the distance at Zuoying, to the M60A3 main battle tanks rumbling by on Penghu and the F-16A/Bs firing flares during a simulated air attack in Chiayi, it is becoming clear that despite the impeccable maintenance of those platforms, Taiwan is fast losing its edge in the Taiwan Strait. Even non-military experts could see that.

Despite the scarcity of modern systems acquired by Taiwan in recent years, such as Patriot air defense systems and Apache attack helicopters, which in qualitative terms may still keep up with Chinese equivalents, the balance quickly evaporates when the orders of battle are weighed in quantitative terms. In other words, with few exceptions, both qualitatively and quantitatively, Taiwan is running out of gas while the PLA is rushing ahead at breakneck speed.

Furthermore, since President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) came into office, the defense ministry has been ordered to cut back on live fire drills, the utility of which in ensuring military preparedness cannot be compensated for no matter how many computer simulations are held. For three years in a row, the nation’s defense budget as a share of GDP has also fallen and will be just 2.6 percent of GDP next year — this amid very expensive efforts to create a fully professional military by 2015, a goal that increasingly looks like a pipe dream.

The Ma administration has staked its defense posture on the premise that its diplomatic overtures to Beijing will succeed. Though a peaceful approach to conflict resolution is commendable, doing so with China carries far too many unknowns for Taipei to forsake a robust defense. In fact, investment in the military is not antithetical to a diplomatic approach to longstanding tensions in the Taiwan Strait; it is, rather, responsible planning for various — by no means impossible — scenarios.

For the sake of the dedicated men and women, career soldiers and conscripts alike, who every day put their lives on the line to ensure that Taiwan’s way of life continues unthreatened, the Ma administration should get serious about defense and stop pretending that, a mere two years into cross-strait rapprochement, peace in the Taiwan Strait is upon us, or that today’s relative calm will inevitably extend into the future. Our men and women deserve systems and resources that are equal to the immense challenge they would face should confrontation replace diplomacy in a future scenario.

Though for the moment Beijing’s “peaceful” approach appears to be paying dividends, we should be in no doubt that it is equally prepared for a non-­peaceful outcome.

This editorial, based on my two-day tour with the Ministry of National Defense last week, appeared in the Taipei Times on Tuesday.