Give Taiwan’s youth a fighting chance against China

One might get the impression that Taiwan’s defense is just a question of having the right weapons and hardware. But there’s of course more to it than that, including a huge psychological component, as a friend noted the other day when he asked:

These are difficult questions for an outsider to answer about any nation. And even locals never really never know until the time comes. But I’ll give it a try and start with a story.

One day while living in Taiwan a few years back, I was studying a map board outside a subway station. A young women, maybe in her early 20s, came up and asked if she could help. The place I was going wasn’t far away, so she offered to walk me there.

On the way she asked where I was from: I said, “America.” She said: “Please don’t let us be part of China.”

That said a lot. At least from my perspective, a majority of young Taiwanese do not want to be part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) or come under Chinese communist domination.

They know enough about life on the mainland and more recently have watched the Chinese Communist Party smother Hong Kong and persecute people who exercise freedoms taken for granted in Taiwan.

They also increasingly see themselves as Taiwanese. Relatively few young people have substantial first-hand experience with the mainland and people they know who do are likely their grandparents or even great-grandparents. It is perhaps akin to how Irish-Americans came to see themselves as American rather than Irish (except for one day a year).

But what about actually defending Taiwan?

I think a lot of young Taiwanese would indeed do something to defend their nation. Or, at least, they would want to. A big problem is that they don’t know what they can do.

Yes, Taiwan has