Taiwan's Independence

Okay let's take it another route. China has absorbed Macao and Hong Kong. Those two places are basically about the same as they were before the takeover. So if China were to take over Taiwan, why is there an expectation for the democratic level of the region to drop?

The issue I have with talking about evil and oppressive China is compared to Taiwan? I've talked to plenty of people from both places. People from mainland come here and they actually complain how they can't petition the government anymore and that only money matters, but they just take that as "that's how it works here, so do as in Rome", and just assume that money is all that matters. And for people from Taiwan, all they have are the same talking points you are saying right now with no real substance. It's all well and good to talk about all sorts of things that we can use to "measure" democracy, but the only thing that matters is that the government does what the people want.

Actually I should be more clear here:

I don't think China is way more democratic or just as democratic as Taiwan. I don't think Taiwan is so much more democratic and saintly as to justify independence on that point alone.

edited 8th Feb '12 8:53:25 AM by breadloaf

Again: Why do you assume there should be Taiwanese unity with the mainland at all costs? And you can ask Hong Kongers how much Beijing does meddle in their internal affairs. "One country, two systems" is a structure that's basically constantly under threat. So it's clearly better for the Taiwanese people (and that's what it should be all about, the Taiwanese people!) to not get under any form of PRC rule at all.

I don't tend to feel that nationalism and separatist nationalism leads to better systems. Instead I think it leads to antagonist, alliance systems and cold wars, which in turn allows governments to increase the amount of abuse they can perform on the local populace versus a single system that must be accountable with no external threat to mask their domestic failings.

Funny. And yet here you're arguing Chinese nationalism, that Taiwan has to be united with the mainland (for which you still have given no reason at all) while I'm arguing what's better for the population we're talking about.

Which is not ethnic nationalism :) As I said, I stand by my no-hypocrisy principle. I'm not willing for my country to be torn apart by separatists so I will never advocate it for any other country. Taiwan was once part of China, and had been for centuries, to argue for its independence now, for a group of people who were never native to the land, strikes me as the argument that requires justification. It's like Kosovo all over again. Western powers come in, whine and bitch about the old regime and then support the independence movement and then afterward go, "Oh well looks like the separatists we supported committed all the same crimes as the old power, oh well our mistake, anyway it's independent now so it's good".

The non-Han ethnicities would dispute your claim that Chinese nationalism is not ethnic. This is just a perverse form of reverse hypocrisy. Chinese nationalism is not an iota different from German, French or US-American nationalism.

And Taiwan also belonged to Japan, the Netherlands and Portugal once upon a time. This doesn't mean anything at all. What matters, the only thing that truly matters is what the people of Taiwan want now. Placing any other factors above that is just plain undemocratic.

The Portuguese are the only people of those you listed who didn't commit genocide upon taking over the island and if there were still any Portuguese there, I would entertain that thought.

It starts getting a bit ridiculous to call it reverse anything when some of this land has been part of China longer than half of Europe's countries been in existence.

I take it as a huge problem that the current people we consider Taiwanese get to have all these rights and privileges after slaughtering everyone there previously and then claiming it should be their land. I don't think it right and past crimes do matter in this regard. If we're going to say this is their land, they should have to earn that privilege and I don't think they have at all. They've been continuing to commit grave crimes against humanity right up to 1991, and since then I merely assume they have not been committing grave crimes against humanity.

Democracy is one thing but as I'm just stating an opinion, I don't think it in Taiwan's long-term favour to continue to push for independence. They spent vast portions of their budget on the military, they buy offensive military weapons all the time, they have conscription and they use the China excuse for their poor domestic policy and mass corruption. I think the people would be much better off if the situation were resolved and it's likely much better to have a Taiwan part of China, with a Chinese government that becomes increasingly democratic, versus trying to prop up a malfunctioning democracy with guns and tanks.

breadloaf, explain to me once again why you're pessimistic about Taiwan while Optimistic about China. The common knowledge is that, despite "improvements", China is still authoritarian and Taiwan is democratic. Taiwan > China in terms of liberty. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate in this thread why I should believe otherwise.

Taiwan was once part of China, yes, because Taiwan was the original ruler of China. It lost most of its land to the rebelling communist party. Taiwan was also considered a permanent Security Council member. Those promoting Taiwan independence think that the mainland it lost to the communists is a lost cause, and should just manage the remaining land. It's not rebellion against the mainland.

If Taiwan is to rejoin China, it should wait until China catches up to Taiwan in terms of democracy.

I have no problem with waiting until China is democratic enough until joining. That would be how I reconcile the two parties. I think it bad for it to remain separate and create this wasteful cold war between the two nations, which foreigners can exploit (such as the 10s of billions of dollars spent on purchasing military goods) and domestic governments can exploit (such as Taiwan still having conscription).

I don't think that separatism will help local stability. If we look at the current military situation, Taiwan's independence creates instability. If we look at China/Hong Kong/Macau joining, we see that it can work. If the problem is that China isn't democratic enough now, then sure, the agreement for rejoining requires China to be more democratic. Done.

And it was KMT that was the original ruler of China, not Taiwan. KMT retreated there, killed everybody and then took over. Heck, communist take over of Tibet was bloodless and the 1959 rebellion resulted in thousands of deaths, which is nowhere close to what KMT did to Taiwan.

edited 8th Feb '12 10:59:36 AM by breadloaf

I'm a bit confused by what you mean, breadloaf. Who committed genocide on whom, exactly? "The current population" has been on Taiwan for centuries. Sure there are also Taiwanese aborigines, but they're less than 2% of the population and have been massacred/pushed into the mountains already centuries ago, under Imperial Chinese rule. As for the mainlanders who propped up the KMT dictatorship, they're just 14% of the population. Meaning 84% of the population are Island Chinese, of Min or Hokkien tongue, whose ancestors have been there for centuries. And it is in fact that part of the population from which the proponents of total independence draw nearly all supporters.

So in short your claims continue to be ridiculous. It are the victims of the KMT who want a "Republic of Taiwan" or somesuch (but are content with the status quo). Which is only logical if you think about it.

And no, democracy is not just "one thing". It is everything.

KMT committed genocide against the locals and the aborigines. Certainly they didn't kill all of them but they killed many of them. They also violently suppressed them for decades with a military dictatorship. If that's something you're going to ignore that's a big one. The Imperial Japanese before the Taiwanese committed genocide against the aborigines and also used re-education camps for the local Chinese population, killing those who disagreed. Before that was Qing Dynasty, who fought some battles before forming a treaty with the aborigines to leave each other alone.

edited 8th Feb '12 11:09:21 AM by breadloaf

South Korea also had a military dictatorship during its industrial growth, but that doesn't reflect its current status.

Democratic countries didn't exactly have a nice past.

Got ninja'd:

Well, I think the discussion here is something like this:

You believe that China is not democratic and therefore Taiwan should be independent.

I believe that China can be made more democratic and that separation will cause long-term problems, thus I would rather reunification with Chinese democratisation.

It's not that I'm more optimistic about China in terms of improvements, it's two things

• I think Taiwanese democracy will stagnate if there persists a cold war situation
• I don't think Taiwan's current level of democracy and considering their past crimes, that it really justifies independence versus the potential antagonism and instability in the region (not enough gain for the loss), further if we are to ignore past crimes of the other countries, we might as well ignore everything about China's past.

edited 8th Feb '12 11:10:12 AM by breadloaf

And yet it is the "victim population" who wants Taiwanese independence most now, so that renders your argument kinda moot. The two political camps on China are the Pan-Blues led by the KMT and the Pan-Greens. And it are the Pan-Greens who want independence, the Pan-Blues do want more unity. Your entire argument is based on that it's the KMT who wants more independence, but that is not so.

Incidentally, as I've said before, it were the Pan-Greens who held the Presidency 2000-2008, hence having the KMT in the opposition, so democracy cannot be that bad in Taiwan. Usually it is said that after two successful elective government changes a democracy can be considered stable. And it was in that time, 2000-2008, when the KMT was out of power that most pushes towards symbolic independence were made, too.

Really, your entire argumentation doesn't hold up. Look up Taiwanese politics and for that matter Taiwanese demographics.

Fortunately it doesn't matter what you think. What matters, what should matter exclusively with no other factor involved, is what the Taiwanese people want.

edited 8th Feb '12 11:10:29 AM by Octo

Well, I think you haven't clearly stated your views because the only other view I've seen stated was that KMT take power over China or that KMT take independence. But I don't like KMT one bit. If your argument rests on the pan-greens, that's different. I'm not sure why you didn't raise your point long ago after all this discussion of KMT versus communists when you didn't even like the KMT in the first place :P

If the pan-greens want independence then I want de-militarisation. That's my requirement. Reduce military spending to NATO average or less (I think 5% of GDP?) and remove conscription. They remember the KMT crimes, they won't let them back into power if they can.

I still prefer unification because I think that results in a more stable situation, without the threat of war and leaves the door open to Chinese democratisation. Considering China and Taiwan are both becoming more democratic over time, it shouldn't be a problem.

If Taiwan undergoes demilitarization, how would it defend itself from China?

It's still pretty suicidal for China to go attack Taiwan whether or not there is a large standing military presence, so I think it's fine. If the rest of the world were to sit back, then we have other more pressing political issues I would imagine.

I mean really, what would Taiwan's defence policy be against a nation as powerful as China? Spend 50% of the GDP into the military?

The goal here is what's better for Taiwanese people so if it's going to be independent then it has to be a better place to live.

And actually Taiwan can be the vehicle for China's democratisation via staged unification. For instance, expanding political links requiring both China and Taiwan to implement transparency controls or democratisation.

edited 8th Feb '12 11:29:35 AM by breadloaf

breadloaf, how the fuck does "Taiwan does de-militarization, China has less reason to invade" logic work? Because of the alliances it has? What if those go too?

What in this logic of yours keeps China from going in and forcefully taking what it considers it's own?

Also, your argument that Taiwan is corrupt falls flat when you have Worldwide Corruption Perceptions ranking of countries published by Transparency International. As of 2011, Taiwan is on rank 32 with score of score 6.1. PCR, on the other hand, is on rank 75 with score 3.6

Smaller the score, higher the corruption. For comparison, number one is New Zealand with score 9.5, US is 24th with score 7.1 and Finland is in 2nd place shared with Norway, score 9.4

Also, Press Freedom Index ranks Taiwan as 45th, where as PRC is 174th. According to Global Competitiveness Report, published by World Economic Forum, Taiwan ranks as 12th, where as PRC is 26th.

Futher more, Human Development Index would rank Taiwan on 22nd place, however since Taiwan is not member of UN(due to PRC taking it's place), it not on the official list. PRC on the other hand, had rank of 101. I grant that Taiwans place is calculated by themselves for the reasons I stated already.

However, if you really want something to blackmail Taiwan, I give you Privacy index which places Taiwan on rank 40, with score of 1.9, PRC is 45 with score of 1.3

So, explain to me, how is Taiwan a disaster waiting to happen compared to Mainland China?

edited 8th Feb '12 12:06:08 PM by Mandemo

Well Taiwan is actually fairly difficult to take even with modern technology if it were to try to maintain independence. That plus none of the populace on either side of the water wishes there to be war. The aborigines in Taiwan likely want independence or some sort of special status if there was unification, while the KMT and Communists both want reunification under different conditions. But mainly, I think the best example of somehow not getting invaded and taken over is Canada/USA. Despite having a 10x numerical advantage, Canada was never taken in any of the wars.

If China were to invade Taiwan, that would guarantee an independence movement and probably Taiwan's independence. So I think it only likely that if China were to reunite with Taiwan it would be under peaceful conditions. I would imagine the Taiwanese would only unite if China's reputation and outlook were positive to them. Given the way China is growing, both economically and politically, I find it highly likely that unification under those conditions will occur.

That really has nothing to do with the implication that China is godsend and Taiwan is not. I even made a post specifically stating that I believe China is less free than Taiwan. However, Octo took it way too far the other direction with these crazy statements like Taiwan being such a godly country of democracy and hope. But, if someone is going to believe Taiwan is going to stay independent, then there's one main issue to resolve:

• How are you going to end the tension?

And so far the only comments thus far is "I think China is not free or democratic therefore they should be independent". Really? That's it? Everybody else in the world keeps their countries together through some of the most bloody conflicts, most of the posters here being from such countries, but a slow slide into unification through non-violent means is abhorrent?

edited 8th Feb '12 4:02:11 PM by breadloaf

See, some of us think quite the opposite; if China were to invade Taiwan, it would conquer it and make it Taiwan, China. Though I'm hoping that the democracy-friendly nations would assist Taiwan if a war did break out, considering the little international relations Taiwan gets, I can't take that chance.

Reform in China has to be internal, as it had been so far. Only when China meets the criteria for sufficient reform will Taiwan think of unification.

Which is fine, unless everyone thinks that my plan for unification was "right now". I mean the OP asked about Taiwan's independence and I personally don't think it'll last more than a few decades.

To be honest, I think that the Taiwanese people will become accustomed to being a different country. There are certainly a lot of benefits to being a sovereign nation. If I had to guess, I would disagree with you, breadloaf. But as long as you're just making a prediction for the distant (in today's world, a few decades is a long time) future, I have no quarrel with you.

If China invaded Taiwan, Taiwan would lose without help. Just the amount of missiles china could chuck at them would batter them down eventually. With outside help, it would(Likely) quickly become WW3, and that turns into the whole world with all chances of that.

In a hypothetical war (which, assuming China invades Taiwan, would presumably basically be the US against China), who are China's allies, incidentally? The only one with major weight on the global scale, AFAIK, is Russia. And I wouldn't put money on the Russians coming to save China.

But that's the thing. China wouldn't need anyone to save her.