In public remarks made while visiting the People’s Republic of China, Kuomintang chairwoman Cheng Li-wun seemed to suggest that the tension in the Taiwan Strait is more or less Japan’s fault. Her remarks have evoked the concern of the ROC’s Mainland Affairs Council (MAC). MAC spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (shown above) chastised Cheng for deciding to “go there and echo the Chinese Communist Party’s” propaganda line.
“Visiting the mainland is one thing, but she should not go there and echo the Chinese Communist Party’s narrative—that would put Taiwan in a very dangerous position,” MAC deputy head and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh said at a regular news briefing in Taipei.
He claimed that Taiwanese people are not concerned about Japanese militarism from a century ago, but about present-day China and the CCP’s authoritarian rule….
Cheng, leader of Taiwan’s main opposition party…criticized Japanese colonial rule in Taiwan, which lasted from 1895 to 1945—beginning after the First Sino-Japanese War and ending with Japan’s defeat in World War II.
“To this day, the two sides of the Taiwan Strait remain unable to heal the wound carved across the Strait by the blade of Japanese imperialism during the First Sino-Japanese War 130 years ago,” she said.
Liang argued that Cheng portrayed [Sun Yat-sen] as a leader opposed to Japanese militarism and framed cross-strait issues as problems left over from the First Sino-Japanese War, which he said was “quite surprising.”
Given Sun’s close ties with Japan during his revolutionary career, including founding the Tongmenghui in Tokyo, which helped overthrow the Qing dynasty, Liang said portraying Sun as a leader who fought against Japanese militarism and colonialism is “a major distortion of history.”
The tangled web of history includes Mao’s use of Japan to undermine the national government against which he was rebelling. In any case, Liang is right that many Taiwanese regard present-day Japan as a friend.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has made clear her government’s support for the Republic of China and asserted the likelihood of Japan’s militarily supporting Taiwan if it is attacked by the mainland. This expression of support has angered the PRC, which has responded with punishments and threats. Japan is not the problem. The PRC is the problem. And Cheng.
