TAICHUNG (Taiwan News) — On the anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre, when soldiers from the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) armed wing, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), shot and ran over thousands of unarmed students with tanks, the Taipei Times ran an editorial headlined “Militarization promotes violence.” The author expressed, “I see a vast militarization taking place in Taiwan, with all the negatives that can come with that.”

He continues, “The establishment of a dominant military, aggressive, war-oriented purview of all life and existence is far from the best way to conduct an entire, modern society, and excludes the better values noted here. I see something like this in Taiwan, and hope for something better.”

The author certainly seems to mean well, and I also believe that a democratic and free society should always be vigilant regarding attempts to curtail civil rights and freedoms. Benjamin Franklin famously noted, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

The problem with the editorial is that Taiwan is not being militarized at all, that is, unless we are talking about K-pop BTS ARMY.

There have been some prudent steps taken, to be sure. They have been implemented through the democratic process, in consultation with the public, and with broad public acceptance and approval. That is not militarization of society by any stretch of the imagination, any more than the government taking prudent steps to prepare for earthquakes.

I suspect the misunderstanding is laid clear in this line: “This can be seen not least in this newspaper, the Taipei Times, in which military acquisitions, preparedness and the acute danger of an imminent full-scale attack by China are splashed across page one and beyond in virtually every single issue.”

I can see how someone reading English language reporting on Taiwan could get the impression that Taiwanese society is being militarized. Few Taiwanese read English language media outlets, though.

I spend hours every day immersed in the local Chinese language news media across the media spectrum as research for these columns. I would be very surprised if military-related news made it into the top 25 topics the local news covers. Subtopics of topics like food, such as beef noodles, get more coverage.

As for television shows and movies glorifying the modern military, I can not think of a single one that has come out since the martial law era ended.

List of fears

The author explains his fears as to what he sees happening to Taiwanese society: “Militarization is the process by which a society organizes itself wholly for military conflict and violence, not least in terms of policies of required military service (usually for men, but women, too), massive arms purchases, arms races, the consolidation of power by politicians, military-industrial complexes, the infusion of military language and imagery into journalism and other forms of communication and a top-down, masculine, patriarchal mindset.”

Taiwan’s society is not organized wholly for military conflict and violence. How many people do you see in the street or at the convenience store in military uniforms? Virtually none.

Military recruitment is not increasing. In fact, they are getting a bit desperate to get more people to sign up. Militarization starts with a growing military, not a shrinking one.

It is true that starting in 2024, military conscription will be expanded back to one year for men and a small number of reservists will have their training time expanded a bit. That puts Taiwan in line with such heavily militarized societies as Sweden and Finland.

Massive arms purchases do not militarize society, as they are exclusively used within the military, not outside of it. Similarly, neither does an arms race change society except in higher taxes, and it is worth remembering who initiated the current arms race.

TSMC vastly outspends military

Taiwan’s defense budget is NT$586.3 billion (US$19 billion), including special budgets for arms purchases, and represents 2.4% of GDP. That is roughly in line with Finland and Sweden.

To put Taiwan’s defense spending in context, TSMC’s capital expenditure in 2023 is expected to top US$32 billion, and the revenue outlook is in the US$65-70 billion range. When the entire complex semiconductor supply chain is counted together, Taiwan’s society is increasingly geared to chip production, not the military.

I have not seen any out-of-the-ordinary consolidation of power by politicians, and I think it is very likely that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is likely to lose its legislative majority in the coming election. I suppose a military-industrial complex could form someday, but there is little-to-no sign of it existing now. Again, being immersed in local language media for years, I have not seen any uptick in the use of military language or imagery.

As for his comment that a “top-down, masculine, patriarchal mindset” is militarizing society, that suggests it is on the increase. While it exists, it is actually in decline. For example, electoral trends showed in the last election that women candidates won two-thirds of the races they entered versus only half for the men, and women have made big gains in every election for over a decade.

In the last elections, women won ten of the 22 city and county leadership roles. The legislature, which is currently well over 40% women, is on track if current trends continue to reach parity or even exceed their male counterparts in the upcoming election.

Civil society groups are growing in power, not weakening, and they are a big check on “top-down” thinking. The rising strength of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) also indicates the desire of many for a check on the power of the two big parties.

Misunderstandings regarding “civilian defense force”

The author also expresses concern over increased talk of a “civilian defense force.” The author appears to have a misunderstanding of what that actually means. As I previously wrote in a column, it is not about producing civilian soldiers, it is about preparing people to handle logistics, food, emergency rescue, and other civilian tasks to support both the citizenry and provide assistance behind the lines to properly trained armed soldiers.

This is what the Kuma Academy is doing now. They are not teaching offensive skills to attack incoming soldiers, such as how to shoot, but rather first aid and emergency assistance to the wounded, helping to evacuate people in emergencies, and other skills that largely overlap with disaster relief.

Even if you can not read Chinese, the pictures of their students dressed in civilian clothes attending classes and learning to apply tourniquets tell the story. English language media, especially foreign news outlets, like to play up some sort of military aspect to Kuma Academy, but the reality is very different than their breathless, dramatic accounts.

It is also worth noting that Kuma Academy is a civil society activist group, not affiliated with the government or the military in any way. Far from militarizing society, it could be said they are de-militarizing it from the grassroots up, and definitely not with a “top-down, masculine, patriarchal mindset.”

What government has actually done

The list of what the government has done in practice that would have the slightest impact on society is very limited. Conscription has been extended to be in line with other democracies and they are testing extending training for a handful of reservists, including a tiny number of women for the first time.

They have set up a website and app for finding air raid shelters and have recently been replacing the old, faded, and barely legible signs pointing to shelters. A civil defense handbook has been produced.

In emergency and disaster preparation exercises, coordinating police, firefighters, and other key emergency personnel, they have increased the amount of time devoted to handling a military attack alongside earthquake and other disaster preparation. Much of what is learned is useful for any type of disaster, and considering a military attack is not out of the realm of possibility, it seems prudent to take the possibility into account.

That is about it. There is no militarization of Taiwan’s society taking place. I hope this has set the author’s mind at ease.

The author will not like that I advocate for more to be done, though only through the democratic process in consultation with the public. Across the strait, their society is everything the author fears and more, including teaching small children how to bayonet, shoot, and grenade Japanese and Americans, who they are being taught to hate.

The stakes could not be higher. Recently, some students from Hong Kong interviewed me for a university project and asked me if China were to invade Taiwan, whether I thought the model for their rule would be Hong Kong.

I said no. It would be Xinjiang.