Wartime lessons help us all
Thank you for the article entitled “Memoirs recall Japan’s wartime rule over Taiwan in the 1940s” (Nov. 1, page 12), and thanks to Tony Kuo (郭天祿), who translated into English his father’s memoirs of life under Japanese rule and as a soldier for the Japanese.
This type of research needs to be carried out to enlighten us to a fascinating and under-studied period of World War II and the years prior to the war.
Tens of thousands of Taiwanese served in the Imperial Japanese Army. As in Tony Kuo’s father’s diary, their story needs to be told.
I have always been interested in the US bombing of Taiwan. At the National 228 Memorial Museum in 228 Park there is an exhibit on the bombing of Taipei by the US. The Presidential Office and Longshan Temple were just two of the many buildings bombed in those air raids in an effort to defeat the Japanese occupiers of Taiwan.
I recall religious Taiwanese friends’ stories that some of the bombs dropping from the air were caught by “guardian angels” of the people below. If only those stories were true: So many suffered during the war, on all sides of the conflict.
Let us tell the stories of those who lived through those times in the hope that such violence will never happen again.
Academic research, oral histories and newspaper articles such as this can only enlighten us to those terrible times.
Dave Hall
Taipei
This hypocrisy is sickening
Your recent editorial (“Promoting gays rights helps Taiwan,” Oct. 31, page 8) underlines the blatant hypocrisy of promoting human rights in Taiwan.
Whilst I agree with gay rights, this society takes no action when the right of darker-skinned non-citizens to sit in a public park is openly abused and no corrective action is taken. This was noted in recent news stories and in your bland editorial “Racism raises its ugly head” (Sept. 22, page 8) that accepted this occurence as normal.
Action was needed but your much-vaunted newspaper proposed absolutely nothing. You choose to ignore the fact that non-residents are excluded from riding on government-financed shuttle buses in Taoyuan and are in fact thrown off (“More Taoyuan racism,” Letters, Sept. 27, page 8). These types of outrageous acts will continue because, when it comes to civil rights, Taiwanese will never confront the racist actions of fellow Taiwanese when outsiders are involved.
Your paper’s trumpeting of “civil rights” is a sham, but you still love to receive false international credit for it. It is enough to make a person sick.
John Hanna
Taoyuan
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
RSS