A new study on the rising number of retired senior Taiwanese military officers who visit China concludes that retired officials of “mainland” heritage represent the constituency in Taiwan most likely to support unification and could serve as willing conduits for Chinese propaganda intended to manipulate public perceptions in Taiwan.
“Retired Taiwanese military officers have visited China in an individual capacity for many years,” writes John Dotson, a research coordinator on the staff of the congressionally mandated US-China Economic and Security Review Commission in the latest issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s China Brief.
“More organized exchanges between retired Chinese and Taiwanese flag officers — initiated primarily from the Chinese side — have expanded significantly in scale since 2009, he added.
Although the Ministry of National Defense says it does not authorize such visits, it has done nothing to curb the practice, which has raised concerns among US -defense officials over the potential for leaks of sensitive military information or the creation of a back channel for secret negotiations.
A common thread in cross-strait officer exchanges, Dotson writes, is the sponsorship role of the Huangpu Academy Alumni Association, nominally a Chinese civic organization for graduates of the Huangpu (Whampoa) Military Academy.
However, the exchange program is actually a project of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) United Front Work Department (UFWD), he writes.
“[The association] is a thinly disguised front organization operated by the UFWD. It is one of several entities identified by name on a United Front Work Department Web site as organizations managed by the UFWD,” Dotson writes.
The association also shares the same contact telephone number and address with an organization known as the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful Unification, which describes itself as “a voluntary association of people from all walks of life who support reunification, with an independent legal status.”
“The role of the UFWD in -organizing the exchanges of retired Taiwanese military and intelligence personnel makes it clear that there is more going on than simple reminiscing over friendly games of golf,” he writes. “Chinese officials hope to use the exchanges to achieve a two-track set of goals.”
The first goal, he says, is to “influence opinion in Taiwan’s elite circles of national security policymaking in favor of closer relations — and eventual reunification [sic] — with China,” a facet of the program that has been explicitly acknowledged by CCP officials, he writes.
“The second major goal behind the exchanges is almost certainly an effort to glean information of intelligence value,” Dotson writes, adding that although they are no longer are in active service, retired generals and intelligence officials represent “a highly valuable source of potential information for Chinese intelligence collectors — on areas such as command and control relationships, contingency planning, the status of unit readiness and the personalities of senior officials — whether gained through direct recruitment, or more subtly through targeted elicitation.”
“The exchanges provide an illuminating look at some of the methods by which the CCP conducts intelligence collection and perception management operations directed at Taiwan, as well as its employment of front organizations that masquerade as civil society groups,” he writes.
The department will almost certainly continue to expand its outreach to retired Taiwanese officials, Dotson writes, adding that it will be up to Taiwan’s democratic process “to decide where to draw the line between individual rights of expression and travel in a free society and the national security restrictions required to maintain those same freedoms.”
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at