The purpose and duties of President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) National Security Council (NSC) are obscure, and despite a reshuffle of members, no clear strategic objectives have emerged, former national security officials said.
Tsai’s appointments seem to support no particular policy direction, compared with the national security teams of former presidents Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), which highlighted foreign policy and cross-strait relations respectively, former officials said.
Former chief of the General Staff Yen Teh-fa (嚴德發) and academic Tsai Ming-Yen (蔡明彥) were sworn in on Monday last week as NSC secretary-general and deputy secretary-general respectively.
Photo: CNA
The other two NSC deputy secretaries-general are polling expert Chen Chun-lin (陳俊麟) and national defense expert Chen Wen-jenq (陳文政). The five NSC advisers are lawyer and judicial reform leader Lin Feng-jeng (林?正), international finance lawyer Lin Liang-jung (林良蓉), Academia Sinica fellow and information security expert Lee Der-tsai (李德財) and former Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) deputy ministers Fu Dong-cheng (傅棟成) and Tung Chen-yuan (童振源).
Chen Shui-bian’s national security team was focused on expanding foreign relations, and former NSC secretaries-general Chiou I-jen (邱義仁), Mark Chen (陳唐山) and Kang Ning-hsiang (康寧祥) were in charge of developing ties with the US, according to a source who spoke on condition of anonymity.
During the same period, NSC deputy secretaries-general and other council members — including now-MAC Deputy Minister Lin Cheng-yi (林正義) and Taichung Mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) — were responsible for analyzing foreign relations, the source said.
Photo: CNA
Ma was pushing the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement with China and aiming to develop cross-strait relations, so his NSC appointments — including former NSC secretary-general Su Chi (蘇起) and deputy secretary-general Kao Charng (高長) — were designed to forward that goal, the source said.
Experts in cross-strait trade were later added to Ma’s NSC team, including former minister of economic affairs John Deng (鄧振中) and former MAC minister Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦).
The NSC has four major roles: mid and long-term strategic planning, tactical operations for immediate purposes, daily administration and crisis management, former NSC deputy secretary-general Chang Jung-feng (張榮豐) said.
The NSC has to formulate plans for cross-strait and foreign relations to be employed over the next decade, but it also has to respond to rapidly changing events, such as the 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, which took place during former president Lee Teng-hui’s (李登輝) tenure, Chang said.
“The NSC is very important if it is valued by the president, but not important at all if it is not valued by the president,” Chang said.
The NSC advises the president on national security issues such as defense, foreign relations, cross-strait ties and major national emergencies, former NSC deputy secretary-general Michael Tsai (蔡明憲) said.
“It does not suit the NSC’s purpose to have judicial reform and polling experts in the NSC leadership,” Michael Tsai said.
The US last year passed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017 authorizing senior military exchanges with Taiwan, but Taipei has remained too conservative to seek increased military ties with the US, he said.
That Tung was appointed to the NSC last year after he resigned as Cabinet spokesman suggested that “Tsai Ing-wen does not place a high value on NSC functions,” the source said.
Tung is rumored to have been appointed representative to Thailand, the source said, adding that the president should use the opportunity to reorganize the NSC, as Tsai Ming-Yen is the only official tasked with foreign policy management, and that provides too little support for a Democratic Progressive Party government that is seeking to expand the nation’s international space.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
‘MALIGN PURPOSE’: Governments around the world conduct espionage operations, but China’s is different, as its ultimate goal is annexation, a think tank head said Taiwan is facing a growing existential threat from its own people spying for China, experts said, as the government seeks to toughen measures to stop Beijing’s infiltration efforts and deter Taiwanese turncoats. While Beijing and Taipei have been spying on each other for years, experts said that espionage posed a bigger threat to Taiwan due to the risk of a Chinese attack. Taiwan’s intelligence agency said China used “diverse channels and tactics” to infiltrate the nation’s military, government agencies and pro-China organizations. The main targets were retired and active members of the military, persuaded by money, blackmail or pro-China ideology to steal
RSS