As China staged a second day of “punishment” drills yesterday in response to President William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration, some residents said they would carry on with their normal lives despite Beijing’s pressure.
China staged mock missile strikes in waters east of Taiwan and dispatched fighter jets carrying live missiles, Chinese state media reported, as Beijing tested its ability to “seize power” and control key areas of Taiwan.
However, in the nation of 23 million people, life has continued as normal with no overt sign of worry, as Taiwanese have gotten used to decades of living with Chinese threats.
Photo: Ann Wang, REUTERS
China’s military exercises “don’t really affect our daily lives. We still have to work to make money,” said Chen Sian-en, a tire repair shop owner in Kaohsiung.
“From childhood to adulthood, it means that we’ve gotten used to [China’s] threats,” said Chen, 66, adding that the drills were “some kind of intimidation tactic” and a “show of force” from Beijing to Taiwan’s new president.
“They’ve talked about it so many times, but there hasn’t been any real action. If they wanted to take over Taiwan, they would have done it already,” Chen said.
While Taiwanese media have covered the drills, a lot of the focus has instead been on continuing protests against efforts by the opposition to push legislative reforms, and occasional fighting by lawmakers on the floor of the chamber.
“I feel no reason to be scared,” Taipei taxi driver Chuang Jun-sung said. “If China really attacks Taiwan, there’s nothing Taiwan can do but deal with it, but we should still have the guts to fire our missiles back at them.”
The drills are being conducted all around Taiwan, as well as areas close to Kinmen County, and Dongyin (東引) and Wuchiu (烏坵) islands in Lienchiang County near the Chinese coast.
Kinmen resident Tim Chang, 52, said that Beijing has been threatening war for decades.
“If war is bound to happen, if they planned to attack, they would have struck 20, 30 years ago,” he said.
Taiwan’s benchmark index is at a historic high, scarcely impacted by China’s drills. The market closed down 0.2 percent yesterday; on Thursday, the day the drills began, it closed up 0.3 percent.
The stock of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, is also at a historic peak.
“The drills will have a short-term psychological impact, but won’t reverse the long-term upward trend of Taiwan stocks,” Mega International Investment Services vice president Alex Huang (黃國偉) said.
Vasu Menon, managing director of investment strategy at OCBC in Singapore, said that investors were not expecting any dramatic escalation in tensions.
“China’s military has over the past few years carried out regular activities near Taiwan, making investors less sensitive to such drills,” he added.
Still, Kaohsiung resident Angeline Liao said that she was personally “very worried” about the drills.
“If, hypothetically, there were some military [war] activities today, I think I would be the first one to wave the white flag,” the 36-year-old insurance agent said.
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