Taiwan pushes back against Xi's WWII narrative bid — SkimNews
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- Taiwan is pushing back against Beijing's effort to rewrite WWII history, rattled that Washington could be won over to a narrative that would lessen US support for the island from its key arms supplier
- Xi Jinping and Donald Trump at Thursday's state dinner in Washington lauded their countries' wartime fight together; a White House fact sheet said they recalled the US and China "were allies in World War Two and fought side by side to win the war"
- Shen Yu-chung, deputy head of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council, accused Xi of "continuously trying to guide the World War Two historical narrative to be led by the People's Republic of China" and said Taipei will keep messaging Washington that the Republic of China was America's "steadfast ally"
- Taiwan Deputy Foreign Minister Francois Wu said Beijing wanted to overwrite the "true history," adding: "China is trying to replace the Republic of China's role during World War Two. I think this is something we should feel very sad about."
- Taiwan notes the Republic of China government fought alongside the Allies during WWII before fleeing to the island in 1949 after losing the civil war with Mao Zedong's communists, while Beijing's official history credits communist guerrillas as the "backbone" and gives little mention to Republican forces
- Taiwan's opposition Kuomintang (KMT) fired at President Lai Ching-te, saying his government only invokes pre-1949 Republic of China history when it suits a fight with Beijing — "bringing back the 1945 Republic of China when they need to confront Beijing and compete for the narrative rights"
- Last year on the 80th anniversary of the war's end, the de facto US embassy in Taipei already accused China of spreading "false" WWII narratives to pressure Taiwan — a pattern Soochow University associate professor Chen Fang-yu says Taiwan cannot match given Beijing's "enormous propaganda resources"
Why it matters: The WWII alliance story is Taiwan's strongest historical-legal argument for distinct international standing from Beijing — if Washington absorbs Beijing's framing, Taipei loses a key wedge issue with its most important arms supplier. The KMT's attack on Lai for selectively invoking pre-1949 history "when they need to confront Beijing" shows the narrative fight divides Taiwan's own politics, not just Taipei and Beijing.
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