May 25, 2024
Lansing, Michigan
Massive protests began in Taipei this week. The divided legislature has led to a coalition between the KMT and the TPP, and that, when moving on its first priorities, has attempted to fast-track a bill with security components in it and this has aroused widespread opposition.
Among the components of the bill have been provisions like making it a crime to lie or withhold information to parliament; for example in inquiries officials might be compelled to give information publicly that could expose state secrets to the public sphere that would be to the advantage of China, their geopolitical rival. So that is opposed on the streets.
But then also there is the concern that the newly statutorily-described civil violation of “contempt of parliament” is overly vague and would lead to broad discretion in the use of political powers that would be used as a dragnet against political opponents, if passed.
Sunflowers were seen again on the streets.
China’s cognitive war against Taiwan and its allies and close friends has not abated. Throughout all this process of drafting this bill in the legislature, China has been doing cognitive warfare attacks on Taiwan through both propaganda and grey zone warfare, but the cognitive warfare has been most operationalized against the mental state of the pro-China factions in the government there who are most persuadable. Taiwan is China’s first target but Taiwan’s friends should pay close attention to the methods that China is using because these are the prototypes of the sort of geopolitical gamesmanship that the rest of the world will be facing in short order from China.
It is a game of wills in this cognitive warfare paradigm. To contest this takes the intelligent use of the common skill of media literacy. Disinformation and cognitive warfare go hand in hand after all. Cognitive warfare will seep into the U.S. from China, and it is especially insidious, so the U.S. should look to Taiwan as a friend in those, with the skill and ability to guide and inform U.S. policy on Chinese cognitive warfare.
