What lessons Taiwan has learned from the Russian invasion of Ukraine
Global News
Beijing's recent rhetoric and military posturing against Taiwan are prompting some to prepare. And the Taiwanese are taking lessons from Ukraine.
Canadian veteran Ray Buxton and his Taiwanese wife, Judy, had just moved into their dream home on the southern coast of Taiwan in the summer of 2020 when they heard a deafening roar overhead.
“Like a bat of the hell came these two fighter jets,” Buxton recalled. “They ascended up and they just kind of disappeared.”
The Taiwanese planes had scrambled from a nearby airbase to confront a fleet of Chinese fighter jets, which were heading straight for Taiwan.
Pilots issued a warning, and eventually, the enemy planes retreated to China. But after a couple of days, the jets returned again. And again. And again.
“It’s become much more frequent,” Buxton said. “It’s all part and parcel with Chinese Communist Party propaganda. Show of strength, sabre rattling, provocation.”
The Chinese Communist Party has vowed to take control of Taiwan, by force if necessary. The Taiwanese have lived under that existential threat for seven decades, and many have learned to ignore it. But Beijing’s recent rhetoric and military posturing are prompting some to prepare. And they’re taking lessons from Ukraine.
On a Sunday afternoon, a few dozen Taipei residents sit on the floor of a church basement, learning how to tightly wrap a tourniquet around their leg to stop the flow of blood in case of a catastrophic injury.
The training is offered for free to Taiwanese civilians by a nongovernmental organization called Forward Alliance — one of several NGOs launched in recent years to provide survival courses in case of a Chinese military invasion.