Flying Tigers debate exposes Taiwan’s struggle over wartime identity
References by Donald Trump and Xi Jinping to wartime cooperation between the United States and China have intensified a dispute over who represents the Republic of China’s historical role. Taiwan’s government objected to Beijing’s claims, while opposition critics accused the ruling Democratic Progressive Party of selectively invoking ROC history.
References to wartime cooperation between the United States and China by Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have sharpened a debate in Taiwan over the historical identity of the Republic of China, the island’s formal name. During Xi’s visit to Washington last month, Trump described China and the United States as allies in the Second World War and praised the Flying Tigers, the American personnel who helped defend mainland China against Japanese air attacks. Xi recalled the countries fighting side by side against Japanese militarism.
A White House fact sheet also said the two countries had been allies during the war. Taiwan’s Deputy Foreign Minister Wu Chih-chung accused Beijing of trying to replace the Republic of China’s wartime role through what he called “narrative diplomacy”. The Republic of China government represented China when it fought Japan alongside the Allies.
Communist forces established the People’s Republic of China on the mainland in 1949, while the ROC government retreated to Taiwan. The episode has created difficulties for Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, which has promoted a distinct Taiwanese identity while now invoking the ROC’s wartime history to challenge Beijing’s claims. The opposition Kuomintang, which governed the ROC during the war, accused President William Lai Ching-te’s administration of referring to that history only when politically useful.
DPP legislative caucus chief executive Chuang Jui-hsiung said the “China” that fought with the United States was the ROC and cautioned against overinterpreting deliberately vague diplomatic language. Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office said victory belonged to the Chinese nation and maintained that the creation of the PRC represented a change of government rather than a change in China’s international legal identity. Analysts said the dispute could become more significant if Washington continued using terminology that did not distinguish between the ROC and PRC.
Taiwan remains self-ruled, while Beijing claims it and has not ruled out force.
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