Some Background.
I’m a British national my wife is Taiwanese. I’ve lived here for seven years and I wish to start the naturalization process to become Taiwanese.
My question is that once I become a naturalized citizen, would I be required to do military service? If so what would that entail for a western man. My spoken Chinese is okay but I can’t read or write. I’m 26 and would be 27 by the time I’m naturalized.
I can’t find anything on the net about foreign nationals doing military service, only that foreign born Taiwanese do need to do it if they return to Taiwan.
Some Background.
I’m a British national my wife is Taiwanese. I’ve lived here for seven years and I wish to start the neutralization process to become a neutralized citizen (Taiwanese)
My question is that once I become a neutralized citizen, would I be required to do military service? If so what would that entail for a western man. My spoken Chinese is okay but I can’t read or write. I’m 26 and would be 27 by the time I’m neutralized (sounds painful)
I can’t find anything on the net about foreign nationals doing military service, only that foreign born Taiwanese do need to do it if they return to Taiwan.
Any information would be very much appreciated.
Thanks [/quote]
Becoming a neuter was more a Qing dynasty thing. What you need to do is become naturalized. No need to sacrifice the family jewels at all.
From what I’ve been told by the Consulate, it’s pretty common place to renounce your citizenship then apply for repatriation after if it’s to apply for citizenship. The UK allows this but I’ve heard it’s not the same for some other nationalities. Thanks for the feedback I’ll check out the book.
Right, I don’t know the situation with the UK. I know with the US, it is a royal pain in the butt to try and get your citizenship back. They basically look at you as any other Taiwanese person, and you need to go through all the long lines and waiting and uncertainty that anyone else does.
Doesn’t sound particularly pleasant to me.
If you go through with it, keep us updated. I’m interested in hearing what it’s like.
Yes, just because you’re white does not mean you are exempt from military duty, unless you have preexisting medical conditions.
However the conscription age ends after 35 so wait until you are after 35 to naturalize. Note not all countries recognize renouncing citizenship (I think Taiwan is one of those countries) so sometimes it just becomes a formality. I think the US takes a dim view upon renouncing citizenship because many people do it to avoid tax obligations.
I’ve heard that military service will be getting scrapped at some point.
I’m also from the UK and thought about getting naturalised in Taiwan. I figured that as my wife (born in Taiwan) has Taiwanese and British citizenship, I could have dual nationality as well. Then I found out about having to renounce my British citizenship and that really annoyed me. Quite a few people have ranted about this, and quite rightly so. Anyway, I just figured that I’d live here as a foreign spouse for the time being. Taiwan’s future is more uncertain that than of your average country. Perhaps things will get better and in a few years we won’t need to renounce our nationalities to get naturalised. Then again perhaps things could take a turn for the worse. I love this place, but have it in the back of my mind that it may radically change in the near future. I’d hate to think what could happen if my imaginary Taiwanese passport was confiscated and I was left without any official nationality. But those are just my fears.
For the repatriation thing. You need to find out what it involves and how much it’s going to cost you. My wife applied for British citizenship and after going through all the steps - the Life in the UK test, paying for a marriage visa and then paying for British citizenship. All this ended up costing several thousand pounds. You want to find out if they’re going to give you a nice and easy fast track option, or if you’re going to have to start from stage one.
When A-jeou became president. He said he had a plan to bring in an all volunteer military service by 2014. And the only real compulsary service would be 3 months. At least that’s what I read. Now you only need to do 3 months military service instead of 2 years.
Other than that, you would have to volunteer to do more.
military service is already only 10 months. I had to do a year and a half.
The plan was to have an enlisted military force but they are having difficulty enlisting any significant amount of people so the plan to end conscription is delayed at the moment.
