Very high levels of basic education too relative to their peers in Asia. This of course was due to Japanese investment in educational infrastructure, much more so than what other colonizers invested.
Guy
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Yes they did encourage the kids to go to elementary school at least (they would give the kids candy and food to attend school ). But they werenât âniceâ, for instance they extracted a food tax from poor farmers , were often hated by them for that , and didnât do land reform. They actually grabbed vast tracts of land off pingpu aboriginals (I believe ) and these later became Taiwan Sugar land. And we know how they treated other aborignals. They created a Japanified Taiwanese elite in the cities.
You can still see the old docs clinics from those times owned by the same families through the generations. Kinda interesting.
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Taiwan wasnât âpoor and underdevelopedâ back in 1945. It was âparadise on Earthâ for many of the mainland peasants who came over. I suggest reading âFormosa Betrayedâ to get a full picture of what it was like at the time of the hand over and how much the place had advanced under Japanese rule. The KMT dragged this place down with them and it took decades to recover.
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Bay of Pigs?
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George Kerr should be required reading for allâbut I would caution against depicting his account (important as it is) as a âfull picture.â He was an American (albeit a disillusioned one) that had his own take on the terrible events that transpired in the 1940s with the tacit support of the US government.
Guy
Itâs relative. Maybe in the first decades, but later they put foundation for teck revolution. They liberalize business. Morris Chang was invited to Taiwan by KMT government. However fundamentals were put by Japanese. Hard work habits and organizations skills
So thirty years of looting killing and repression, followed by the semi-conductor move in the 1980s. OK I guess I could agree with that.
The repression, btw, continued into the 1990s until finally the democracy activists (including both Taiwanese and Chinese nationalists) forced this change. So thatâs closer to 45 years of active state repression.
Guy
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I get your reasoning, but things donât look better without US being in the asian pacific. China and the whole Asian pacific region would all be richer along with the rest of the world if China played nice. The US isnât looking to invade into China, nor are the Japanese and Koreans in this century.
The US in fact, gave China the biggest gift of recognizing PRC as China. The entire world wanted China to join and prosper, anything the US and its allies are doing is a response to China and not the other way around.
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I donât agree that it is that unlikely, depending on how the take-over occurs. If there is a violent invasion with lots of casualties, yeah. But, if there is a legal veneer somehow orchestrated through the KMT and the take-over happens as a bloodless fait-au-complet, I think it is at least possible that enough of the human capital hangs on because they have mortgages to pay and the new boss offers everyone a big raise.
It is easy to dismiss it out of hand as being completely impossible in all circumstances, it is harder to consider all possible circumstances. I think greed and self-interest are great motivators; didnât the Taiwanese government have to implement a law recently to prevent semi-conductor talent from being poached by the Chinese anyways?
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I believe brain drain would occur before this could even be possible.
Yeah but thatâs not how china sees things. They feel they are a great power and donât want to be surrounded by the US. They also Want to be the hegemon in the indo Pacific. They have no interest in just being a player in a US led system anymore and donât think they have to
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And thatâs how Japan also started expanding, hailing itself as the liberator from imperialist oppressionâŚ
will be pockets of resistance, but I personally think they wonât be, thatâs my opinion. I donât think you can call your mommy and daddy to come fight a war for you. Taiwanese arenât a warrior culture.
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And thereâs Allen J. Shackletonâs account, Formosa Calling; he was from New Zealand. Maybe George Kerr talked about the upside of Japanese influence and I forgot it, but in any case, I found Shackletonâs description of railroads, electrical power, other infrastructure, and lifestyle, memorable, even though brief. He seemed to admire the Japanese, and by extension the Taiwanese.
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I donât know where Iâd go.
I have a Taiwan passport, not a citizen of any other country.
I might be able to fly to say Germany, the UK, Australia, NZ or whatever visa free, and thatâs assuming that I can predict when the war might start. Iâd have to sell everything to be able to fund the trip.
Iâm likely to face discrimination and all that, and being not ânormalâ would only make that worse. Only a matter of time until they found some way to get rid of me or keep me in perpetual immigration detention.
Given that it may be best to just go to China and try to blend in.
If Russia had retreated after the first weekend, then this invasion wouldâve been analogous to Bay of Pigs.
Also, the US embargoed/almost invaded Cuba because Cuba was planning on hosting Soviet nuclear warheads. Ukraine returned their nuclear weapons to Russia in exchange of peace, but Russia still attacked because Putin wanted another Belarus.
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So just fly away from your only home ,donât fight even though you have good engineering skills and know something about weapons.
If a country invaded.my homeland Iâd be flying to get into it to fight the bastards. A bit different than the people on this island I reckon.
Well, I have good engineering skills but have very poor physical fitness and stamina, which is very important for soldering.
So I wouldnât be much useâŚ
Engineering skills is exactly what they need in places like Ukraine now.
Oh yeah but you have skills how to fly away quickly 
.
At least in Ukraine the men are sticking around to fight. Many are even flying back to fight.
They are being forced to stay. Iâm sure many would run away if they had the chance.
The physical fitness thing can be sorted TaiwanLuthier, right?
I read a book by a Russian trainer once. He used war as an example of why you should be strong/fit. He was like imagine a guy on top of you and if he overpowers you, your family is dead.
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