In the afternoon of December 23rd, President Chen Shui-bian and Vice President Annette Lu attended a luncheon with presidential advisors at the Taipei Guest House. The President gave a speech before the luncheon.
Here are the main points of the President's speech:
This morning, during the monthly memorial ceremony of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, we heard a speech delivered by Professor Chen Ming-tung. This speech was titled "New Viewpoint of National Security of Taiwan in Democratization." I learned a lot of things and had a lot of thoughts about this speech.
Professor Chen pointed out that the most serious problem of national security is the threat from China which included political, economic, social, military, and diplomatic unfriendly or even antagonistic acts from China. Next, Professor Chen pointed out the second most serious problem of national security is domestic challenges which included five major elements: 1. interior ethnic and political tensions; 2. discordance in constitutional and political systems; 3. incompletion of economic reconstructing and industrial upgrading; 4. losing of awareness of national security and lacking of faith in government creditability; 5. insufficiency in lands and natural resources.
Threat from China is a problem with many factors that are beyond our control and as such we can only face it with vigilance and caution. However, we can deal with domestic challenges because we could control and solve these problems if we are active and cooperative.
Though Professor Chen had listed five major troubles, actually the root problem is "national identity." If we could solve this problem, all constitutional historical burdens could be resolved. Even in the economic development, requirement of risk and management control will get wider support from the business sector if our "national identity" issue is solved. Only after identifying the other side is a friend or a foe could we build up a common awareness of exigency to pool the power of the people, to beef up the defense system and to overcome the limitations of natural hurdles in engaging the enemy outside our territory.
If we did not deal with the "national identity" issue, we would make the problem even worse. In the authoritarian past, we were living in a useless fantasy of "Pan-Sinicism." However, after democratization, we are having a new national awareness which is the new principle of "national identity." According to a long-term study in 1996, only 41% of the Taiwanese people believed the country's territories only included Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu while 42% of others believed the territories included all Mainland China. In 1998, the ratio changed to 65% against 27%. In 2003, the ratio further changed to 71% against 14%. On Taiwan's future status, the 1996 survey showed that 73% of the people insisted that only the Taiwanese people could decide its fate, while 13% others thought the 1.3 billion mainland Chinese also had the same right. The ratio changed to 81% against 13% in 1998. Today, we have no more statistics about these investigations but I believed the range would be greater today.
"Taiwan-oriented consciousness" is the mainstream of Taiwanese social value today. However, there are still 13% of the people clinging to the old-fashioned idea of national identity. Though we do not agree with them or support them, we must tolerate and respect these people who are having very strong sentiment about this old-fashioned idea because we live in a democratic society.
The wheel of history never stops for a few people who would like to live in the past and the "Taiwan-oriented consciousness" will go deeper and more forceful as day goes by. During this process, how to hold the people together in the democratization will be Taiwan's utmost concern.
I once mentioned that we should never change the direction of "Taiwan-oriented consciousness" and I also believe that we should take more proactive actions. It is our goal of achievement next year and I sincerely hoped you can give me more and more advice.
Moreover, I must make it known that the unification process of the European Union is just one of the models, not the only one model or solution or the last one model or solution for the settlement of cross-strait disputes. Anyway, the values and spirits of the EU model is something that we could benefit from it.
I believe that four major principles contributed to the successful unification of the EU. They are the sovereignty, equality, democracy and peace. Everybody knew that the success of EU is based on every member respecting each other's sovereignty. In other words, members of EU respect each other as equal and there is no country bossing others in this community. Without equality, EU cannot be unified as today. Moreover, it required democracy and they are respecting the choices and free wills of the people. People are the boss and it is the basic principle of democracy. Finally, the process must be done in a peaceful way. Peace in the process should be achieved through non-military ways and every difference must be solved by negotiation. Negotiation is the only way to attain peace. The four principles of sovereignty, equality, democracy and peace of EU were also the principles of our solution of cross-strait problems. I believe this is the main opinion of Professor Chen and I added some of my opinions in it. This is my idea and I hope everyone can give me more advice.
Finally, I must say it to all of you and your families: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!