Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁) has caused havoc with his attempts to overturn the democratic and constitutional order in the legislature. If we look at this devolution from the context of a transition to democracy from authoritarianism in a culturally Chinese sense — that of zhonghua (中華) — then we are playing witness to a servile spirit from a millennia-old form of totalitarianism that is intent on damaging the nation’s hard-won democracy.

This servile spirit is ingrained in Chinese culture.

About a century ago, Chinese satirist and author Lu Xun (魯迅) saw through the servile nature of Chinese.

Recent media reports have highlighted a critical national security case that concluded last year, revealing retired Taiwanese military personnel recruited by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) were tasked with gathering intelligence on key military installations and the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT), and, alarmingly, were implicated in a plot to establish an armed assassination unit.

That case represents an unprecedented escalation in the PRC’s infiltration tactics. The PRC’s evolving strategies, from manipulating internal narratives and employing “gray zone” tactics, to planning assassinations, underscore its intent to destabilize Taiwan’s institutional and societal frameworks. That progression reflects a deliberate and systematic approach to undermining Taiwan’s sovereignty and disrupting its social fabric. The involvement of retired military officers suggests potential contraventions of Criminal Code provisions on sedition and treason.