Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

A US military expert is playing down the threat to Taiwan of China’s new DF-21D ballistic anti-ship missile, which is said to be capable of sinking an aircraft carrier.

Four-star US Admiral Robert Willard, commander of the US Pacific Command, made headlines earlier this week when he revealed for the first time that the missile was now in the early stages of deployment.

This time every year the press decide on one word that best represents the previous 12 months. They have yet to come up with one for this year, but here is one for the coming year: chaos.

Taiwan now consists of five special municipalities and 17 counties, with 60 percent of the population living within the former. The implications for how finances are to be divvied up are horrendous. The newly-elected mayors of these municipalities inherit huge debts, and to fulfill campaign promises they are going to need to go cap in hand to the central government for cash, personnel and other resources. The 17 counties will be allocated a smaller portion of the pie and will see their subsidies fall. The five municipalities already exist, but the legislation concerning the allocation of finances, namely the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) and the Public Debt Act (公債法), are held up in the legislature, waiting for amendments. This means a worsening of the disparity between urban and rural areas, and between rich and poor.