On Taiwan's 'red beaches,' nonchalance about the threat from China

TAIPEI, Taiwan, Jan. 26 (UPI) -- Taiwan's Bali beach is peaceful, if not picturesque, with a rocky shoreline punctuated by massive wind turbines and a vista marred by a power plant and the Port of Taipei.

Just a half-hour's drive northwest of Taipei, the beach mainly attracts fishermen, who were out in modest numbers on a recent weekday morning to cast their lines into the choppy waters of the Taiwan Strait.

As the fishermen waited for a bite, there was little to indicate that this quiet scene was taking place directly in the crosshairs of a military threat that worries defense officials from Washington to Taipei.

Bali is what Taiwan's military calls a "red beach," one of the island's most likely landing spots for a Chinese amphibious invasion. Its location offers direct access to the mouth of the Tamsui River, which flows right into the Taiwanese capital.

That ominous fact doesn't faze Li, a sanitation department employee who has been catching fourfinger threadfin, known locally as "noon fish," here for decades.

"There's nothing to be afraid of," said Li, 62, who requested he be identified only by his surname. "Yes, if China attacks Taipei they would come here. But they probably won't come.

"If they do, we'll fight back," he added.

Taiwan's military remains attuned to the danger of an amphibious invasion, regularly holding anti-landing drills at Bali and the other dozen or so red beaches around the country. Beijing, which considers the democratic island of 23 million a wayward province, has ramped up its provocations in recent years with near-daily incursions of fighter jets, naval ships and, more recently, large balloons.

But the coastline shows little outward signs of preparation for war. Decades-old concrete bunkers from Taiwan's martial law period are scattered at various locations, some abandoned and toppling over into the sea, others repurposed for use as viewing stations for tourists.

At a fish market near the beach at Zhuwei -- another prime target thanks to its proximity to Taiwan's largest airport, Taoyuan International -- 50-year-old Wu, also identified only by his surname, is unmoved by the threat from China.

"I'm not worried," said Wu, who operates a seafood restaurant in the market.

"I was more nervous before, but our society is more advanced now," he said. "Our infrastructure is better. Our military is better."

Not everyone agrees that civilians have nothing to be concerned about. A handful of advocates are warning that the military alone cannot defend Taiwan and are calling for training and eventually arming citizens -- no small feat in a country that has extraordinarily strict gun control laws.

"It's very strange that you have a strong enemy just outside Taiwan, but its people do not have guns or training," former army captain and firearms expert Friedrich Wang said.

Wang, 47, owns a shop in downtown Taipei that sells tactical gear and Airsoft pellet guns while offering shooting lessons at its indoor range.

An armed citizenry, like the militias and civilian groups that have played a crucial role in Ukraine's defense against Russia, would give Beijing pause before launching an invasion, Wang said.

"We have to send a message to [Chinese President] Xi: If you want war, it will hurt," he said. "Make them think again. That's why we need to have civil defense, with updated training and gear."

One of the most outspoken proponents for civil defense has been semiconductor magnate Robert Tsao, the billionaire founder of United Microelectronics Corp.

In 2022, Tsao pledged more than $30 million to train 3 million "civilian warriors," including 300,000 sharpshooters -- a goal he recently acknowledged remained "quite a challenge."

"Just like Ukraine before 2013, a lot of [Taiwanese] people don't realize what kind of danger they face," Tsao said in remarks to UPI and other journalists at an event ahead of Taiwan's recent election. "Many people are not willing to fight for their freedom.

"We have to win the cognitive warfare first," he said. "Then we can unify people in action."

The primary civil defense training group Tsao has funded, Kuma Academy, is also focusing its early efforts on mental preparation and non-combat essentials such as first aid, rescue and evacuation operations.

Arming civilians "is something that has to be approached very carefully," Ben Wu, a representative of Kuma Academy, told UPI in a conversation with a small group of journalists.

"The industrial scale of mobilization, of preparation, of resource gathering and stockpiling could rattle nerves in Taiwan," Wu said. "Could it sow chaos, could it further the potential for conflict? These are the questions being raised.

"The simple idea of protecting ourselves should not be changed," he added. But "we have to begin walking before we can run."

For now, most experts believe China does not have the ability to invade Taiwan. According to a survey released this week by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, only 27% of U.S. experts and 17% of Taiwanese experts thought that China could currently execute an amphibious invasion.

And while Washington maintains an official policy of "strategic ambiguity," 96% of American experts in the CSIS survey felt confident that the United States would intervene if China invaded Taiwan in the next five years.

Taipei, for its part, announced a record defense budget for 2024 and has begun extending its compulsory military service from four months to one year.

If all else fails, Wu at the fish market has another line of defense in mind.

"The gods of Taiwan are very powerful," he said, gesturing at a shrine set up in the market to some of the island's thousands of folk deities. "They will protect us."