Taiwan: Chiang's Legacy and Historical Revisionism

I've been so busy ranting about taxes that I haven't looked back at Taiwan in a while, but I just did, and I'm not thrilled to see the KMT prancing around.

Indulging in a little historical revisionism mingled with current self-preening, are we, KMT? Taiwan News, though, is calling them on it. Blurb (my emphasis in boldface):

The ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang)'s celebration of the centenary of the late president Chiang Ching-kuo, the autocratic son and successor of KMT dictator Chiang Kai-shek, marks a major step in the restored KMT regime's attempted "historical cleansing" of the Taiwan people's "quiet revolution" of democracy.

The taxpayer financed commemorations for the late KMT leader have included a mountain of "pulp panegyrics" and exhibitions, a music concert, a website (www.cck.org.tw) and an official memorial service topped off by a 11,000 Chinese character essay by President Ma Ying-jeou, who is transparently positioning himself as his mentor's political successor.

In his address posted on Friday, Ma lauded the younger Chiang for launching the so-called "10 Major Construction Projects" in the early 1970s, improving the livelihood of the Taiwan people and creating an economic miracle" and "guiding democratic reform and lifting the freeze in cross-strait relations" with the People's Republic of China which is ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, which expelled Chiang Kai-shek's KMT regime from the China mainland in 1949.

Ironically, Ma's keynote account is more noteworthy for what it omits than for what it includes.

For example, readers will look in vain for any mention of the younger Chiang's role as the mastermind of the KMT martial law regime's security network in the 1950s and 1960s and his role as the hands-on executor of the "White Terror" purge of alleged "communists," Taiwan independence advocates, liberal dissidents and rivals for power that cost the lives of at least 5,000 mainlanders and native Taiwanese, nearly 30,000 imprisoned political prisoners and the destruction of tens of thousands of families.

Learn the history! That way you can recognize whitewashing when you see it.

The editorial does have a firecracker of an ending, though:

But the very fact that Ma and the rest of the KMT leadership are unwilling to confront the true and full history of Chiang Ching-kuo and exposes their fear of the historical memory of the Taiwan people's successful if imperfect democratic revolution in the face of the incompetence of the restored KMT government.

The Taiwan people should never forget that our democracy was not a "gift" but a priceless treasure which the blood, sweat and work of hundreds of thousands of activists and the votes of millions of ordinary citizens "repossessed" from a dictatorial regime.

We should also never forget that we did it once and can do it again.

YES.

More here.