Pearls and Irritations

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) does not have the democratic rights of the people in the 100 plus countries in which it operates at heart. It is solely interested in the maintenance of US power.

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) is holding its annual democracy assembly in China’s Taipei and some people find this surprising. That the meeting is being hosted by NED is not a surprise at all, but that they chose China’s Taipei as the venue, may be something of a surprise to some people.

The NED was formed in 1983 to “promote freedom around the world”. To the casual observer this is a noble and righteous cause but, look a little deeper and it becomes less noble.

The NED is not the righteous campaigner for democracy and freedoms it claims to be, it is a deliberate cut-out for what used to be CIA funding. Its leadership are not promoting democracy, they do the opposite they promote American interests wherever they are. This might seem to be a conspiratorial view but is held by many researchers and, a very interesting fact sheet from the Chinese government released just a few months ago. People may wish to ignore China’s input into this or even criticise them as being biased against an organisation formed as a non-profit by Ronald Regan but the well-researched and supported information provided by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, makes that a very difficult position to defend. The NED does not have the democratic rights of the people in the 100 plus countries in which it operates at heart, it is solely interested in the maintenance of US power.

Once the reader embraces that piece of information the obvious answer to any questions as to why Taipei was chosen as the site of this summit will become clear. Taipei is the capital city of the Chinese province of Taiwan and NED are happy when they are prodding US enemies with a sharp stick. So, holding a democracy meeting on a Chinese island, so soon after the visit by Speaker Pelosi, is exactly that; A stick into a nest to see what comes out, they hope it will be ants or hornets!

Taiwan is part of China, this much is not disputed by the USA (which owns and funds the NED), this was clarified way back in 1943 by the Cairo Declaration, confirmed by the Shanghai Communique of 1972 and placed into international recognition by the UN which confirmed the position when the spokesperson for the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Mr. Stephane Dujarric said in August 2022: “The policy of the United Nations on this issue is that we are guided by General Assembly Resolution 2758 from 1971 on one-China.” The UN resolution 2758 to which he referred is the one that expelled the representatives of Chiang Kai Shek from the UN.

There are, of course, some legalistic interpretations where some people might argue that this does not mention Taiwan and therefore the people of Taiwan are not part of China, but are a separate nation: if that were the case, they would have been provided with a nationality and a place in the United Nations, as proposed by the US but voted against by the General Assembly; they were not. The UN resolution also went on to restore “all its rights” and recognise the government of the People’s Republic of China as the “only legitimate representatives to the United Nations,” What all this means is that there is only one China and Taiwan, whether some people like it or not, is a part of China. Historically, geographically, culturally, linguistically and ethnically, Taiwan and China are linked. Politically however, thanks to the likes of NED, they are not.

The second surprising reason for choosing Taiwan as the location for any display of democracy is that until quite recently, Taiwan wasn’t a democracy at all and, since becoming one has not really shone as any kind of beacon, even the usually right leaning Brookings Institute in a January 2021 paper conceded that: “while the elections are fair and clean and the system is strongly supported, the political system does not do so well due to structural factors.”

Until 1991 there were no elections in Taiwan, the country was a military dictatorship from 1949 and under Martial Law under the Kuomintang until 1987. This martial law prevented any form of democracy, political opponents were arrested and, those that weren’t executed during the period known as “White Terror,” were sent to Green Island, a penal colony 33 miles off the coast which became known as Taiwan’s Alcatraz, a prison from which no one escaped. Estimates vary but several thousand people were summarily executed during the White Terror period and this does not count the 18,000 the KMT executed before arriving in Taiwan, during what is now known as the “228 incident.” It is no surprise when these factors are taken into account that the United Kingdom, Canada and most of Europe, 76 countries in total, gave their votes to the People’s Republic of China over the oppression created by the KMT. The United States, of course, voted no!

Another surprising fact about choosing Taiwan as some model of democracy, is that since becoming one, only 31 years ago, the Legislative Yuan (LY), as Taiwan’s governing body is called, has failed to impress anyone with its form of governance which quite often leads to tantrums, aggression and security intervention. It would be fair to say that they have not demonstrated any ability to show the world any form of decent governance and have instead, become the laughing stock of the international community. Even the USA with its partisan politics must look at Taiwan and question the decision to impose western style democracy on a group of people clearly unsuited for it.

Back in 2009, problems with Taiwan’s fledgling Democracy were so common that a paper was written explaining how and why Taiwan’s politicians resorted to fighting. It would be a reasonable assumption that the elected representatives of the people of the island would have learnt from this; sadly, they did not.

In 2016, there was chaos as members fought each other because they couldn’t get their way over holiday cuts; in 2017, members didn’t like what was going on so chairs were thrown and chaos ensued; in 2020, fights broke out in the LY over tyranny; also in 2020, in an incident that amused some people but disgusted others, pigs intestines were thrown from one side of the LY to the other; in 2021, there was a brawl in the chamber as members disagreed over Covid policies. These are not isolated incidents; they are so common that, as recently as 2017, papers were still being written in an effort to explain this through the lens of “western experts”.

In truth, these constant fights and brawls are simply examples of how democracy fails the people when those who represent them do so without adequate education and experience of this foreign form of governance and how an imported form of democracy from a different culture, supported only with money but without the required training and education is so poorly implemented.

Unsurprisingly, the Brooking’s paper concludes with the finding that: “Taiwan’s structural impediments to good policy performance are not easily fixed.”

And, to end this on a jocular note: one final point which makes the decision to hold this event in Taipei so close to the end of the year surprising, is that just a week ago one United States Navy Admiral, was predicting that China “could invade” Taiwan by the end of the year – and, indeed they could. Given the words of China’s President as he opened the National Congress just a few days earlier, It’s a fairly safe bet that they won’t but if they did, it might be because NED’s 11^th Global Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy between 25^th and 27^th of October might be too tempting a target!

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