From the massive-scale surrender of 1949 to the problems over Quemoy, the ROC’s military forces have huge symbolized patience amidst suffering. But, amid Xi Jinping’s increasing stress on Taiwan through China’s new Joint Sword Exercises, ADIZ attacks and mental war, military confidence has become an existential problem.
Low morale is having a significant impact on Taiwan’s defence because it is dealing with a severe lack of soldiers, with some combat units having under 80 % staffing as a result of early retirements and discharges.
This article examines the historical causes of the ROC’s military confidence crisis, examines how Taiwan’s struggle for identification affects defense confidence, and offers suggestions for how to handle this pressing problem.
The ROC military’s confidence crises dates back to the early 20th centuries. After the 1911 Xinhai Revolution, China was divided by regional warlords fighting over lands and cultures, who distanced themselves from the principles of liberty, equality, and normal privileges.
This decentralization and infighting between warlord armies proved fatal, with rising provincialism, defection, and bribery shaping the early ROC, and preventing the creation of a unified national military.
In his article,” Historical origins of the party-army relations in the Soviet Union and China,” Professor Luyang Zhou explains how collective treason exploded in the 1910s and 1920s, replacing actual fighting with defection and bribery. Dialects, topography and self-sufficiency further fueled the already-rising provincialism in China’s Warlord Era.
In 1925, the National Revolutionary Army ( NRA ) was formed, comprising of the KMT Party Army and four military forces loyal to regional leaders. The NRA’s heterogeneity with its individual regional leaders exemplified the decentralization of control.
As outlined in the book” The Chinese High Command: A History of Communist Military Politics”, informal relationships and personal loyalties, rather than ideology, dominated the officer corps dynamics. This fragmentation of the NRA led to widespread defections, further eroding morale.
Additionally, poor military leadership exacerbated the morale crisis. General George Wetzell, a German advisor, criticized Chiang Kai-shek’s rapid promotion of unqualified military officers, which led to underdeveloped leadership development. Officers frequently prioritized socializing, planning logistics, and dealing with budgetary issues over training, leaving troops underprepared for conflict scenarios.
By the mid-20th century, military morale had deteriorated significantly. A total of two Kuomintang army divisions deserted in 1946, and an entire section defected to the CCP in 1945.
In a 1947 article from the Far Eastern Survey, high troop losses and desertion rates in the KMT army, as well as the loss of strategic advantages as American forces halted supplies, provided clear evidence of declining morale.
According to 1947 media reports, the CCP was most likely to prevail in the civil war because of the KMT’s declining morale and ideological weakness. The demoralized KMT military had already lost the Chinese Civil War by 1949 and had retreated to Taiwan.
The ROC military’s dual allegiance to a party and a state added to the difficulty of democratizing and addressing historical morale issues after the retreat. Under President Lee Teng-hui’s leadership, efforts to reform the military in the 1980s faced opposition from the military bureaucracy.
President Lee was the first to endorse civilians for the role of defense minister, appointing Chen-Li-an and Sun Chen in succession, but the military leadership’s refusal to cooperate with them led to the appointment of retired General Chiang Chung-ling to the position instead.
Following President Lee’s attempt to reform the military, President Chen Shui-bian enacted critical reforms to democratize the military. The Ministry of National Defense’s Organization Act and the National Defense Act established civilian-level control over the military, making it necessary for the minister to be a civilian.
However, this requirement was removed during a number of administrations, with retired generals taking the job. The military’s isolationist culture and inability to democratize through civil society have increased the identity dissonance between the military and civilians, making it more difficult to maintain the military’s morale crisis.
Beyond its historical and structural challenges, Taiwan’s evolving identity has a significant impact on military morale because shifting perceptions of national identity affect how the military interacts with the civilian society it serves.
In 1992, the National Chengchi University Election Study Center started conducting annual polls on national identity, with results that year showing that 46.4 % of respondents identified themselves as Taiwanese and Chinese, 25.5 % identified as Chinese, and 17.6 % as Taiwanese.
By 2024, 64.3 % of Taiwanese considered themselves primarily Taiwanese, 30.4 % considered themselves both Taiwanese and Chinese, and only 2.2 % considered themselves primarily Chinese. The significant shifts in distribution show a significant shift in how people perceive national identity in Taiwan.
However, this identity evolution clashes with the ROC military’s traditions, many of which are relics from the country’s Nationalist era. Military songs like the” Military Discipline Song” ( 軍紀歌 ) and” I Love China” ( 我愛中華 ) perpetuate outdated symbols and ideas such as the” National Revolutionary Army” ( 國民革命軍 ) and” Revitalizing China” ( 復興中華 ), and consequently alienate younger conscripts who identify more closely with being Taiwanese than being Chinese.
Furthermore, societal perceptions of military service exacerbate morale issues and impact military recruitment. The interaction between military and civilian societies, which crosses both, is represented by conscription. Conscripts frequently complain that their service is mediocre, with tasks like housekeeping obscuring meaningful training. This problem has its roots in the Republican era, which was attributed to the NRA.
In” The Nationalist Army on the Eve of the War” by Chang Jui-te, the author cites a conversation between Xu Yongchang, director of the ROC Nationalist government’s Military Affairs Commission, and a friend where he stated:” If we implement a conscription system, people will join against their will and will lack ardor. This being so, to defeat Japanese aggression, we must reform the education system to change people’s attitudes or our country will perish”.
Improvements in the conscription system’s quality should be prioritized in order to improve the military’s reputation, as the military is subject to both internal and external criticism.
The reality of Taiwan’s conscription system depicts deeper issues tied to civil-military relations and public perception. The death of 23-year-old conscript Hung Chung-chiu in 2013, as he served a detention sentence, led to allegations of military abuse.
Over 100, 000 people participated in protests and signed petitions against Taiwan’s military justice system, which caused a decline in public confidence in the military and the conscription system.
Taiwan was supposed to move to an all-volunteer force by 2015, but the incident exacerbated the military’s recruitment crisis. This conflict between civilian and military societies raises questions about how compatible the military is with contemporary Taiwanese values.
Taiwan’s bloody history of civil-military relations also complicates contemporary reform efforts. The memory of the White Terror, a period of authoritarian rule marked by state-led violence and widespread political and intellectual persecution that claimed the lives of 3, 000 to 4, 000 civilians, continues to shadow Taiwanese society today, severely impacting civil-military ties. Although democratization led to progress, structural and cultural issues still persist.
Defense Minister Wellington Koo has started reforms at the moment to modernize and localize the military, including removing dated methods like goose-stepping and bayonet training.
As the first civilian defense minister in over ten years, Koo has the crucial responsibility of reducing the wide civil-military gap and further “democratizing” the military. His position is especially crucial given that the ROC’s military still suffers from issues like poor maintenance and outdated equipment, low morale, and a lack of noncommissioned officer training.
Bureaucratic resistance from within the military, however, has hindered significant progress. President Tsai Ing-wen made an attempt in 2017 to reform the military pension system, which was viewed as being extremely generous in comparison to other public sectors. The reform aimed at reducing the fiscal burden on Taiwan’s economy, ensuring its long-term sustainability.
Tsai’s DPP suffered a massive defeat in the 2018 local elections as a result of fierce opposition from retired military personnel’s protests. This military community resistance demonstrates how resistant it is to reform and how the military has an impact on civilian life.
The military’s consistent investment in symmetrical warfare equipment is another example of reform resistance. Retired or active generals have a tendency to benefit their own branches by investing in powerful weapons like submarines and fighter jets throughout the ROC’s history.
The absence of civilian oversight in the military bureaucracy and the sector’s structure, which are infused with cultural dissonance between the military and civilian societies, have contributed to the country’s persistent morale crisis.
For the highest levels of control to modernize, democratize, and better align themselves with the expanding Taiwanese identity, significant reform is required moving forward. They must abandon their dated customs, which range from military songs to symbols, and instead embrace Taiwan’s new and democratic ways of representing the values of the nation they support.
These reforms must serve to foster transparency, improve training quality, and ensure that the military represents the developing Taiwanese identity.
The roots of Taiwan’s military morale crisis emerges from historical, structural, and societal issues that require critical attention from policymakers. Taiwan is coming to an end to China’s siege. Through its Joint Sword exercises, naval fleet expansion, political and cognitive warfare, China’s pressure on Taiwan underscores the need for resilient civilian and military societies.
From the military’s fragmented origins and the scars of martial law to the evolving Taiwanese identity, these fundamental vulnerabilities in Taiwan’s defense demands urgent attention. The morale crisis is not only a matter of identity but also an existential threat which resonates with Taiwan’s future, security, and sovereignty.
The military must adapt and go through reforms that are in line with the democratic values of contemporary Taiwan as Taiwan’s identity has evolved.
Safe Spaces, a policy consulting firm based in Taiwan and Washington, is the home of Patrick Ko, a policy analyst. His research focuses on international affairs in East Asia and Latin America.