China using aggressive pressure tactics to overthrow Taiwan government: Taiwanese think tank

Beijing/Taipei: – A leading think tank from Taiwan claimed that China has started using Cognitive Warfare to change the stand of the population in Taiwan to overthrow the government in Taiwan, to gain control without fighting a war. China has intensified the campaign against the background of the Coronavirus pandemic. The Taiwanese think tank claimed that the goal of this Cognitive Warfare is to create a defensive mentality in the Taiwanese population using simultaneous pressure on military, intellectual and mental levels.

The think tank ‘Institute for National Defence and Security Research’ (INDSR), a part of the Taiwan government, recently published a report. This report speaks about the pressure tactics initiated by China. INDSR has said that China is making aggressive efforts to change the Taiwanese population’s outlook, taking advantage of the freedom of media and social media in Taiwan.

The government of President Tsai Ing-Wen is being consistently targeted. Moves are being made to fuel the social tension and political divide in Taiwan. INDSR report says that at the same time, plans are being executed to reduce the support for democracy, in the Taiwanese population. The Taiwanese think tanks have claimed that the internet is being exploited to a great extent, and the Chinese military is also involved in this process. INDSR has also said that running propaganda based on fake information and exposing tricky sensitive information, through hacking, are the methods being used for the campaign.

Earlier last year, China had used cognitive warfare even during the elections held in Taiwan. But the Chinese rulers could not succeed in the campaign. Instead, the problems for China increased with the victory of Tsai Ing-Wen. But the INDSR report clarifies that China is continuing to use the tactics to pressurise the Taiwanese government and population. Last year, the Chinese communist government took control of Hong kong using a special law. China had threatened that Taiwan is the next target after Hong kong. It had also been revealed that China had also made preparations on the military level, for this purpose. China had taken care that the Taiwanese military remains under constant pressure, with consistent intrusions into the Taiwanese territories. The report of the think tank makes it clear that China is now making efforts to pressurise even the Taiwanese government and population to gain entire control over Taiwan.