People in Taiwan are preparing for an all-out Chinese invasion. Taiwan’s military is vastly outmanned by China’s, so a Taiwanese billionaire businessman is offering to pay to train millions of civilians.
Robert Tsao founded a microchip company and is one of Taiwan’s richest citizens. At a press conference last week, Tsao said he would take $33 million from his own fortune and divide it between two civilian defense training programs. Tsao said he hopes the money can be used to train 3 million “civilian warriors” in three years. Part of Tsao’s money will also go to train 300,000 expert marksmen from among “common folks” across Taiwan.
The relationship between China and Taiwan has been strained for years, but tensions escalated after U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., visited Taiwan this summer.
China began performing military drills around the island nation, and Taiwan said it had to shoot at a Chinese drone last week to protect its airspace.
A spokesperson for the Taiwanese cabinet said it is grateful for Tsao’s offer, but the plan will need to be evaluated for feasibility.
About 73% of Taiwanese said they would be willing to fight for Taiwan if China were to invade.
Reuters contributed to this report.
