Taiwan to channel World War Two spirit to bolster response to China's threats

By Ben Blanchard

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan will use this year's events to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of World War Two to bolster public sentiment on the need to defend the island from Chinese threats - and remind the world it was not the government in Beijing that won the war.

World War Two, and the full-scale Japanese invasion of China in 1937 that preceded the start of the world war in 1939, is a touchy historical subject in both China and Taiwan.

The Chinese government at the time was the Republic of China, and its forces did much of the fighting against Japan.

The republican government fled to Taiwan in 1949 after losing a war to Mao Zedong's Communists, and Beijing today largely downplays the role of the republican forces.

Speaking to reporters in Taipei on Wednesday, Lou Woei-jye, head of Taiwan defence ministry's cultural and psychological warfare section, said the main theme of this year's events, including exhibitions and concerts, would be "resist invasion, protect the homeland".

"Our country, the Republic of China, is now likewise facing extremely serious challenges," he said, using Taiwan's formal name and referring to ongoing military and other threats from Beijing. "We hope that spirit of resisting invasion from World War Two and fighting Japan can be brought to bear to the environment we are in now."

China is also expected to hold large-scale events to mark the end of the war, but has yet to give details.

Lou said that it was not a matter of who had the right to speak about the war anniversary, but that it was the Republic of China government which fought the war, because the People's Republic of China was not founded until 1949.

"On the signing of all World War Two documents it is the Republic of China there and absolutely not the People's Republic of China," Lou said. "This is an indisputable fact."

China's Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Taiwan was a Japanese colony during the war and some Taiwanese fought alongside Japan's military, making the anniversary even more potentially sensitive in Taiwan.

Asked whether China had invited veterans living in Taiwan to attend any war anniversary events there, as it has previously, Lou said he was not aware of that happening yet.

"We want them to know that in their youth it was the Republic of China they were defending," he said of veterans in Taiwan.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard. Editing by Gerry Doyle)