• SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    A Taiwanese tycoon has announced his plan to train 3.3 million “civilian warriors” and marksmen to defend Taiwan from a Chinese invasion, using one billion Taiwan dollars ($32m) of his own money.

    The announcement by Robert Tsao, a well-known Taiwanese businessman and founder of United Microelectronics Corp, a major microchip producer, comes amid increasing military activity between Taiwan and China. On Thursday Taiwan’s defence ministry announced its soldiers had shot down a Chinese drone over Taiwan’s Kinmen islands.

    At a press conference on Thursday, Tsao, 75, said the Chinese Communist party (CCP) threat to Taiwan was growing. Wearing a bulletproof vest and helmet, he pledged funds to train “three million people in three years”. Working with the island’s civilian defence organisation, the Kuma Academy, 60% of the funds would go towards building an army of “warriors”, and 40% to training another 300,000 in how to shoot.