What who are you advising on a position to take ? The indigenous folks Jim Craven was advising ?
If so , seems best advice is stay out of it, as Jim said. "Taiwan" is not really claiming to have derived from some separate kinbased, hunting and gathering/horticultural society than "China" as the reason that it would be a separate nation, with distinct language, history, territory, culture, traditions, and the other indicia of indigenous sovereignty and independence. If you are advising the U.S., advise the U.S. to stay out of it. This imperialist, oppressor nation already played a main role in creating "Taiwan" as a nation separate from the larger Chinese nation, not because Taiwan had been a historically derived separate nation, but because the U.S. was trying to stop the development of communism in the world . Has there ever been a pretty state ? I know. Switzerland. Charles ^^^^^^^ All those KMT people are dead. What is in place now in Taiwan is a bourgeois democracy. It is less clear what is in place in China proper, but whatever it is, it isn't pretty. In that light, non-support for PRC sabre-rattling in re: Taiwan, and Taiwanese self-determination seems the right position to me. We met with some Taiwan union people a few years back. They were not looking forward to merging with the PRC labor market. Taiwan as "indigenous" or not seems to me a distraction from the fundamental issue, as far as Taiwan v. China goes. mbs
