As the 2024 presidential election is approaching, the cross-strait situation is getting more and more attention. The "2023 Cross-Strait Peace Survey" conducted in late September by Farsightedness and Farsightedness Public Opinion Survey among the public in 22 counties in Taiwan was released today. When asked about their expectations of cross-strait relations, 59.5% of the respondents hoped to "maintain the status quo", which is the highest since the cross-strait direct flights began in 2008, when Vision conducted the cross-strait opinion survey. On the other hand, the proportion of people "in favour of Taiwan becoming independent" has dropped from 28.7% in 2022 to 25.2%.
The survey also shows that three-quarters (74.4%) of the respondents believed that there should be more cross-strait interactions, while another 46.2% hoped that cross-strait dialogue would be maintained. Regarding the issue of war, more than half (54.1%) of the respondents did not want to go to war themselves or their family members, and nearly half (49.8%) were not prepared for war. While Tsai Ing-wen's government emphasised that the relationship between Taiwan and the United States is "rock-solid", 46.4% of the respondents still thought that the United States would not send troops to help Taiwan fight in the event of a war between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait.
Besides, nearly 70% of the 20-29 year olds are unwilling to send themselves or their family members to war, higher than the overall percentage (54.1%); 46% (46.4%) think the U.S. will not send troops to help Taiwan in a war; nearly half (49.8%) are unprepared for war; three-quarters (74.4%) think there should be more cross-strait interactions; 46% (46.2%) hope that the government would maintain dialogue and exchanges with China; and 42% advocate "more interaction" with the mainland. Forty-six percent (46.2%) hoped that the government would maintain dialogue and exchanges with Mainland China. 42% of the respondents advocated "peace with the United States and China", while only 14% preferred "pro-US and anti-China".
Since 2008, our Farsightedness Poll has been observing the trend of change in people's stand on unification and independence, but there are some fluctuations in people's stand on unification and independence in this survey. The proportion of people "in favour of Taiwan's independence" has decreased from 28.7% in 2022 to 25.2%; the proportion of people "maintaining the status quo before looking at the cross-strait relations" has also decreased from 32.4% in 2022 to 31.9%, while the proportion of people "in favour of unification with the Mainland" has risen from 6.1% to 8.5%; and the proportion of people "maintaining the status quo for good" has reached an all-time high of 27.6%.
In terms of political affiliation, 46.3% of the pan-greens supported the independence of Taiwan, compared to 21.4% for the PPP and only 7.5% for the pan-blues, while 15.2% of the pan-blues, 10.6% for the PPP, and 3.8% for the pan-greens favoured reunification with the Mainland.
On the whole, if we combine "maintain the status quo first and see what happens later" with "maintain the status quo forever" to form "maintain the status quo", we can see that "maintain the status quo" has reached its highest level of 59.5% again after December 2009, while "in favour of the independence of Taiwan" accounted for less than 30%, and "in favour of the reunification with the Mainland China" for less than 10%.
Farsightedness said, from this survey, it can be seen that, in the face of the tension of the Chinese Communist Party not giving up the unification of Taiwan, the status quo has reached an all-time high, although people are not worried about a war in the near future, and have not yet begun to start making preparations for a war; however, more than half of them are unwilling to go to war, and 40% of them think that the government is not ready to prepare for a war, 46% of them think the U.S. will not send troops to assist in the defence of Taiwan, and 67% of them think the U.S. is only using Taiwan to suppress mainland China. The US is only using Taiwan to suppress Mainland China.
udn.com
