A gentleman on Facebook posted an article saying: “The reason Taiwan had the Ten Major Construction Projects was because after the Korean War, the United States began to aid Taiwan financially. However, over half of the funds were embezzled by Chiang Kai-shek and Soong Mei-ling, who even ostentatiously bought real estate in the United States.”
This gentleman also claimed: “Truman said, “The Chiang family are all thieves.” To prevent the Chiang family from further lining their pockets with US aid, the United States changed its original direct financial aid program to supporting Taiwan”s infrastructure construction. This is the origin of the Ten Major Construction Projects.”
This gentleman”s Facebook post received thousands of likes, and countless shares. Yet, this is an article that even muddles the timeline, and still, a bunch of green-brains liked it. It truly makes one wonder whether to laugh or cry XDD…
Taiwan today is truly a society where no one bothers to check or think about readily available information; people get excited just by hearing a few critical remarks.
Timeline and the Truth of US Aid
The Ten Major Construction Projects were originally planned to begin in 1974. US aid had already been canceled as early as 1965 because the United States felt that “the Republic of China”s infrastructure and economy were stable.” This is completely contradictory to the gentleman”s argument.
US aid must be viewed in two stages:
- Since the KMT government retreated to Taiwan after 1949, to unite with the ROC against the Communist Party, aid was provided to assist in construction starting from 1951 until 1957 under the name of grants.
- However, as ROC society developed rapidly, from 1957 to 1965, it became a loan in nature. Some people don”t need to rush to praise the U.S. as a father figure…
Later, an American author, conducting an independent investigation for a book on financial aid incidents, discovered that the actual amount of early US aid (grant portion) that arrived was only a little over US$200 million. How could US$700 million have been embezzled??? (Not Chen Shui-bian”s “Seven Hundred Million from the Cape”…)
As for the part where Truman angrily accused Chiang Kai-shek and T.V. Soong of stealing US$700 million, it was actually recorded during an interview with Truman after his retirement by another American author publishing a celebrity interview book. One is a retired politician”s memory, the other is official record. Who do you believe??
The Origin of the Sino-Saudi Friendship Bridge
The original poster also claimed that Saudi Arabia lent us money because “American dad” approved it. This is an anti-intellectual remark that aims to attribute all credit to the American father and endlessly weaken the KMT. The reason the Sino-Saudi Friendship Bridge was built in Taiwan back then was because the Republic of China transferred agricultural technology to Saudi Arabia. To show gratitude, Saudi Arabia specifically provided an interest-free loan to us to build the bridge, hence its name as a testament to the friendship between the two countries.
These types of posts are full of vague information combined with personal opinions filling in the blanks. They involve hundreds of billions in money and complex projects, yet in the eyes of some, they are easily erased and slandered with just a few words. One can only chuckle at such conspiracy theories.