In the imagined blockade of “Zero Day,” a Taiwanese television dramathat will be released next year but is already causing a stir, the Chinese military has encircled Taiwan, cutting it off from the world and plunging the island democracy of 23 million into crisis.
In a 17-minute trailer released last week, the public responds to China’s blockade with a mixture of terror and resignation. Young couples ride bikes past tank convoys on empty streets. Criminal gangs stir up chaos on behalf of Beijing and its territorial claims over Taiwan.
Taiwanese shouldn’t fight and couldn’t win anyway, an influencer tells her followers in the series. “Those who want us to enter the battlefield — they really don’t care about our suffering,” she says.
It may be fiction, but the show’s bleak assessment of Taiwanese readiness to fight touches upon a very real problem facing President Lai Ching-te, who took office in May and whom Beijing considers a dangerous separatist.
The threat from Beijing has intensified as Chinese leader Xi Jinping has declared China’s “reunification” with Taiwan inevitable. He has underscored his willingness to use force to achieve that goalby sending rising numbers of warplanes and navy ships to probe the island’s defenses.
Cony Hsieh, 31, who previously enlisted and served as a soldier for six years, signed up for reservist training as soon as women were allowed to join last year. She returned for a second round in May.
While there were minor improvements, the military was moving too slowly to gain public trust and make training more than a formality, she said. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do in my position if a war breaks out,” Hsieh, who is now working on a master’s degree, said in an interview.
Rising public concern about a conflict has left many in Taiwan asking themselves what they would do in a “Zero Day” scenario and how far they should allow China’s invasion threat to infringe on daily life.
Surveys show a majority of Taiwanese support the decision to lengthen mandatory service, but that doesn’t mean they think training is a good use of time or public funds.
“Everyone has their own lives and families. My wife would have to work and take care of the child by herself when I was away,” said Hsieh Yu-hsiang, a 30-year-old salesman at an insurance company who attended 14 days of training in early July.
Even so, he supports government plans to strengthen reservist training. “As the threat increases,” Hsieh said, “it’s inevitable that we need measures in place to respond.”
