Even in death, Lee Teng-hui is helping shape Taiwan’s identity

the momentous occasion, in March 1996, of being able to choose their president for the first time, China’s Communist Party launched a campaign of intimidation. Its leaders snarled on television. The armed forces simulated an invasion of Taiwan with beach-landing drills. And missiles landed in the seas around the island, in effect blockading it.

China’s actions backfired. Taiwanese refused to be intimidated. Election rallies were huge. Children rode on parents’ shoulders, air horns lent a carnival air and taxis raced around the capital, Taipei, flying candidates’ flags out of their windows. Never has Banyan witnessed such a boisterous election. Mr Lee’s stump speeches drew crowds to flatter a rock star.

Mr Lee died on July 30th, aged 97. The arc of his remarkable life traced Taiwan’s own modern history. He was born under Japanese colonial rule, to a farming family. He studied in Kyoto and joined the Japanese imperial army, though he never saw action.existed to reclaim the mainland from the Communists . It brooked no dissent. Anti-government protests on February 28th 1947 led to more than 20,000 Taiwanese—students, artists, doctors, lawyers and intellectuals—being rounded up and shot.

A young Mr Lee dabbled with communism. A more enduring inspiration was Zen Buddhism. It taught that there is no shame in bending like a reed, nor any wisdom in hurrying. In 1961 Mr Lee was baptised a Christian, and if his evangelism hinted at a messianic streak, it was also rooted in grassroots activism. As an agricultural economist, he was at the heart of Taiwan’s development.

For years Mr Lee kept his head down. Still, state goons kept a dossier on him, even filling it with titbits from. His appointment in 1972 to a ministerial portfolio under Chiang Ching-kuo was an extraordinary turn. Given mounting popular anger at rule by mainlanders, Chiang turned to Taiwan-born politicians to lend the regime legitimacy. Sometimes, Mr Lee later said, of his decision to join theMr Lee, in the words of Richard Kagan, his biographer, was the “ultimate Trojan horse”.

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