From "Fighting for Tribe" to "Fighting for Country"

The tribe is the basic unit for the communal life of Aborigines. A clear concept of "country" did not exist in their traditional worldview. When conflict arose between tribes (due, for instance, to outsiders killing tribe members or invading a tribe's territory), tribal warfare would inevitably follow. A tribe's men, under the leadership of their chief, would hunt down the perpetrators and hack off their heads with machetes.

With the arrival of foreign powers, such as the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, Han Chinese, and Japanese, the Aborigines gradually shifted the focus of their defense from tribe to nation.

In 1874, for example, the Japanese military dispatched soldiers to attack southern Taiwan (modern Pingtung County) in what is now known as the Mutan Village Incident. The local Aborigines fought valiantly, but their machetes were no match for the guns of the Japanese. The people of three villages, Mutan, Kaoshihfo and Nujeng, were annihilated by the Japanese.

Again, between 1910 and 1915, under the "Aboriginal management" policy, the Japanese colonial authorities dispatched troops a number of times to suppress Aboriginal tribes, eventually leading to the Wushe Incident of 1930 which resulted in six Atayal villages populated by a total of 1,400 tribe members being left with only 500 survivors.

The Japanese government enacted the National General Mobilization Law in 1938, ushering in an era in which Aborigines served their "country" in the military.

Under Japan's Kohminka Policy (the training of colonial peoples to be Japanese), Aborigines living in Taiwan's mountains were recruited for a "volunteer army" and forced to fight in the Pacific War instigated by Japan.

It is believed that mobilizing Taiwan's Aborigines to fight was the brainchild of Japanese staff officer General Wachi Takaji. He was confident that if Taiwan's Aborigines, who had proved their valor during the Wushe Incident, could be recruited, they would contribute a great deal to the Japanese army's cause.

The first group of 500 Aboriginal recruits was formed into a unit which the Japanese army referred to as the Takasago Volunteers. From 1942 to 1944, the Japanese created a total of eight similar units, including two special marine units renowned for their bravery and combat skills. More than 5,000 Aborigines were mobilized and sent on eight expeditions into tropical rainforests in places like the Philippines, New Guinea, and Borneo.

The physical and mental aptitudes of the Aboriginal volunteers were held in high esteem by the Japanese military. They had twice the physical strength of Japanese troops, an outstanding sense of direction, and were highly skilled at nighttime combat because of their excellent night vision. They were highly obedient, responsible, and had an indomitable spirit.

Sun Ta-chuan, an Aboriginal scholar and associate professor at National Chengchi University's Graduate Institute of Taiwanese Literature, points out that the aforementioned physical and mental traits are evident in the attitudes toward life of generation after generation of Aborigines.

Sun uses the phrase "forced to give one's body over to the state" to describe the ideological brainwashing that Taiwan's Aborigines underwent under the Kohminka Policy as they were sent out to fight for their "country" and their physical bodies given over to the colonial Japanese motherland.

At war's end in 1945, Taiwan reverted to the Republic of China. In 1949, the National Government implemented the draft in Taiwan. All young men of draft age, Aborigine and otherwise, were required to serve their country. A number of them, attracted by the financial security, pursued studies in military academies, thereby continuing to "give over their bodies to their country." As Taiwan's military gradually transforms itself into a volunteer force, in the future, officer and NCO positions will be filled by volunteers, and Aborigines will no longer be forced into the armed services; rather, the military will become another career option, perhaps allowing those who choose it to show their true courage and devotion.