This week, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Canada is promoting Taiwan’s brave female Top Guns. In its weekly newsletter, TECO included the “Staunch Wings” music video, subtitled in English. With stirring music reminiscent of a Tom Cruise movie, the video shows Taiwan’s female pilots on the ground and zipping through the air.
“Staunch Wings” features Capt. Chiang Hui-Yu, Second Liet. Hsieh Yun-Ting, Capt. Hsu Hsiu-Ching, Capt. Chiang Ching-Hua, Capt. Wu Fang-Yu, Capt. Huang Wan-Lin, Second Lieut. Chen Pin-Fen, and Second Lieut. Kao Tzy-Yu.
It opens with the voice of Capt. Guo Wen-Jing, noting that she has 770 hours of flying time under her belt.
“Currently, I’m the wingman leader,” Guo says in Mandarin. “My responsibilities are to ensure the aircraft deploys and returns safely.”
Last March, Taiwan’s Military News Agency unveiled the Mandarin-language video to coincide with International Women’s Day.
“These Top Gun pilots are role models for women and girls taking off in traditionally male-dominated careers!” says TECO in the newsletter.
Watch the “Staunch Wings” music video with English subtitles.
Pilots promoted as VP Lai touches down in U.S.
TECO distributed the video just as analysts expect China to launch military drills near Taiwan.
According to Reuters, China wants to send a message to coincide with Taiwanese vice president Lai Ching-te’s expected stopover in New York today (August 12). Lai will travel through the United States on his way to Paraguay to attend a presidential inauguration. Then he will return to Taiwan through San Francisco on Wednesday (August 16).
Lai is the Democratic Progressive Party candidate in Taiwan’s presidential election in January.
China claims that Taiwan is a long-lost province. This is despite the island nation having its own elected national assembly, currency, flag, constitution, and health-care system. In 1895, authority over Taiwan transferred to Japan in the Treaty of Shimonoseki following the first Sino-Japanese war.
After Japan lost the Second World War, the Chinese Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek asserted control over Taiwan. He imposed martial law over the island and held onto the presidency for decades after his forces had lost the Chinese Civil War to the Communists.
Taiwan transitioned to democracy in the early 1990s whereas the People’s Republic of China remains a Communist dictatorship.
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