This is a memorial for the soldiers who fought defending Kinmen. Kinmen is a very peculiar island in that while part of Taiwan, it also only 2km away from China. This obviously makes it a very contentious place. For over twelve years it was a sporadic battleground between Taiwan and China.
The first fight was when CKS' army was fleeing China and going to Taiwan. Many troupes stayed at Kinmen to cover the retreat. Over ten thousand communist forces landed on Kinmen and CKS's troupes were able to hold them off and win the battle.
Almost then years later was the battle depicted in the photo, where for more than a month China bombarded the island and Kinmen shot back sinking 81 of China's naval boats. Granted all my information is from this memorial and depending on when it was constructed, it could have been during the time of severe nationalist propaganda. So some of these numbers must be taken with a grain of salt. My own research in English didn't turn up similar information.
You Americans might know Kinmen as the tiny island that almost got the USA into a war with China, as they didn't take too kindly to China's threatened attacks. Although with all the deep level American conspiracies this could all have been a bit show to get Taiwan to sign it's contract to buy old discarded military vehicles and equipment from America. For years Taiwanese have been upset with the fact that Taiwan spends millions of dollars on 40 year old military relics that the US military doesn't use anymore. Although I'm sure the US just views this as a clever way of "recycling" it's old weapons.
Regardless of how things really went down, I am still quite impressed that such a small number of people on a tiny island were able to stop China's invasion of another country. Then again I never really understood past wars. I could never understand that if somebody is in your way, why not just choose another way to get to where you want to go. Thankfully for every soldier out there, I will never be a general.
Now a days Kinmen still has an army base but with relations between Taiwan and China much better, it really isn't a functional base. It is more used as a training ground for the Taiwanese mandatory military service for all men over 18 years old. It used to be a two year requirement, but I think it is now down to eight months (don't quote me on this).
Actually I'll have to write more about the mandatory military service another time. As for the topic I really want to write about Kinmen island, you'll have to wait until tomorrow. Oh before I go there was one other thing I want to share. You can't really see it in the photo, but all the soldiers in this picture are very old men. They all look like they are in their late 50s at that youngest. I'm doing some ongoing research about this, to find out if this is because in fact those soldiers were all old men, or if it was just the artist's way of portraying them as ragged run down soldiers who were operating under less than ideal conditions.
