The Taiwanese television show imagines a Chinese invasion and a debate stokes

A Chinese jet fighter crashes in the waters off the Taiwan coast, which prompted Chinese warships to block the island for “research and rescue”.

Taiwanese soldiers Manning Dadan Island, a rocky outcrop a few kilometers from the Chinese coast, begin to disappear mysteriously.

Then one night, a fishing boat landed on Dadan. A signal surge is in the ink sky – and illuminates Chinese soldiers who overturned from the boat and raised on the beach.

This is the key scenario of Zero Day Attack, a new Taiwanese television program on a fictitious Chinese military invasion. Beijing has long seen Taiwan auto-hurlé as part of its territory, promising to “meet” with it one day without excluding the use of force.

The series, which broadcast its first episode during the weekend, was partially funded by the Taiwanese government, which hopes to raise awareness of the threat that China poses.

But the show also landed at a very divisor in Taiwan and attracted criticism of fear.

Zero Day Attack focuses on the way in which various parts of the Taiwanese society attack the invasion, from the president to the rural villagers.

The Anthology series presents several scenarios on how an invasion could take place, provided by defense experts consulted by the production team.

These include the disturbance of Taiwan’s communication lines; Chinese disinformation campaigns; Supporters of the “fifth column” of China arouse troubles; And military officials have become collaborators who conspired against Taiwan.

The showrunner Chen Hsin-Mei told the BBC that she wanted to make the series to “warn the Taiwanese people that war really arrives”, citing the growing use of China “disinformation campaigns and the war of gray areas to put our society in chaos and make us confuse our identity”.

The message of Zero Day Attack echoes the rhetoric of the government led by the Progressive Democratic Party (DPP) and its leader President William Lai, who warned against the threat of China and preached the need to lift the island.

The Taiwan Ministry of Culture partially financed a zero day attack, while the military supported filming and production. Chunghwa Telecoms, the largest Taiwan telecommunications company in which the government has a minority participation, has also contributed to funding.

The other private investors include billionaire Robert Tsao, a well -known supporter of Taiwanese independence who has financed civil defense efforts.

Ms. Chen told the BBC that at no time did the authorities try to influence the show. She also said that she was not a member of the DPP or any political party.

But even before one episode was broadcast, Zero Day Attack became a political lightning rod, given the charged subject.

A 17-minute trailer published online last year by the production team quickly accumulated hundreds of thousands of views and comments.

While some greeted him for his message, others criticized him to have fun anxiety and discord with China.

This debate intensified with the first in the series, which was the most watched show on several platforms on Saturday, according to the production company.

In recent days, Wang Hung-Wei, an eminent legislator of the Kuomintang opposition party, criticized the zero day attack like “selling dried mangoes”, a Taiwanese euphemism which means to attach an unnecessary fear of the destruction of his country.

Stressing the government’s government funding, Ms. Wang said the DPP “used the state apparatus to achieve its political objectives.”

A comment by Wang Kunyi from the Taiwan International Strategic Study Society accused the show of having pushed the independence of Taiwan “so that Taiwan becomes a place that never knows peace”.

He added that it was proof of the Lai government “once again using all kinds of channels to play the” anti-communist card “and arouse the anxiety of war”.

The DPP and the LAI are often accused by their detractors, including opposition and China, putting pressure for the independence of Taiwan. Any official statement as such would be considered an act of war by Beijing.

While Lai described himself in the past as a “pragmatic worker for the independence of Taiwan”, he also insisted that Taiwan does not need to officially declare independence because it is already a sovereign nation.

The attack on the day zero also aroused positive criticism. One of the pts published by the public broadcaster said that it “expresses the concerns and anxieties of Taiwanese in various political camps in a very realistic and reasonable way”.

“It’s a good watch,” said a commentator on the Facebook page of Zero Day Attack. “The Taiwanese people can relate to it because they reflect our current situation, the Chinese Communist Party must be postponed because their tactics have been exhibited.”

Some praised the first episode, which depicts the invasion that begins quietly in the midst of a controversial presidential election marked by violence and political fighting.

They were struck by the strangely way of this episode reflected the current fractual mood in Taiwanese politics. Last month, the island organized a controversial reminder vote against Kuomintang legislators accused of being too friendly with China. Another lap will take place later this month.

This led to questions about the show of the show and if it was supposed to influence the reminder votes. Ms. Chen told the BBC that the production of the show started long before the recall movement start.

The discussion around the show goes to the heart of one of the most existential questions of Taiwan: what is the reality of the threat of a Chinese invasion?

Taiwan has had its own government since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. During the following decades, the island saw largely peaceful relations and stronger economic ties with China.

Surveys show that most Taiwanese do not believe that Beijing will imminently attack and prefers the “status quo” in the Taiwan relationship with China, which means neither unifying with Beijing nor officially declaring independence.

But the question of a Chinese invasion has become clearer and more political in recent years.

The Chinese war of the gray area has increased, which raises fears that the war planes and Chinese ships are entering several times in the airspace and the waters of Taiwan can trigger a conflict.

The United States has warned this year that China is an “imminent threat” against Taiwan. US officials have repeatedly said that Chinese President Xi Jinping is his soldiers to invade Taiwan by 2027.

Beijing has never confirmed this date. But it is a warning that Lai takes seriously.

He undertook to increase the military spending of Taiwan, his government carried out reforms in the army, and last month, Taiwan organized his most important and longest exercises of Han Kuang aimed at defending himself against a possible Chinese attack.

Lai stressed that these efforts aim to protect Taiwan and not seek war. His political opponents say, however, that he annoys Beijing who revises Lai as a “separatist” and that he leads Taiwan to a greater conflict with China.

Beijing repeatedly stressed that he was looking for a “peaceful reunification” with Taiwan. He rejected any discussion on a Chinese invasion as a pretext made by those in favor of Taiwan’s independence to support.

A zero day attack was considered one of these provocations. Last week, the spokesman for the Chinese Defense Ministry, Zhang Xiaogang, accused the DPP government of using the show to “pedal anxieties and try to provoke war”.

He said that Zero Day Attack “plunged Taiwan into the flames of war and used the Taiwan people as a cannon fodder for” Taiwan’s independence “.

Ms. Chen, however, insisted that her show “does not speak of China or does not represent it as an evil”.

“We are talking about war and how Taiwanese are fighting and responding. And it is because the terror of war has never stopped, all over the world.”

Additional BBC Chinese Joyce Lee report.