The Central Broadcasting System at 80

Taiwan's only national broadcasting system, and one that only broadcasts overseas and not domestically, CBS is largely unknown to the Taiwanese general public. In actuality, it was founded on August 1, 1928 and just recently saw its eightieth anniversary. Its history is full of twists and turns, and stands testament to the twists and turns of the history of the Republic of China. The thawing of relations after years of cross-strait standoff, the development of Taiwan's image in international society-CBS has played a role in many stories worth hearing.

The Central Broadcasting System, which was founded in 1928 at the instigation of senior KMT party figure Chen Guofu, first served to broadcast government policies and educate the public. After the KMT government advanced into the north of China, the whole of China sought to modernize. Chiang Kai-shek personally delivered the first CBS broadcast. CBS also broadcast the memorial service for Sun Yat-sen. Teams of reporters were with the motorcade and in the Zhongshan tomb complex. It was the first live, on-location broadcast in Chinese history.

In 1938, in order to keep Taiwanese from listening to CBS broadcasts from Nanjing and to wage psychological warfare against mainland Chinese during Japan's push into Southeast Asia, the Japanese colonial government set up a broadcasting station in Minxiong on Taiwan's Jianan Plain. Later the station came to be used by CBS.

Unstoppable broadcast

It wasn't long after CBS's founding that the Japanese invaded and worked their way into many locations in China. To insure that the broadcaster would retain the power to serve as a voice, it invested heavily in German technology. Now not only could it drown out broadcasts from Tokyo, but the 75,000-watt transmitter could even reach India, New Zealand, and San Francisco. The Japanese were shocked by the "uncanny broadcasts."

Once tensions between China and Japan started, broadcasting became a method of disseminating information, influencing thinking, and driving the popular spirit-a "weapon on the airwaves." For example, during the Mukden Incident of 1931 and the Shanghai Incident of 1932, CBS provided information on the situations as they happened, not only praising the bravery of Chinese soldiers and appealing to the citizens to make sacrifices on behalf of the nation but also using the power of shortwave radio to alert the global community to the violent actions of the Japanese and winning the world's sympathy.

After war with Japan broke out, CBS was bombed several times. The broadcaster was also forced out of its facilities several times in order to accommodate Nationalist troops, and had to find new bases from which to broadcast. Each time, its employees had to struggle to dismantle and move the machines or even destroy bulky ones lest they fall into the hands of the Japanese. But no matter how bad the situation got, CBS never went off the air. A Japanese newspaper even asked the question, "Our imperial aircraft have bombed Chongqing so heavily that even the frogs there have stopped croaking. Why is CBS still blaring on?" Thus, the station came to be known as "the frog of Chongqing that the bombs couldn't kill."

After the KMT government moved to Taiwan in 1949, CBS became an important part of the "psychological warfare" against the mainland. Interestingly, the broadcaster's most powerful shortwave broadcasting station in Taiwan, the one in Minxiong, Chiayi County, was left over from the Japanese occupation era. The station, which took the colonial government three years to build, broadcast propaganda to the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" of eastern mainland China and Southeast Asia to demoralize Allied troops fighting far from home.

As London was bombed during World War II, British prime minister Churchill spoke to the public several times via the BBC. His speeches have been called the voice of hope amid the darkness. CBS played a similar role as "the frog of Chongqing that the bombs couldn't kill." Its broadcasts were a great source of morale for the troops. Pictured are CBS workers broadcasting from an air-raid shelter.

Messages and codes

From the 1960s through the 1980s, while tensions between the ROC on Taiwan and the PRC on the mainland were high, CBS's most famous show was Night Talks from Three-Family Village. (Three-Family Village was originally a column written by Deng Tuo, Wu Han, and Liao Mosha, three Chinese literary figures who were criticized by Mao Zedong as an "anti-party clique.") At the beginning of each episode, a male voice would say, "If you want to know why the Communist cliques are fighting one another, please listen to Night Talks from Three-Family Village." Next, a female voice would say, "If you want to know why the people are suffering, please listen to Night Talks from Three-Family Village." Following would be a short drama of around ten minutes' length that revealed untoward secrets of Communist Party officials' lives or the PRC government's disastrous policies. Though it was crude propaganda, in those difficult times of repressive rule it surely attracted a fair number of listeners along China's coast.

There was another sort of "special delivery" message encoded into the broadcast. Four-digit numbers representing Chinese characters were broadcast to ROC intelligence agents behind enemy lines. These important messages were sent with this secret code once every six or seven hours, and the code was changed periodically to keep the messages from falling into enemy hands.

The effects of psychological warfare were broad. For example, CBS would periodically broadcast messages offering rewards (of various amounts depending on the make of aircraft) to mainland pilots who "righteously rise up and return" to the ROC. The broadcast provided detailed instructions on the route to fly and how to "shake the wings" in order to indicate surrender. The messages were successful, and many "righteous men" flew to Taiwan.

One of them, Wu Ronggen, who came to Taiwan via Korea in 1982, admitted that not only did he frequently listen to CBS but that he was especially fond of the Monday-through-Saturday-night Teresa Teng Hour. After arriving in Taiwan, Wu fulfilled his wish to sing "Small Town Story" with his idol in Taichung's Qingquangang military base. He also appeared as a guest on the Teresa Teng Hour and met the voice he'd listened to for so long, host Chen Xiaoping. It was also due to CBS that Teresa Teng became so famous in the mainland even though she'd never set foot there. As popular sayings had it, "By day, listen to Old Deng (Xiaoping), and by night listen to Little (Teresa) Teng," and "I only love Little Teng, not Old Deng."

In recent years, CBS has extended its services to providing programming for foreigners in Taiwan, especially marginalized groups such as manual laborers and foreign spouses. It brought the parents of a Vietnamese laborer to Taiwan for a family reunion and a tour. The reunion was a moving scene, as the long-separated family couldn't help but tear up and embrace one another.

Friends from afar

Many old hands at CBS describe the period between the Tiananmen Incident of 1989 and Taiwan's first transfer of power in 2000 as the station's golden era.

Cross-strait relations were thawing at the time, and CBS broke off from the Ministry of National Defense to become an independent corporation. It also merged with Voice of Asia, which was originally the overseas broadcasting arm of the Broadcasting Corporation of China (BCC). Changes were made in CBS's hosts and programming, and it was reoriented toward general interest shows featuring popular music, lifestyle news, and inspirational essays. The lively, personal style and content opened new doors for mainland audiences and became highly popular.

Wu Ruiwen, director of programming, remembers the large audience in mainland China. Their counterpart on the mainland, The Voice of the Straits, would collect mail for them and forward it on. Each delivery brought several large sacks of letters. They wanted to go to the mainland to visit their fans, but they didn't dare hold an event open to the public. Instead, they only announced that they would be in such-and-such a hotel in such-and-such a city and that everyone was welcome to "stop by and say hello." They didn't realize what a strong response they'd get. Often when they'd arrive at their hotel, it would be full of fans bearing flowers.

One time there were three listeners who had spent hundreds of Renminbi to make the three-day, three-night trip from Henan to Fuzhou to see them. The CBS staff were shocked by their disheveled appearance and only later learned that, with no money left over, they had spent the night on the streets. Wu was very moved and tried to give them some money, but they adamantly refused. Many years later, one of them called Wu and said, "Brother Wu, I run a computer company now. Come to the mainland and let me take care of you all!"

Back to politics

In recent years, the mainland has made a lot of progress. It's more open than it used to be, and information from many sources is available. It's no longer left to CBS to provide news from the outside world. Also, after the Democratic Progressive Party came to power in Taiwan, they looked to further separate Taiwan from the mainland and created a number of shows criticizing the state of human rights and democracy in China. They invited activists to speak out. Many long-time listeners thought, "What's with all the politics? You guys have changed-didn't we used to be friends?" The mainland reacted by clamping down on outside interference. CBS eventually quieted down and turned its attention to the Internet.

In addition to mainland China, CBS has made efforts to spread its political message internationally through many different languages. For example, during the first Gulf War in 1991, Central Broadcasting System reporters entered the Anman Regency Hotel, which was within the range of Saddam Hussein's missiles, and set up an antenna on the roof to receive local Arabic broadcasts and send out first-hand information. They also disseminated Taiwan's point of view. Their fluent Arabic and bravery under fire put them among the best of the international reporters.

Taking it on the road

In late October 2008, after Taiwan's second democratic transfer of power, the newly appointed head of CBS, Gao Huiyu, said that the broadcaster would continue on with its founding directive-to faithfully report and reflect the new administration's policies and point of view. She also said her goal was to take the organization in a more multifaceted, international direction.

For example, CBS's broadcasts have long been popular among ethnic-Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. Seeing as how in recent years the number of Southeast Asians in Taiwan for work or marriage has surpassed 500,000, CBS has a new target audience. Thus it is cooperating with private radio stations such as the Voice of Han Broadcasting Station to create Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Thai programming to be broadcast domestically. There will be shows broadcasting news from home, dealing with their concerns, offering Mandarin language instruction, and introducing Taiwan.

Starting in 2006, CBS has chosen a Best Foreign Laborer of the year from among nominations from employers. It pays for the winner's family members to come to Taiwan for a visit. Every year it elicits a great response, with even Southeast Asian diplomats in Taiwan taking part and expressing gratitude.

Back to the basics

Shortwave broadcasting is expensive, and the shortwave radio is on its way out, so looking to the future Gao says she will focus more on CBS's news website and providing audiovisual programming over the Internet. For that, the organization's new studio will be of use. At the beginning of 2009, Gao will personally lead CBS's foray into Internet television with a pilot for a show called "CBS Summit Meeting."

Looking at national broadcasting agencies around the world, Gao says that in political terms CBS cannot compete with the Voice of America, which is controlled by the White House and through which American leaders can directly disseminate their viewpoints. In terms of public image and influence, CBS is no match for the venerable British Broadcasting Company or Japan's NHK, which are both respected as models of independent media. Shrinking allocations from the government in recent years have also restricted CBS. Yet she swears that, like an expert chef who can whip up a meal with limited ingredients, CBS will be even better at its fundamentals and get more competitive, and that this institution, the second-to-none broadcaster for Chinese communities around the world, will shine brightly once again!