TAIPEI/FUZHOU -- People across the Taiwan Strait have raised doubts about Taiwan leader Lai Ching-te's civil mobilization plan, criticizing his thinly-veiled intention of seeking "Taiwan independence" by military means.

At the first meeting of the island's newly-formed so-called "Whole-of-Society Defense Resilience Committee" on Thursday, relevant authorities announced a plan to mobilize and train about 400,000 people, including active and former substitute military service personnel, volunteers at police stations and fire departments, as well as those from private disaster-relief and charity groups.

Lai said the core functions of this civilian force, other than handling disaster emergencies, also include "supporting military operations when necessary."

The move was immediately met with doubts and criticism.

Shi Xue-qin, a Taipei resident in his thirties, expressed his concern that if young people are forced to prepare for war, the island's industries will lack the labor force and financial resources to sustain development.

"This does nothing to ensure Taiwan's safety and will only severely harm its industries, economy and the future of the island's young people," Shi said.

Lin Yan-chen, a Taiwan student who is studying on the mainland, said the act of binding Taiwan's youth to the "Taiwan independence" agenda is shameful as it sacrifices the interests of a generation of young people for political gains.

"What we truly need is development and peace, not isolation or confrontation," Lin said.

Yeh Yuan-chih, a Chinese Kuomintang legislator, said Taiwan already has guidelines and training systems for civil mobilization. But instead of upgrading the existing system, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authorities insisted on creating a new high-level committee, which is clearly a political maneuver to give a platform to those supporting "Taiwan independence," said Yeh.

Many said they viewed the new civil mobilization plan as Lai's latest attempt to hijack people in Taiwan onto his "war chariot."

"Well, we are heading to a proxy war," commented a Facebook user named Wu Gen-xin, under Lai's post about the newly-formed committee.

Li Zheng-xiu, an associate researcher of a think tank in Taiwan, said Lai has repeatedly advocated his "two-state theory" on various occasions, provoking cross-Strait tensions by triggering the mainland's sensitivities.

"This leads the public to wonder: does Lai truly have a vision for peace in his heart? Or does he believe that war is the only solution to resolve cross-Strait differences?" Li said.

Observers also pointed out that Lai and the DPP were further emboldened by US politicians who constantly sent wrong signals to the island.

One such example was Robert O'Brien, a former US national security adviser, who once gave a much more radical and scary version of so-called "defense resilience."

During a visit to the island in March 2023, he suggested that Taiwan with 1 million AK47-armed citizens on "every corner and in every apartment block" would be, as he described, "a fearful deterrent."

Wang Zhenwei, a research fellow with the Graduate Institute for Taiwan Studies of Xiamen University, told Xinhua that some US politicians neither want to make a clear security commitment to Taiwan, preferring Taiwan to rely on self-defense, nor are they willing to see the two sides of the Taiwan Strait cooperate for peace and stability.

Washington seeks to divert China's strategic focus through tensions in the Strait to serve its global hegemony, Wang said.

"If the DPP authorities insist on accommodating or even implementing US intentions, they will further intensify cross-Strait tensions and threaten the safety and well-being of the people of Taiwan," Wang said.