A trip to the mainland by the KMT's leader exposes a rift in the party.
History casts a long shadow over relations between the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang or KMT,
which ruled China until it fled to Taiwan in 1949.
The two parties remained sworn enemies for decades afterwards
as the KMT fortified its island refuge with American weapons.
Only in 1991, as Taiwan democratized, did the KMT formally renounce its goal to retake China by force.
And yet, in one of the stranger ironies of present-day geopolitics,
China now sees the KMT, the biggest opposition party in Taiwan's current parliament,
as its best hope of peacefully uniting the island with the mainland.
Hence the hoopla surrounding a visit to China by Chang Li-wun,
the KMT's new chairwoman, between April 7th and 12th.
on the first visit there by a KMT leader in a decade.
But her trip is not only dividing public opinion in Taiwan,
it is deepening American doubts about Ms. Chang,
who is blocking the government's proposed increase in defense spending,
most of which would be used to buy yet more American weapons.
And it is widening a rift between Ms. Chang
and a rival KMT faction that leans closer to America.
The timing makes the visit even more controversial.
It comes about a month before a planned summit in Beijing