evidence: Taiwan's Kinmen Island lies just three kilometres from mainland China, putting it in the remarkable vanguard of escalating tensions between Beijing and Taipei [...] But Kinmen is more than just a geopolitical curiosity as conflict over Beijing’s claim to ownership of Taiwan heats up. It’s also where a horribly bloody battle ended the Chinese civil war and led to the birth of greater China’s only democracy. [...] Kinmen is home to multiple military museums and monuments, temples that commemorate the soldiers lost on both sides of the Guningtou battle and cavernous marine tunnels built to house boats in the event of Second World War bombing raids. A store sells knives and other objects made from spent 1950s artillery shells.