Is the establishment of the Republic of China in Taiwan a man-made factor or a historical necessity?
Or is it just a series of accidental events and unintentional historical coincidences?
Or is it just a series of accidental events and unintentional historical coincidences?
An Accidental Country explores how the Republic of China in Taiwan came to be, and how the role of the United States changed during this historical process. The existence of two Chinese regimes on both sides of the Taiwan Strait—one controlling mainland China, one controlling the Taiwan Strait—is often understood as the inevitable result of the Chinese Civil War. Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang fled to Taiwan after being defeated by Mao Zedong and established a country to compete with the Communist Party, thus creating the thorny "two Chinas" problem in the international community. An Accidental Country challenges this traditional view and leads readers to examine the creation and shaping of modern Taiwan from a new perspective.
Taiwan’s political status has been fraught from the beginning. The island was ceded to Japan after the First Sino-Japanese War, and during World War II the Allies promised Chiang Kai-shek that Taiwan would be returned to China after Japan’s defeat. As the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party turned against the Kuomintang, American policymakers reassessed whether to continue supporting Chiang Kai-shek, and the “Taiwan trusteeship theory” began to prevail. Later, Cold War confrontations and concerns about Taiwan falling into Communist hands caused Washington to adjust its policies again. But American support for the Republic of China, which used Taiwan as its last base, remained ambiguous. Taiwan, a country that existed in reality even though it did not enjoy full sovereignty, had to strive for a place on the international stage.
The author of this book, Lin Xiaoting, uses Chinese and English archival materials as the basis, including President Chiang Kai-shek's cultural relics, Kuomintang party history materials, Chiang Kai-shek's personal diary, Song Ziwen's special files, and relevant documents and archives from the US State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency to try to depict another historical style of the critical moment of "the Republic of China in Taiwan", breaking away from the framework that we have generally known in the past to retell this period of history. This book argues that the historical process of the formation of the party-state system of the Republic of China and the Kuomintang in Taiwan is far more complex and bizarre than what the academic community has known in the past, and it is mixed with many historical factors and coincidences that have been ignored in the past. This process is attributed to many factors, including the little-known, impromptu, unpredictable, and personal policy formulation and planning during and after World War II, and even historical accidents and coincidences. The historical shaping process of the "Republic of China in Taiwan" also fully reflects the complex and key roles played by many official and private figures in the US government. At the same time, it is also closely related to the US geostrategic issues in the Asia-Pacific region from the end of World War II to the early Cold War, and how they were closely related to the collapse of the Kuomintang regime and internal power struggles.
In just ten years from 1945 to 1954, Taiwan went from being a colony of Japan to a province of postwar China, and then from a remote island of China to the last territorial base of the nearly extinct Republic of China, and the last stronghold of power of the Kuomintang government. The historical process of Taiwan becoming the anti-communist hub of the Republic of China was unexpected, fortuitous, extremely dramatic and uncertain. At the Cairo Conference in 1943, when the three Allied powers of China, the United States and Britain discussed the future of Taiwan and Penghu, no one could have foreseen that Taiwan would undergo such a dramatic evolution in just over a decade. During this process, the United States played a role, from government organizations to numerous individuals. Its policy planning and formulation, many bold assumptions and suggestions that were once shelved, and its "wrong" inferences about the situation of the Kuomintang-Communist Civil War, as well as its many actions and inactions, have had a profound impact on Taiwan's political future and played an important role in shaping the critical moments of the "Republic of China in Taiwan." The formation of the Republic of China in Taiwan after 1949, which is not affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party-ruled mainland, is a process that involves many coincidences and is inextricably linked to the political instability within the Kuomintang government, the Chinese Civil War, and the geopolitical strategies and decisions of international powers in East Asia after the start of the Cold War.
In exploring how the Republic of China was shaped and deeply rooted in Taiwan, the author also revealed many little-known histories and proposed new interpretations. For example, Ge Chaozhi's role in the February 28 Incident and his suggestions on the future political development of Taiwan after the incident were widely accepted by Chiang Kai-shek, giving Taiwan the opportunity to break away from the centralized economy and gradually promote a new political and economic structure. In the next few years, the Kuomintang's party-state system was deepened in Taiwan, playing a "paving" role. The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 can be said to be the most significant and critical accident in the historical process that affected the permanent establishment of the "Republic of China in Taiwan". What is less well known is that in the period before and after the outbreak of the Korean War, it can be seen from the secret telegrams between Chiang Kai-shek and the South Korean ambassador that he tried to start a major war in East Asia, giving him a chance to reverse the disadvantage and "turn the tables"; coupled with the influence of the United States on the shaky Kuomintang government, through the informal advisory group led by retired Navy Admiral Kirk, the "Western Company" established in Taiwan later, and Chiang Kai-shek's secret invitation of Japanese military advisers "White Group", which went private and underground, all helped Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang survive in Taiwan.
As we enter the 21st century, the ups and downs of cross-strait relations have become one of the important factors affecting the international political landscape in East Asia. From the low point of cross-strait relations caused by the Democratic Progressive Party's first term in office, to the rapid development of cross-strait relations during the Kuomintang's return to power, to the uncertainty of future relations between the two sides brought about by the Democratic Progressive Party's second term in office, facing the world situation, today we are re-exploring how the pattern of separation between the two sides of the strait came into being more than half a century ago, how the Republic of China was shaped on the island of Taiwan, and how the United States played its role in this historical process. The discussion in each chapter of this book will help us think about and answer these important issues.
Important events: Cairo Conference in 1943, Civil War between Kuomintang and Communist Party in 1946, February 28 Incident in Taiwan in 1947, Kuomintang government moved to Taiwan in 1949, Korean War broke out in 1950, Sino-US Mutual Defense Treaty in 1954
Highlights of this book
Based on Chinese and English archival materials, including President Chiang Kai-shek's relics, Kuomintang party history materials, Chiang Kai-shek's personal diary, Song Ziwen's special files, and relevant documents and archives from the U.S. Department of State and the Central Intelligence Agency, this book attempts to depict another historical perspective of this critical moment of "the Republic of China in Taiwan", breaking away from the framework of our past general cognition and retelling this period of history. For example, the unique insights of American officials stationed in Taiwan in the early post-war period indirectly gave rise to Taiwan's becoming an independent island nation; the US geopolitical planning during the Cold War saved the collapsed Kuomintang regime and became a condition for shaping Taiwan; the US attempted to use the uncertainty of Taiwan to support Sun Liren, Wu Guozhen and others to launch an anti-Chiang Kai-shek plan; it exposed the anti-communist mainland slogan as a political declaration of Chiang Kai-shek's rule in Taiwan and the calculations between Taiwan and the United States.