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Kiwi
Post Boaster
Joined: May 07, 2003
Posts: 4732
Status: Online!
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 Posted:
Feb 27, 2005 - 10:25 PM |
 
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| Post subject: Formosa Betrayed (Book on Taiwan available online) |
Taiwan comes up pretty regularly on this site. Some of you probably think that I make it come up all the time, but I don't really see it that way. Many people here just say such stupid things that I can't help but offer an alternative view.
I think much of the problem is that relatively few people (particularly Mainlanders) have any real knowledge of Taiwanese history.
Well, Monday is the anniversary of the 228 Incident (Feb 28, 1947). In this incident the Nationalist Chinese (KMT) troops, recently arrived in Taiwan following the Japanese surrender and subsequent transfer of sovereignty to China, slaughtered many thousands of Taiwanese civilians. Ostensibly the massacres were a reaction to a communist plot. In reality the killings were simply a means of subjigating a population that was growing indignant at their exploitation by a corrupt and morally bankrupt Mainland regime.
Well, here is an interesting book on the subject. I read this while I was in Taiwan, but didn't realize it was available online until the other day.
The book is "Formosa Betrayed" by George H. Kerr. Here's the URL:
http://www.pinyin.info/books/formosabetrayed/index.html
It tells the story of how the sovereignty of Taiwan was transferred from Japan to China after WWII, and what a cock up that turned out to be.
The author was in Taiwan and China before and after WWII. Naturally as a participant he has his own bias. He is clearly pro-Taiwanese, but has his reasons for being so.
For me the interesting part of this book lies in all the small details and anecdotes. You get a clear sense of how Taiwan and China were totally different worlds at the conclusion of WWII. You can feel how disasterously inept the early years of KMT rule in Taiwan were. You can also see the chauvanistic attitudes that Mainlanders have historically held towards Taiwan.
Fifty or more years on those same chauvanistic attitudes shape the current debate, and I think that is most unfortunate.
Hopefully anyone who takes the time to read this book will get a fresh perspective on Taiwan. |
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Edgewood
FooSlinger
Joined: Jan 28, 2004
Posts: 3906
Location: Colonial Shanghai
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Feb 27, 2005 - 11:44 PM |
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Thanks. |
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Conlige suspectos semper habitos |
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Andreas
Board Royalty
Joined: Feb 27, 2004
Posts: 6207
Location: 31 N 121 E
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Feb 28, 2005 - 01:45 AM |
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Kiwi
Post Boaster
Joined: May 07, 2003
Posts: 4732
Status: Online!
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Mar 01, 2005 - 05:24 PM |
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I realize most people don't have time for reading the book. However, just to stimulate some interest I'll paste a couple of paragraphs.
Some locals might find the following passage interesting. Locals often talk about the Rape of Nanking and their hatred of Japan. They should find the following quite thought provoking.
The section below talking about the massacre that began after the KMT brought reinforcements to Taiwan from the Mainland in early March of 1947 (their response to the 228 incident). At the time the troops landed Governor Chen was still promising that he would negotiate and that no reinforcements were on the way.
The violence that ensued was done by Mainland Chinese to their 'Taiwanese brothers'.
Kerr says: "Many mainland Chinese at Taipei were of course shocked by the brutality of this campaign, but few were surprised. One prominent person, visibly moved, told me that he had witnessed the notorious "Rape of Nanking" by the Japanese in 1937, but that this surpassed it, for the Nanking rape was a product of war, a wild outburst of wartime passion, whereas this was coldly calculated revenge, perpetrated by the Nationalist Government upon its own people.
. . .
We saw students tied together, being driven to the execution grounds, usually along the river banks and ditches aboutTaipei, or at the waterfront in Keelung. One foreigner counted more than thirty young bodies - in student uniforms - lying along the roadside east of Taipei; they had had their noses and ears slit or hacked off, and many had been castrated. Two students were beheaded near my front gate. Bodies lay unclaimed on the roadside embankment near the Mission compound.
If searchers, with student lists in hand, could not find a wanted boy at home, some member of his family -a father, grandfather or brother - would be seized and dragged off. Families were too terrified to make a wide search for missing members, or too confused to know where their bodies might be found.
Fifty students were reported to have been killed at Sungshan and thirty at Peito on the night of March 9. By March 13 I was brought a report (which I considered reliable) that more than 700 students had been seized in Taipei in the preceding five days." |
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