History of Taiwan (1945–present)
As a result of the surrender and occupation of Japan at the end of World War II, the islands of Taiwan and Penghu were placed under the governance of the Republic of China, ruled by the Kuomintang, on 25 October 1945. Following the February 28 massacre in 1947, martial law was declared in 1949 by the Governor of Taiwan, Chen Cheng, and the ROC Ministry of National Defense. Following the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the ROC government retreated from the mainland as the Chinese Communist Party proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The KMT retreated to Taiwan and declared Taipei the temporary capital of the ROC. For many years, the ROC and PRC each continued to claim in the diplomatic arena to be the sole legitimate government of "China". In 1971, the United Nations expelled the ROC and replaced it with the PRC.
In 1987, martial law was lifted and Taiwan began a democratisation process, beginning with the abolition of the Temporary Provisions and culminating with the first direct president election in 1996. By 2000, the Democratic Progressive Party came to power and began to pursue Taiwanese independence and identity.
Due to Taiwan's ambiguous political status, the ROC has participated in a number of international organizations under the name "Chinese Taipei". Under its One-China policy, the PRC holds that the ROC ceased to exist and that Taiwan is an inseparable part of the PRC despite the fact that it has never controlled the island. Moreover, the PRC refuses diplomatic relations with any country that recognizes the ROC. However, the ROC still controls Taiwan, Penghu, Quemoy, Lienchiang, and other minor islands.
Chronology
Early postwar society
The Second World War's hostilities came to a close on 2 September 1945, with the defeat of the Empire of Japan and Nazi Germany. Taiwan, which had been ceded to Japan by the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895, was placed under the control of the Kuomintang-led Republic of China by the promulgation of General Order No. 1 and the signing of the Instrument of Surrender on that day.He Yingqin, the ROC representative at the Japanese surrender ceremonies, established the separate from the provincial-level executive system on mainland China. After the establishment of the provincial executive office, Chen Yi was appointed Chief Executive. Chen proclaimed 25 October to be Retrocession Day. However, because Japan had not formally relinquished the sovereignty of Taiwan at that time, Allies of World War II did not recognize the unilateral annexation of Taiwan by the Republic of China.
Chen Yi's administration was marred by corruption, as well as a lack of discipline in the military police assigned to occupation duties, resulting in a severe undermining of the chain of command. With the rampant corruption in his administration, Chen Yi began to monopolize power. In addition to this, the island's post-war economy was failing and headed into a recession, causing people on the island to endure economic hardship. The government's program of "De-Japanization" also created cultural estrangement, along with tensions between the growing population of migrants from the mainland and the pre-war residents of the island. The building tensions erupted in 1947, when the arrest of a cigarette vendor by government agents led to the death of a bystander. The clashes between police and residents that followed quickly spread across the island, and grew into a general rebellion against Chen Yi and the Chief Executive's Office in what came to be known as the February 28 incident. Several weeks later, government troops were sent to Taiwan from the mainland to handle the crisis and to suppress any opposition or resistance to the government. Many prominent individuals in Taiwanese society, as well as other residents of the island, many of whom had nothing to do with the incident, were either killed, imprisoned without trial, or simply disappeared. The February 28 Incident was a prelude to the White Terror of the 1950s, resulting in ethnic tensions between pre-war and post-war residents, as well as the genesis of the Taiwanese independence movement.
File:中華民國第一位民選首都市長吳三連於1951年勝選後 First People-elected Mayor of Taipei, the Capital of TAIWAN.jpg|275px|right|thumb|Non-Kuomintang Taiwanese politician Wu San-lien celebrated his landslide victory in the first-time election for mayor of Taipei in January 1951 with his supporters.
After the February 28 Incident, the Kuomintang-led ROC government reorganized the local government, abolishing the Chief Executive's Office, while establishing a new provincial government. Wey Daw-ming, whose parents were scholars, became the first Governor of Taiwan Province and, during his administration, reduced the scope of the public enterprises, which had grown significantly under Chen Yi.
Wey was succeeded as governor by Chen Cheng in 1949. Wey reformed the currency system, replacing the devalued Old Taiwan dollar with the New Taiwan dollar, at a 40,000:1 exchange rate, and implemented the, easing the inflationary situation.
The KMT viewed the population of Taiwan as corrupted by Japanese influence and neither fully Chinese or fully trustworthy. This perceived influence led the KMT to believe that the population of Taiwan was backwards and required re-education. The KMT sought to remove any trace of Japanese influence and to force a full Chinese identity on the people of Taiwan.
After Japan's surrender, most of Taiwan's approximately 300,000 Japanese residents were expelled. The KMT also seized properties from Japanese colonists either for sale or for their own use. In modern Taiwan these appropriated properties are considered ill-gotten assets. The KMT also took assets which had belonged to the Japanese colonial authorities. In 2017 a court ordered the KMT to pay compensation for 458 properties which had been expropriated in this way.
Authoritarianism, martial rule and cold war
On 20 July 1946, Chiang Kai-shek launched a large-scale assault on CCP territory in Huabei with 113 brigades, starting a new phase of the Chinese Civil War. Chen Cheng, who served as the chairman of Taiwan Provincial Government and commander of Taiwan Garrison Command, declared martial law on the island on 19 May 1949. A part of the Republic of China, Taiwan inherited the international pronouncement of the ROC government including the 1932 Note Verbale to France, where China declared that its southernmost territory was the Paracels.In December 1949, the Republic of China Armed Forces and the Kuomintang were defeated in the Chinese Civil War, forcing the Government of the Republic of China to relocate to Taiwan. This allowed the CCP to declare the establishment of a new Chinese state: the People's Republic of China.
Following their retreat to Taiwan the KMT viewed their retreat as a temporary one with Chiang Kai-shek saying "prepare for one year, counterattack in two years, sweep out the enemy in three years and succeed within five years." This led them to prioritize military armament and preparation over economic development.
After the February 28 Incident, the Nationalist government launched a campaign of suppression against political dissents. The KMT mostly imprisoned Taiwan's intellectual and social elite out of fear that they might resist their rule or sympathize with communism.
Up and until 1958, small-scale military campaigns between the ROC forces and the People's Liberation Army were carried out across the strait. An attempt by the CCP government to take the ROC-controlled island of Quemoy was thwarted in October 1949, halting the PLA advance towards Taiwan.
In April 1950, amphibious operations were successful in conquering Hainan Island in April 1950, leading to the capture of Wanshan Islands off the Guangdong coast and Zhoushan Island off Zhejiang.
This period of tension lasted until the Second Strait Crisis, in which the United States pledged to protect the island from the mainland. From that point on, both sides of the strait have ceased all major hostilities against each other, with the ROC Navy having resumed unilateral combat and escort duties while the US Navy secretly and quietly removed their extra warships from the Taiwan Strait.
Democratic reforms
The Republic of China entered into the development phase of constitutional democracy with the promulgation of the Constitution of the Republic of China in 1947. Subsequently, the National Revolutionary Army was also renamed as Republic of China Armed Forces and was nationalized. However, due to the Chinese Civil War, the Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion were passed as an amendment to the Constitution of the Republic of China. This established martial law in Taiwan and curtailed civil liberties and democracy. The official rationale for the Provisions was the ongoing Chinese Civil War and ROC was effectively under the military rule of the KMT during the period of mobilization. Taiwan was effectively under martial law.However, with the demise of the KMT single-party system and democratization movement during the 1980s, martial law was eventually lifted in 1987. Constitutional democracy was restored in ROC after 1987.
When the Republic of China relocated to Taiwan in 1949, the Chinese Youth Party, China Democratic Socialist Party, and KMT were the only legal political parties in Taiwan. The other established parties operated under the Tangwai movement.
Until the early 1970s, the Republic of China was recognized as the sole legitimate government of China by the United Nations and most Western nations, which refused to recognize the People's Republic of China on account of the Cold War. The KMT rule of Taiwan under martial law until the late 1980s had the stated goals of being vigilant against Communist infiltration and preparing to retake mainland China. Therefore, political dissent was not tolerated.
The late 1970s and early 1980s were a turbulent time for the Taiwan-born as many of the people who had originally been oppressed and left behind by economic changes became members of Taiwan's new middle class. Free enterprise had allowed native Taiwanese to gain a powerful bargaining chip in their demands for respect for their basic human rights. The Kaohsiung Incident would be a major turning point for democracy in Taiwan.
Taiwan also faced setbacks in the international sphere. In 1971, the ROC government walked out of the United Nations shortly before it recognized the PRC government in Beijing as the legitimate holder of China's seat in the United Nations. The ROC had been offered dual representation, but Chiang Kai-shek demanded to retain a seat on the UN Security Council, which was not acceptable to the PRC. Chiang expressed his decision in his famous "the sky is not big enough for two suns" speech. In October 1971, Resolution 2758 was passed by the UN General Assembly and "the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek" were expelled from the UN and replaced as "China" by the PRC. In 1979, the United States switched recognition from Taipei to Beijing.
Chiang Kai-shek died in April 1975 at the age of 87, and was succeeded in the presidency by Yen Chia-kan while his son Chiang Ching-kuo succeeded to the leadership of the Kuomintang. Formerly the head of the feared secret police, Chiang Ching-kuo recognized gaining foreign support to securing the ROC's future security required reform. His administration saw a gradual loosening of political controls, a transition towards democracy, and moves toward Taiwanization of the regime. Opponents of the Nationalists were no longer forbidden to hold meetings or publish papers. Though opposition political parties were still illegal, when the Democratic Progressive Party was established as the first opposition party in 1986, President Chiang decided against dissolving the group or persecuting its leaders. Its candidates officially ran in elections as independents in the Tangwai movement. In the following year, Chiang ended martial law and allowed family visits to mainland China.
Chiang selected Lee Teng-hui, a Taiwan born technocrat to be his vice president, first in the line of succession to the presidency. The move followed other reforms giving more power to native-born citizens and calmed anti-KMT sentiments during a period in which many other Asian autocracies were being challenged.
After Chiang Ching-kuo died in 1988, his successor, President Lee Teng-hui, continued to democratize the government. Lee transferred more government authority to Taiwanese-born citizens, and Taiwan underwent a process of localization. In this localization process, local culture and history was promoted over a pan-China viewpoint. Lee's reforms included printing banknotes from the Central Bank instead of the usual Provincial Bank of Taiwan. He also largely suspended the operation of the Taiwan Provincial Government. In 1991 the Legislative Yuan and National Assembly, elected in 1947, were forced to resign. These groups were originally created to represent mainland China constituencies. Also lifted were the restrictions on the use of Taiwanese languages in the broadcast media and in schools. Lee Teng-hui believed that agriculture was the backbone of a nation and promoted it extensively. He implemented health insurance and occupational hazard insurance programs for farmers. He also emphasized the Japanese roots of much of Taiwan's agricultural infrastructure.
Attempting to maintain good relations with the PRC, Taiwan avoided any criticism of the Tiananmen Square Massacre and the media was largely barred from reporting on it. A group of students who attempted to sail a chartered ship into the Formosa Strait and beam pro-democracy broadcasts into China via amateur radio were foiled by the government by putting various obstacles in their way that caused them to abandon the attempt.
However, Lee failed to crack down on the massive corruption that pervaded the government and many KMT loyalists felt that Lee betrayed the ROC by taking reforms too far, while those in the opposition felt he did not take reforms far enough.