viously beneficial not only to the superpowers, but also to the countries in the Pacific region, including Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, South Vietnam, Cambodia, Australia and New Zealand. It would make it possible for the noncommunist countries in the region to cooperate as independent States within a non-communist framework and also maintain peaceful and friendly relations with mainland China. It would demonstrate that people in this region can show their loyalty to the territorial community in which they live rather than to ethnicity itself. It would have far-reaching significance for the future of countries like Singapore and Malaysia where people of Chinese origin predominate. On the other hand, when ethnicity becomes the paramount criterion for identity and loyalty, it would have immeasurably disruptive repercussions. If Taiwan were forcibly subjected to domination and subjugation of mainland China because of "Chinese ethnicity" of its people, it would spell trouble for countries like Singapore and Malaysia, and also for countries like Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines where the populations of Chinese origin are substantial.

STEPS TO BE TAKEN

What concrete steps are available to the United States in achieving the objectives outlined above? One who is not a United States national must of course offer suggestions with much diffidence and all deference. It may, however, perhaps be forgiven to one seeking deeply to identify both with Taiwan and the larger community of mankind to outline certain possibilities.

1. Formally recognize that Taiwan has in fact existed for more than twenty years as an independent State separate from mainland China-though ruled by regime without genuine authority-and that the People's Republic of China has never extended its jurisdiction and control over Taiwan since its founding in 1949. For that matter, no Chinese government on the mainland has had control of Taiwan in the twentieth century.

2. Take all necessary measures to help evacuate all Taiwanese soldiers stationed on Quemoy and Matsu, the off-shore islands which belong without dispute to China. As a result of the Formosa Resolution passed by U.S. Congress in 1955, the United States has helped the Chiang regime to build these off-shore islands into fortresses and to transport Taiwanese soldiers against their will to these islands in the first place; it is incumbent on the U.S. to do all she can to prevent hundreds of thousands of Taiwanese soldiers from being used as pawns and hostages of the alleged "Chinese civil war." Withdrawing the Nationalist Chinese forces from Quemoy and Matsu would liquidate the last vestige of the so-called Chinese civil war and reduce tension in the area.

3. Discontinue military assistance and the supplying of armaments to the Chiang regime. This would prevent the Chiang regime from using weapons supplied by the U.S. to suppress the legitimate aspirations of the people of Taiwan and diminish the probability that these weapons would end up in the hands of the Chinese Communists through a multiple double-cross by top Nationalist officials like Chiang Ching-kuo.

4. Recognize that the question of Taiwan's status is a question distinct and separate from that of China's seating in the U.N. and bring the Taiwan question as a separate agenda item before the General Assembly of the United Nations. Affirm that any decision to seat Peking as the government of China in the U.N. would in no way prejudice Taiwan's status and should not foster the expectation that the use of force by Peking to conquer Taiwan would be permissible, or could be tolerated or condoned.

5. Support the proposition that the future of Taiwan be decided, in accordance with the principle of self-determination, by the 14 million people living on Taiwan, not by the 800 million people on China, or by Mao and Chiang, and reject any proposal that would leave the future status of Taiwan to be decided by "the two rival Chinese regimes," or by "the Chinese" or "the people on both sides of the Taiwan Straits." The 14 million people on Taiwan should not be placed at the mercy of the 800 million people of China under some ambiguous face-saving formulas of "Chinese solution." A Taiwanese solution is imperative and pending a plebiscite Taiwanese who can truly represent and speak for the people of Taiwan should be consulted.

6. Support a plebiscite for Taiwan to be held as promptly as possible under the auspices of the United Nations. As an interim measure pending such a plebiscite, Taiwan could be placed under the Trusteeship Council or the Special Committee on the Situation in regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Grant

ing of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples or an ad hoc committee. 7. Press the United Nations to take all necessary measures to ensure a free and honest plebiscite on Taiwan in which all viewpoints are freely expressed and choice is made without coercion, and in which external aggression and subversion are effectively prevented or deterred. A plebiscite covered by the press of the United States and of the world would in all probability be free of overt or covert coercion on the part of contending interests.

8. Support admission of Taiwan to the United Nations as a separate member should the exercise of the right of self-determination result in explicit formalization of an independent State of Taiwan-an outcome which is as certain as any future event can be given a free and honest referendum.

& from APPENDIX

BACKGROUND PAPERS ON TAIWAN, DEPARTMENT OF STATE, AUGUST 3, 1971

Chinese Communist Position on the Status of Taiwan.

Military Conquest Versus "Peaceful Liberation."

Peking's View of the Taiwan Problems as an Issue in US-PRC Relations.

VI. U.S. POSITION ON LEGAL STATUS OF TAIWAN

Period Prior to Korean Hostilities.

Korean Conflict.

Japanese Peace Treaty.

Mutual Defense Treaty.

Recent Restatement of United States Position.

VII. SOME ASPECTS OF US-GRC BILATERAL RELATIONS

U.S. Commitment to the Defense of Taiwan and the Pescadores.
US-GRC Defense Relationship.

Bilateral Economic Relations.

Sino-American Scientific and Technological Cooperation.

Diplomatic Relations of the Republic of China and the People's Republic of

China.

Economic Fact Sheet.

Treaties in Force Between the United States and China.

Bibliography.

BACKGROUND PAPERS ON TAIWAN

I. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Beginning of Chinese Rule in Taiwan

Taiwan's earliest inhabitants came from the Malay-Indonesian-Philippine area in prehistoric times. Their descendants are today's 225,000 tribal aborigines, most of whom inhabit the central mountains and are considered by Nationalist Chinese officials as the only true "Formosan natives." Mainland Chinese visits to Taiwan have been recorded in the sketchy Chinese historical accounts of the island since the sixth century. However, the first permanent Chinese settlement probably did not take place until the 16th century. During this period Taiwan was principally a haven for Chinese and Japanese pirates. In the 16th century, Portuguese mariners were the first Europeans to discover Taiwan, but their christening of the island as "Formosa" was the beginning and end of their role in its history.

In that age of European exploration and colonization and the decline of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) the Dutch and Spanish were attracted to Formosa because of its strategic trading location. In 1621 the Dutch set up a small colony at what is now Anping in southern Taiwan. By 1642, they had evicted the Spanish from the northern end of Taiwan. In the following 40 years, the Dutch East India Company exploited the southern coast of the island, assuming authority over Chinese farmers who had migrated from the Fukien and Canton coast of China and the aborigines in the area.

In 1662, Koxinga (Cheng Cheng-kung), the son of a famous Ming pirate, led his refugee band across the Formosa Strait from Quemoy, expelled the Dutch and made Taiwan his personal kingdom, although it was ostensibly the last outpost of the Ming Dynasty. He died shortly after taking control of Taiwan. The twentyyear rule of his son and grandson was most notable for bringing into Formosa refugees from the south China coast, who by 1690 probably outnumbered the aborigines.

Koxinga's grandson surrendered to the Manchus in 1683 and Taiwan was made a prefecture of Fukien Province in 1684. During the early period of Manchu rule, severe regulations restricting emigration and shipping to Taiwan hindered the development of the island. Aborigine rebellions were frequent and the chaotic conditions forced the Chinese authorities to remain on the western coastal plane, adding to the ineffectiveness of local government and contributing to almost two centuries of stagnation on the island.

In step with Western interest in China itself, America interest in Taiwan increased by the mid-1800's. In 1854 Commodore Perry visited the island and made a recommendation that the U.S. use it as a coaling station for its ships. In the 1860's, following the treaties of Tientsin, four treaty ports--Tamsui, Keelung, Anping, and Takao-were opened, allowing western missionaries and trading companies to gain a foothold on the island. Americans again officially visited Taiwan in 1867, when a naval expedition under the leadership of the United States Consul in Amoy attempted unsuccessfully to take punitive action against aborigine tribes for massacring shipwreck survivors. Another massacre, this time of a shipwrecked Japanese crew, led a Japanese expeditionary force to raid the southern part of the island in 1874, thus prompting more effective government on the part of the Ch'ing officials.

A decade later in 1886, after French forces were repelled from the island by Liu Ming-ch'uan, the first governor, Taiwan was made a separate province of China and much needed administrative reforms were begun. During this period Liu Ming-ch'uan strove to strengthen the defense of the island, establish a modern communication system and increase Taiwan's economic development. Although his success was limited Taiwan still became by standards of the time a model province. This period of reform was short lived due to the Sino-Japanese war (1894-95).

Taiwan under Japanese rule

Following Japan's victory over China, the island with over 2,500,000 people was ceded to Japan by the Treaty of Shimonoseki (1895) and remained a Japanese colony for 50 years. Taiwan, however, was not ready to submit to Japanese rule. The provincial governor of Taiwan ignored the treaty, organized the armed forces to oppose Japanese occupation, and on May 25, 1895 proclaimed Taiwan to be the independent Republic of Formosa with himself as President. His forces, however, were no match for the Japanese and by June 6 he was in flight to the

mainland. Even with the Republic of Formosa soon dissolved, the Japanese still encountered resistance and were not able to safely occupy all the citites until the end of 1895. Anti-Japanese sentiment continued to be manifested by Taiwanese over the next several decades. Nevertheless, after ten years of pacification, Japan was able to impose order and improve the economy through effective government based on western colonial precedents.

The Japanese administered the island through a civil governor-general assisted by a prefectural council. The Japanese government, devoted large sums of money to improvement of communications, harbors, and reform of the educational system. Island revenue was derived from state enterprise, customs, and taxes. During this period of Japanese control, the Taiwanese were subjected to a severe policy of Japanization designed to destroy all identity with China and Chinese culture. Some of the measures adopted caused wide-spread friction and resentment, particularly imposition of the state religion of Shinto, educational discrimination against Taiwanese, and economic and occupational limitations placed upon those unable to use the Japanese language. Yet despite discrimination, Taiwan still progressed and flourished under pre-war Japanese rule. For the first time in its history, there was an effective island-wide administration, a comparatively modern education system was established, and living standards rose sharply. By 1940, economic advances due to development of a cash crop economy and improved power, transportation and communications systems gave Taiwan a per capita foreign trade many times greater than China's and higher than that of parts of Japan itself. The strings of World War II, including U.S. carrier-based raids against the island and the destruction of coastal shipping, held back the economy. The defeat of Japan and return of the Nationalist Chinese in 1945 led to a severe economic reversal.

Return of Taiwan to Chinese control

At the close of World War II, Chiang Kai-shek accepted the Japanese surrender on the mainland and Taiwan came under Chinese administration under the terms of the Cairo Declaration of 1943 which stated that Manchuria, Taiwan, and the Pescadores would be restored to the Republic of China.

The Taiwanese had looked forward to liberation from Japanese rule and reunification with China with a mixture of hope and uncertainty. Fifty years of separation from their compatriots across the Taiwan Strait had isolated the Taiwanese from the turmoil of the Chinese revolution, the strife that followed between the National government and the warlords, and the war against Japan. Although happy to shed their colonial status, the Taiwanese felt that the government in Nanking was very much an unknown quantity.

Mainlanders coming to Taiwan had an equally unsure perception of the Taiwanese. Like the Manchurians who had undergone long Japanese occupation, the Taiwanese had a reputation as quislings among the Nationalists. A few Taiwanese had been used by the Japanese in rather unsavory roles during the long war on the mainland and the island had a Japanese veneer on its culture which was looked on with some distaste by the first Chinese authorities to come into contact with Taiwan in 1945.

The takeover by the Nationalists from the Japanese soon became rather disorderly. The attention of war-weary officials in the central government at Nanking was occupied with the titanic task of consolidating control over the portions of the mainland that had been occupied by the Japanese since 1937. The first stirrings of the post-World War II hostilities with the Chinese Communists had begun. It was not a propitious time for an efficient and just resumption of Chinese control over Taiwan. The well-trained and disciplined Chinese Army units which had participated in hard fighting in Burma were quickly shifted to Manchuria to occupy territory contested by the Communists. The troops sent to Taiwan to accept the Japanese surrender were second-line soldiers, ill equipped for their sensitive assignment.

Almost a third of a million Japanese citizens were repatriated to the home islands during the first months of Chinese control. Many of them had held critical posts in the administration of not only the government but also the state enterprises that had dominated the colonial economy of Taiwan. There was no one on the Chinese side prepared to replace these officials and the local result of their exodus was economic dislocation and a certain amount of civil disorder. General Chen Yi, a former Governor of Fukien Province, was named "Administrator General and Concurrently Supreme Commander in Taiwan Province" on October 3, 1945. His appointment proved to be disastrous. Under his inept management, widespread corruption in the administration of the island and

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grossly inequitable treatment of the population contributed to deep resentment and sharpening of the normal suspicions held by Chinese from different provinces of China. The Taiwanese began to feel as if their island was once again undergoing an alien occupation.

As conditions worsened, unrest on the island began to build and exploded in riots which broke out on February 28, 1947, following an incident in which an elderly woman selling black-market cigarettes was beaten by police from the Taiwan Tobacco Monopoly. Community representatives at first wrung concessions from Governor Chen who promised to eliminate some of the conditions which had sparked the troubles. However, after the arrival on March 8, 1947 of reinforcements brought over from the mainland to put down the civil disturbances, numerous incidents of widespread and indiscriminate killings by both troops and police occurred. U.S. official documents written well after the event generally have accepted the figure of 10,000 persons as the approximate number killed during the period of suppression which lasted until the end of March 1947. There were certainly thousands of Taiwanese killed; more precise figures, however, are open to question since the circumstances of that situation precluded the possibility of any reliable estimates of the total number of deaths.

After the February uprising, Chiang Kai-shek replaced Chen Yi with Wei Tao-ming, a former Ambassador to the U.S. Once again Taiwan was made a province of China, and the Wei Tao-ming administration proceeded to make reforms to try to win the loyalty of the people. Martial law and censorship were relaxed, government enterprises were converted back to private ownership, and some mainlander officials were replaced by Taiwanese who had remained loyal to the government during the 1947 crisis.

II. POLITICAL STRUCTURE OF TAIWAN

Present constitutional system

The basic institutions of representative government in the ROC are those prescribed by the Constitution of 1947. Like the Constitution of which they are a part, these institutions and the electoral procedures involved were adopted by the Constitutional National Assembly in late 1946 under the pressures of spreading civil war as one attempt to mobilize support for the Nationalist cause. The attempt also reflected much the same hope which characterized many modernizing efforts of the previous half century in China-i.e., that somehow the adoption of Western political institutions would help China gain the degree of national unity and power befitting a leading twentieth-century nation. Greater forces, including the unpropitious environment of civil war, worked in the opposite direction: the Chinese tradition of benevolent authoritarian rule exercised through an elite selected by examination, the recent grafting on of Soviet-style one-party rule, the heavy influence of military leaders in government, and the absence of preconditions of elective government, such as a literate and informed electorate and a tradition of adhering to the verdict of the ballot box.

Close control of the political process by the KMT was facilitated after 1948 by a radical revision of the Constitution early that year by the National Assembly. Known as the Temporary Provisions to the Constitution, the revision granted virtually unlimited emergency powers to the President.

Central Government structure

1. Elective Bodies.-As provided in the Constitution, members of the National Assembly, Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan were chosen by popular elections held during 1946-49:

National Assembly.-Empowered to elect the President and Vice President of the Republic for six-year terms and to amend the Constitution. Members are to be elected for six-year terms.

Legislative Yuan.-Granted powers of approving the budget and legislating for declarations of war, martial law, conclusion of peace treaties, and "other important matters of state." In practice, the Legislative Yuan has been subordinated to the Executive Yuan, deriving its influence from its interpellative power. Members are elected for three-year terms.

Control Yuan.-Reminiscent of the imperial censorate, this branch is responsible for general supervision of government operations through the powers of censure and impeachment, auditing of government accounts, and approval of certain Examination and Judicial Yuan appointments. Members are elected for six-year terms.