How early a POD would you need for Japan to retain Taiwan? I ask because I head that many didn't believe that Taiwan wasn't a colonial possession of Japan as much as it was apart of Japan itself.
from wikiThen again I don"t know when Japan originally got control of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Japan got them back a quater century after the war. Those islands even have Japanese speaking majorities.
So 1609 or 1872, dependingIn 1609 the Satsuma clan, which controlled the region that is now Kagoshima Prefecture, invaded the Ryūkyū Kingdom. Following the invasion the Ryūkyū Kingdom surrendered to the Satsuma and was forced to form a tributary relationship with Satsuma and the Tokugawa shogunate, in addition to its previous relationship with China. Ryukyuan sovereignty was maintained since complete annexation would create a problem with China. The Satsuma clan earned considerable profits from trades with China during a period in which foreign trade was heavily restricted by the shogunate.
Though Satsuma maintained strong influence over the islands, the Ryūkyū Kingdom maintained a considerable degree of domestic political freedom for over two hundred years. Four years after the 1868 Meiji Restoration, the Japanese government, through military incursions, officially annexed the kingdom and renamed it Ryukyu han. At the time, the Qing Dynasty of China asserted sovereignty over the islands of the Ryūkyū Kingdom, since the Ryūkyū Kingdom was also a tributary nation of China. Ryukyu han became Okinawa Prefecture of Japan in 1879, even though all other hans had become prefectures of Japan in 1872.
How early a POD would you need for Japan to retain Taiwan? I ask because I head that many didn't believe that Taiwan wasn't a colonial possession of Japan as much as it was apart of Japan itself.
True, but they weren't very happy about being invaded by mainlanders, either.Need a different WWII, so we get a negotiated surrender rather than an unconditional one, plus no China as US ally during the war. Perhaps it's a German-Chinese alliance TL, with Japan as opportunist predator rather than Axis member? Taiwan was just the colonial posession where the Japanese acted least like dicks. The ethnic Chinese majority didn't want to be ruled from Tokyo.
Bruce
True, but they weren't very happy about being invaded by mainlanders, either.
Given the choice between OTL's KMT/GMD invasion, continued Japanese rule and Red rule, I'm not sure what the Taiwanese at the time would have picked. None were great options. (All cases involve learning a foreign language that either uses or sort of uses the writing you're used to.)
More likely Japanese rule, IMO, given the three options. The best bet would be is if the Home Rule Movement was more successful and thus Taiwan became a prefecture of Japan in the 1920s. Another option which was seriously considered, for a WW2-era POD but opposed by the KMT was the idea of Taiwan becoming a UN trust territory (since there were many doubts at the time regarding Jiang's ability to govern the place, considering the troubles he had just in Mainland China alone). At the conclusion of the trust territory period, the UN might return it to Japan if Japan wants it - though there it reaches the problem that the majority of Taiwanese at this point would either prefer to be independent or become part of the US.
Really? I mean, I'm all for American expansionism, but choosing the USA just seems random here.
As for the home rule movement, that is along the lines of what I had thought.Taiwan would become a prefecture of Japan, and then when the peace comes with Japan, the allies guarantee the territorial integrity of Japan, which would include Taiwan. Or, a referendum in Taiwan could choose Japan over war torn China.
When Churchill and FDR first meet at Cairo, the proposal was to strip Japan of everything from WW1 Up.
By Chang got them to include Taiwan, Pushing the Date back to 1895, Which Stalin then Used to get the Allies to agree to Russia taking Karafuto Province on Sakhalin Island.
If C & R had held firm on the WW1 Proposal, ..................................
When Churchill and FDR first meet at Cairo, the proposal was to strip Japan of everything from WW1 Up.
By Chang got them to include Taiwan, Pushing the Date back to 1895, Which Stalin then Used to get the Allies to agree to Russia taking Karafuto Province on Sakhalin Island.
If C & R had held firm on the WW1 Proposal, ..................................
Need a different WWII, so we get a negotiated surrender rather than an unconditional one, plus no China as US ally during the war. Perhaps it's a German-Chinese alliance TL, with Japan as opportunist predator rather than Axis member? Taiwan was just the colonial posession where the Japanese acted least like dicks. The ethnic Chinese majority didn't want to be ruled from Tokyo.
Bruce
Oddly? The KMT was really brutal to them. This was because the Japanese had actually treated the original Taiwanese (they were not truly "aboriginals" but simply earlier Chinese settlers) relatively well, so the KMT thought them to be traitors.Oddly, Taiwanese aborigines still remember Japan fondly; much moreso than their KMT rulers.
Err... No. The Taiwanese aboriginals aren't Chinese in any way shape or form. They are the people (OK, descendants of) that the Polynesians probably descended from.Oddly? The KMT was really brutal to them. This was because the Japanese had actually treated the original Taiwanese (they were not truly "aboriginals" but simply earlier Chinese settlers) relatively well, so the KMT thought them to be traitors.
Oddly, Taiwanese aborigines still remember Japan fondly; much moreso than their KMT rulers.