An isolated island in the sea, Taiwan became the target of colonists since the mid-16th century. The patriotic Taiwan people have waged many prolonged struggles against foreign aggressors to defend the territory and national dignity of the Chinese. Their battles with the Dutch and the Japanese invaders were the most heroic.
Sweeping Out the Dutch. Early in the 17th century, the Netherlands broke through the hegemony of Spain and Portugal and began colonization in the East. It invaded Penghu twice, first in 1603, later in 1622. In 1624, the army of the Ming court drove the Dutch out of Penghu. The Dutch general was captured and the rest of his army withdrew to Dayuan (today's Anping District of Tainan City) in southern Taiwan. Two years later, Spanish invaders occupied Jilong, Danshui and the area around. The Dutch took Spain's position in Northern Taiwan in 1642 and turned the whole of Taiwan into its colony.
Taiwan struggled against Dutch colonialism for 38 years. Finally, in April 1661, General Zheng Chenggong left for Taiwan from the island of Jinmen with an army of 25,000 sailors and hundreds of gunboats. With the support and co-operation of the Taiwan people, the court army swept the Dutch invaders out of Taiwan in February 1662. In his letter to the Dutch governor appealing to the latter to surrender, Zheng Chenggong wrote: "Taiwan is China's territory and has been under Chinese jurisdiction for a long time. I have come to take it and the place is now mine."
Zheng Chenggong and his son Zheng Jing and grandson Zheng Keshuang then ruled Taiwan for the following 22 years. During this period, known as "The era of Ming Zheng," Taiwan's economy and culture developed rapidly. In 1683 when the Qing army entered Taiwan, Zheng Keshuang pledged allegiance to the Qing court and thus placed Taiwan under the control of China's central government once again.
Fighting the Japanese. In 1894, the Japanese imperialists launched an aggressive war against China. China lost the war and the Qing government signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki with Japan in April 1895 under which China ceded Taiwan and the Penghu islands to Japan. Taiwan became a colony of Japan, and then for over half a century the people of Taiwan struggled for their liberation and reunification with the motherland.
When the news that it had been ceded to Japan reached Taiwan in the spring of 1895, people surrounded the governor's office to express their anger. Shopkeepers in Taibei went on strike. Taiwan scholars who were attending the national examinations for government officials in Beijing submitted a joint letter to the Qing court, declaring the Japanese invaders were their enemies and refusing to surrender to them, they would rather fight until the last man had died on the battlefield. Local nobility also telegraphed the Qing court, expressing their willingness to defend Taiwan.
Japan occupied Taiwan in May 1895 with a large military force. The Taiwan people immediately took up arms and organized a people's anti-Japanese army, which persisted in armed struggle for seven years.
Beginning in 1907, under the influence of the bourgeois revolution that was in the offing on the mainland, the people of Taiwan staged a succession of armed uprisings to protest against Japanese colonial rule. There were the Beipu Uprising in Xinzhu County in 1907, the Linyipu Uprising in Nantou County in 1912, the 1913 uprising in Miaoli County and the 1915 Xilaian Uprising in Tainan County.
Around the year 1919, the tide of the national democratic movement on the mainland hit Taiwan. Progressive organizations and societies emerged everywhere to arouse the people to fight against Japanese oppression. Their slogans were: "Oppose the aggressive war of imperialism!" "Down with the Japanese imperialists!" "Recover Taiwan!"
After the Anti-Japanese War broke out in 1937, the Japanese invaders strengthened their fascist rule by placing Taiwan under a "war system"-the Chinese language was forbidden and a process of assimilation forced on the Taiwan people. Those who revolted were mercilessly suppressed. But the Taiwan people never submitted to the invaders. Numerous protests and uprisings took place, including a miners' strike in Yilan County, an uprising against the war in Gaoxiong, Liujia and other places, the revolt of draftees in Taibei, Jilong and Gaoxiong, and activities secretly organized by students of the Taibei University against the Japanese. Many returned to the mainland to take part in the Anti Japanese War. |
