Japan recently apologized to South Korea for its colonial rule from 1910 to 1945, seeking, an Associated Press report said, “to strengthen ties between the two countries ahead of the 100th anniversary of the Japanese annexation of the Korean Peninsula.”
During Japan’s occupation of Korea, many Koreans were forced to fight as frontline soldiers for Japan’s Imperial Army, work in slave-labor conditions or serve as prostitutes in brothels operated by the Japanese military. Sound familiar?
Substitute “Taiwan” for “Korea” in the news reports, and the picture becomes clear. Japan also owes an apology to Taiwan for drafting young Taiwanese men to fight as frontline soldiers for Japanese military campaigns and for forcing thousands of Taiwanese women, many of them Aboriginal girls, to serve as “comfort women” in Japanese military brothels. Just as many older Koreans still remember atrocities committed by Japan, many older Taiwanese also remember.
Although the issues do not remain as sensitive here in Taiwan all these decades later, the mental and psychological toll of the Japanese colonial rule of Taiwan cannot merely be airbrushed away by Japanese spin doctors.
“For the enormous damage and suffering caused by this colonization, I would like to express, once again, our deep remorse and sincerely apologize,” Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan told the Korean people earlier this month.
His statement was intended specifically for the ears of South Korean people, in contrast to earlier apologies by Japan for wartime actions made broadly to the Japan’s Asian neighbors, including Taiwan.
Kan also said Japan plans to return some “stolen” Korean cultural artifacts, including historical documents that it “acquired” while ruling the Korean Peninsula.
History is a cruel reminder of what some nations do to other nations, and while many South Koreans were glad to hear of Kan’s remarks, many older people in Korea told reporters covering the story that Tokyo’s most recent apology was insufficient, saying it should be backed up by specific measures, such as reparations for victims, prosecution of wrongdoers and a record of the Japanese military’s history of sexual slavery in Japanese textbooks.
After Kan’s remarks were publicized, a small group of activists protested in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul, urging Japan to offer a more sincere apology and return all Korean cultural artifacts in its possession.
One activist said: “We no longer welcome apologies of words without action.”
Kan’s apology comes ahead of the 100-year anniversary of Tokyo’s annexation of the Korean Peninsula on Aug. 29. The 100-year anniversary of Tokyo’s forced annexation of Taiwan occurred in 1995.
Will Japan also agree to return some of Taiwan’s cultural artifacts that were also transported to Japanese museums during the colonial days and also apologize in a humble and heartfelt manner for forcing young Taiwanese women into sexual servitude for Japanese soldiers during the war years, some as young as 16 and 17?
Certainly, war is terrible and ugly, and unspeakable acts often occur, but where are the apologies from Japan. Germany, after World War II, apologized to the world, and it has been in apology mode ever since. Has Japan ever really apologized for the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, for the atrocities committed all over Asia during what it calls the Pacific War, for the unspeakable horrors that the Taiwanese, Dutch and Korean comfort women had to live through?
Will Taiwan ever get a similar apology from Japan? Only history knows, and for now, history’s not talking.
Dan Bloom is a US writer based in Taiwan.
In their recent op-ed “Trump Should Rein In Taiwan” in Foreign Policy magazine, Christopher Chivvis and Stephen Wertheim argued that the US should pressure President William Lai (賴清德) to “tone it down” to de-escalate tensions in the Taiwan Strait — as if Taiwan’s words are more of a threat to peace than Beijing’s actions. It is an old argument dressed up in new concern: that Washington must rein in Taipei to avoid war. However, this narrative gets it backward. Taiwan is not the problem; China is. Calls for a so-called “grand bargain” with Beijing — where the US pressures Taiwan into concessions
The term “assassin’s mace” originates from Chinese folklore, describing a concealed weapon used by a weaker hero to defeat a stronger adversary with an unexpected strike. In more general military parlance, the concept refers to an asymmetric capability that targets a critical vulnerability of an adversary. China has found its modern equivalent of the assassin’s mace with its high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) weapons, which are nuclear warheads detonated at a high altitude, emitting intense electromagnetic radiation capable of disabling and destroying electronics. An assassin’s mace weapon possesses two essential characteristics: strategic surprise and the ability to neutralize a core dependency.
Chinese President and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Chairman Xi Jinping (習近平) said in a politburo speech late last month that his party must protect the “bottom line” to prevent systemic threats. The tone of his address was grave, revealing deep anxieties about China’s current state of affairs. Essentially, what he worries most about is systemic threats to China’s normal development as a country. The US-China trade war has turned white hot: China’s export orders have plummeted, Chinese firms and enterprises are shutting up shop, and local debt risks are mounting daily, causing China’s economy to flag externally and hemorrhage internally. China’s
During the “426 rally” organized by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party under the slogan “fight green communism, resist dictatorship,” leaders from the two opposition parties framed it as a battle against an allegedly authoritarian administration led by President William Lai (賴清德). While criticism of the government can be a healthy expression of a vibrant, pluralistic society, and protests are quite common in Taiwan, the discourse of the 426 rally nonetheless betrayed troubling signs of collective amnesia. Specifically, the KMT, which imposed 38 years of martial law in Taiwan from 1949 to 1987, has never fully faced its
RSS