Battle lines drawn in China’s World War II narrative

World War II casts a very long shadow in East Asia. Eighty years after ending with Japan’s surrender to Allied forces in 1945, the conflict continues to stir debate over the past, in the context of today’s geopolitical tensions.

China’s high-profile military parade commemorating the conclusion of what Beijing calls the “War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression” is a case in point.

In the run-up to this week’s event, the Chinese Communist Party has been criticized in Tokyo for stoking anti-Japanese sentiment and in Washington for downplaying the United States’ role while playing up Russia’s.

But as an expert on Taiwan-China relations, I’m interested in the battle over the narrative between Taipei and Beijing. During World War II, China’s communists and nationalists became uneasy internal allies, putting their civil war on pause to unite against Japan.

Afterward, the communists prevailed and the nationalists fled to Taiwan, where they set up their own government – one the mainland has never recognized.

Military force

Months of bickering over the anniversary shine a light on how both sides view their respective roles in defeating Japan – and what the show of military force by Beijing signals today.

A peculiarity of the commemorations is that Japan did not actually surrender to Communist China, or technically to China at all.

On September 9, 1945, a week after agreeing to the terms laid out by the Allied forces, Japan formally surrendered at a ceremony in Nanjing to China’s National Revolutionary Army – the military wing of the nationalist Kuomintang led by Chiang Kai-shek.

And this gets to the heart of why many in Taiwan – where the nationalists fled at the conclusion of China’s civil war in 1949 – are unhappy with Beijing’s projection of Communist China as the victors against Japan.

By the time that war in East Asia took hold, in 1937, China was a decade into its own civil war between the nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong’s communists.

The nationalists and communists fell into an uneasy truce with the creation of the second united front in 1937. But the role of both sides in fighting the Japanese has long been the source of disagreement.

The nationalist army bore the brunt of conventional warfare. But it was criticized for being disorganized and too dependent on men forced into service. Those soldiers were often ill-trained and underfed.

To the communists, the army – and its failings – were the product of the corrupt government under Chiang. And it was largely responsible for the inept response to Japan’s initial advances.

In Beijing’s telling today, it was the communist forces, which relied more on guerrilla tactics, that helped push back the Japanese. Conversely, the nationalists cast events during World War II very differently.

Japan’s invasion

China’s nationalist administration under Chiang was the first government in the world to fight a fascist power. For eight or even 14 years, depending on whether you date the start of the conflict to 1937 or 1931, the nationalist army fought hard.

It sacrificed a lot as it put up the bulk of the resistance against Japan. To Taiwan’s Chinese nationalists, the communist contribution was minimal. Worse, to them, the communists took the opportunity of Japan’s invasion to further their own position against the nationalists.

Indeed, when the civil war began again after Japan’s defeat, Mao’s communists had the upper hand, leading to the Chiang’s retreat to Taiwan four years later.

The status of island at the end of World War II presents another wrinkle. By then, it had been under Japanese colonial control since 1895.

Indeed, a second surrender ceremony took place on October 25, 1945, when the Japanese forces in Taiwan surrendered to a nationalist official from the mainland.

What followed was a nationalist takeover of Taiwan and a corresponding Japanese retreat. Still, it took several years for all Japanese officials and families to be repatriated to their homeland.

Meanwhile, the nationalist Kuomintang that came into Taiwan were not terribly well received by the local population. Many were hoping for independence and resisted a Chinese nationalist, authoritarian takeover.

Complicating matters was that a 1943 agreement between the leaders of the Allied nations in Cairo declared that in the event of Japan’s defeat, Formosa, as Taiwan was then called, would be returned to the Republic of China.

But now you had two claimants to being “China” – the communists on the mainland and the nationalists in Taiwan. Either way, the Cairo Declaration served the interests of the “One-China” principle – under which both Beijing and Taipei view Taiwan as part of unified China.

But they differ over which is the country’s legitimate government compared to those seeking the island’s formal independence from the mainland.

Critical moment

The conflicting war narratives from Communist China, pro-unification nationalists in Taiwan and those seeking the island’s independence have been present since the end of World War II. And they tend to flare up around commemorations and anniversaries.

They did so, for example, when China held a big military celebration in 2015 to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Japan’s surrender. This year’s event, Beijing used it to reshape the memory of the Chinese Communist Party’s role in the world as a result of the conflict.

The war is seen as a critical moment in Chinese history – not just in the context of defeating Japan and its role in the subsequent founding of the People’s Republic, but because in Asia it marked the end of the colonial era.

During the war, foreign powers in China gave up their concessions and ended a century of partial colonial control over port cities such as Shanghai. The war also marked China’s emergence as a major player on the world scene.

As a result of its contributions, China gained a role on the United Nations Security Council. The Republic of China on Taiwan maintained that seat and that vote until 1971, when UN recognition finally shifted to the People’s Republic of China.

In recent years, promoting a prominent role in defeating fascism and shaping the postwar order has been important as China looks to carve out a space in a multipolar world. Or an alternative to a world dominated by the United States and Western Europe.

For these reasons, Beijing is keen to keep a focus on its preferred narrative, highlighting communist contributions to the war effort. But given Beijing’s adherence to the one-party principle, Taiwan – as part of China – could not be ignored.

So, invites to Taiwanese officials to the commemorative events were sent out. Representatives from the pro-independence ruling Democratic People’s Party and the main opposition party, the pro-unification Kuomintang, largely declined to attend.

Nonetheless, earlier this week, former Kuomintang chairperson Hung Hsiu-chu announced that she would be in Beijing for the event. For its part, Taiwan has opted for more low-key commemorations of the end of Japanese rule of the island.

Fictionalized invasion

Many Taiwanese are much more concerned about current events than those of 80 years ago. The anniversary comes at a time of increased tension across the Taiwan Strait.

Earlier this year, a new series, Zero Day Attack, depicted a future, fictionalized invasion of the island by the People’s Republic of China, and has since become hugely popular.

Its streaming launch date in Japan was August 15 – the 80th anniversary of the announcement of Japan’s surrender in World War II.

This article is based on a conversation between Meredith Oyen and Gemma Ware for The Conversation Weekly podcast. Subscribe to The Conversation Weekly podcast.

Meredith Oyen is an Associate Professor of History and Asian Studies at the University of Maryland in Baltimore County.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy of China Factor.