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Accidental State - Chiang Kai-shek, the United States, and the Making of Taiwan (Hardcover)
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Accidental State - Chiang Kai-shek, the United States, and the Making of Taiwan (Hardcover)
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The existence of two Chinese states-one controlling mainland China,
the other controlling the island of Taiwan-is often understood as a
seemingly inevitable outcome of the Chinese civil war. Defeated by
Mao Zedong, Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists fled to Taiwan to
establish a rival state, thereby creating the "Two Chinas" dilemma
that vexes international diplomacy to this day. Accidental State
challenges this conventional narrative to offer a new perspective
on the founding of modern Taiwan. Hsiao-ting Lin marshals extensive
research in recently declassified archives to show that the
creation of a Taiwanese state in the early 1950s owed more to
serendipity than careful geostrategic planning. It was the
cumulative outcome of ad hoc half-measures and imperfect
compromises, particularly when it came to the Nationalists' often
contentious relationship with the United States. Taiwan's political
status was fraught from the start. The island had been formally
ceded to Japan after the First Sino-Japanese War, and during World
War II the Allies promised Chiang that Taiwan would revert to
Chinese rule after Japan's defeat. But as the Chinese civil war
turned against the Nationalists, U.S. policymakers reassessed the
wisdom of backing Chiang. The idea of placing Taiwan under United
Nations trusteeship gained traction. Cold War realities, and the
fear of Taiwan falling into Communist hands, led Washington to
recalibrate U.S. policy. Yet American support of a Taiwan-based
Republic of China remained ambivalent, and Taiwan had to eke out a
place for itself in international affairs as a de facto, if not
fully sovereign, state.
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