A few days ago, two television stations — CTITV and CTV — broadcast a historical documentary, Revenge for the 228 Incident: The Rise and Fall of the 21st Division (二 二 八泯恩仇 — 二 十 一師興亡錄), a joint production of the two stations and the China Times (中國時報) newspaper.
The program asserts that, when Shanghai was surrounded by Communist forces toward the end of the Chinese Civil War, the 21st Division of the Nationalist Army — the division that a couple of years earlier had suppressed the 228 Incident in Taiwan — was annihilated by Taiwanese units of the Communist People’s Liberation Army (PLA). It goes on to conclude that the score for the 228 Incident was settled on the Bund in Shanghai all those years ago. The concept and conclusions of the program are rather far-fetched, so much so that it was hard to watch it through to the end.
Former Taiwanese soldiers interviewed in the documentary are presented as witnesses to the settling of scores. In reality, the trials and tribulations of these old men exemplify the experience of Taiwanese caught up in the turmoil of history and unable to decide their own fate.
Toward the end of Japanese rule in Taiwan, some young Taiwanese men served in the Japanese army and went to fight China. Others joined the Nationalist army after World War II and fought the Communists. When they lost in battle and were taken prisoner, they were transformed into soldiers of the PLA and started fighting against the Nationalist government’s army instead. In 1950, some of them were even sent to Korea to fight the Americans. Many Taiwanese who stayed in China went on to suffer in the tragedy of the 1960s Cultural Revolution. Through the fickle twists and turns of history, they changed identities many times in the space of just a few years. Unable to take their fate in their own hands, they were perhaps no longer sure who they were or what they were fighting for.
This TV documentary is based on — or maybe we should say lifted from — Hua I-wen’s (花逸文) book Taiwanese Soldiers in the Chinese Civil War (國共內戰中的台灣兵), published by Babylon Books in 1991, which gives an account of “these people who were abandoned by the Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT], mistrusted by the Chinese Communist Party and forgotten by Taiwan.”
They have indeed been forgotten by Taiwan for a long time, but now they have become a focus of attention because of the appearance in this documentary of an elderly former soldier, Dai Guoting (戴國汀), who talks briefly about how angry he felt when he heard about the 228 Incident.
These few words were made into the pivotal point of the documentary. As the saying goes, you can make nine bowls of soup with just one clam. The documentary picks up on Dai’s words and stretches them to say that Taiwanese soldiers who served in the 70th and 62nd divisions of the communist army took revenge by annihilating the 21st Division of the Nationalist army, and concludes that as the score for the 228 Incident has been settled, there is no need for antagonism between different groups in Taiwan.
The program is an attempt to sow confusion and shift attention away from the real issues.
First, in seeking the truth about the incident, relatives of 228 Incident victims and Taiwanese in general do not seek revenge, still less do they demand an eye for an eye. They do not wish to hunt down all those members of the 21st Division who carried out the suppression under orders. Rather, they demand that the KMT government accept responsibility.
Second, most surviving relatives of 228 victims are magnanimous people and are willing to forgive. Taiwanese in general also hope for reconciliation. The condition, however, is that the party that perpetrated the repression should admit what it did wrong and sincerely remedy its ills. Take for instance President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who shed tears in memory of 228, but who also seeks to reinstate the name of the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall (中正紀念堂). Can this attitude contribute to reconciliation?
Third, the search for the truth about the 228 Incident has nothing to do with inter-community antagonism. It was the KMT government under Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) that sent troops to suppress the upsising on 228. The KMT does not equal the Mainlander community. In fact, the vast majority of Mainlanders who came to Taiwan did not arrive until 1949 and had probably never even heard of the 228 Incident.
Fourth, there were indeed Taiwanese soldiers in the Communist army when it wiped out a division of the Nationalist army during the Chinese Civil War, but to conclude that Taiwanese soldiers got their revenge by annihilating the 21st Division is a ridiculous interpretation of history.
The 228 Incident remains a topic of dispute in Taiwan. We need to work it out among ourselves and heal the wounds. To suggest instead that the Chinese army taught the KMT a lesson and got revenge for the 228 Incident on behalf of Taiwanese is absurd.
Chen Tsui-lien is an associate professor in the Graduate Institute of History at National Chengchi University.
TRANSLATED BY JULIAN CLEGG
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