This is a 2-part series. Part 1 covers events that led to the separation of Taiwan from China and both countries claiming themselves to be the ‘real’ China. Part 2 explores the reasons behind the current tension between the two countries.
In the 19th century, the modern-day China, Mongolia & Taiwan were parts of the territory ruled by the Qing dynasty, which went to war with Japan in 1894.
This Sino-Japanese war was primarily fought in Taiwan & KoreaKorea at the time was supported & protected by China, so despite being separate it was dependent upon China. and after winning the war, Japan added Taiwan & Korea to its territories.
Declining in power, the Qing dynasty was eventually overthrown in 1912, and the Republic of China was established.
Sun Yat-sen became the provisional President but had to give the position to Yuan Shikai because Yuan had the military power.
Yuan Shikai became greedy and overruling the democratic elections, declared himself the new emperor of China.
After Yuan’s death, the country was divided among former military groups (different regions were ruled by different military heads); this period was termed as the Warlord Era.
Sun Yat-sen, who had fled to Japan under Yuan’s rule came back to China, revived his political party Kuomintang and wanted to unite the country but didn’t have the military power.
So, he sought help from the Soviet Union, who agreed but asked Kuomintang to form an alliance with the much smaller Chinese Communist Party.
The Warlord Era soon came to an end but the alliance between Kuomintang (National party) and the Communist party began falling apart after the death of Sun Yat-sen in 1925.
The rift became violent and thousands of communists were massacred; this led to the Chinese civil war that started with the founding of the red army with Mao Zedong as the Commander-in-Chief.
Japan used this civil war as an opportunity to invade China; to fight-off Japan in 1937 collectively, Kuomintang & communist parties called a temporary truce & came together.
Then in 1939, WWII began in which the Chinese parties fought against Japan as one unit.
Japan lost WWII in 1945 and was asked by allies (US, Soviet Union, UK, etc.) to return all the lands it had acquired through warfare, including Korea and Taiwan that it had acquired from the Qing dynasty in 1895.
In 1946, China was back at fighting the civil war, which the communists won in 1949; to save themselves, the Kuomintang rulers, officers, and 2 million troops fled to Taiwan.
Since the nationalist party was the ruling party in China then, and Taiwan was officially a part of China, they claimed themselves to be legitimate China.
The communist party, on the other hand, declared mainland China to be the People’s Republic of China and claimed it to be official China.
