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Cairo Declaration has
limitations
By Gerrit van der Wees
Dec. 1 marked the 70th anniversary of the Cairo Declaration, that was issued
after the November 1943 summit by then-US president Franklin Roosevelt,
then-British prime minister Winston Churchill and Chiang Kai-shek (½±¤¶¥Û).
The commemoration gave rise to a conference in Taipei titled ¡§The Cairo
Declaration 70th anniversary exhibition and international symposium,¡¨ and
prompted a number of statements and declarations by officials from China and
Taiwan, including President Ma Ying-jeou (°¨^¤E).
Many of these commentaries tried to imply that the Cairo Declaration was a legal
basis for the ¡§return¡¨ of Taiwan ¡X then referred to as Formosa ¡X to Chiang¡¦s
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), while People¡¦s Republic of China (PRC)
spokesmen attempted to use the document to justify China¡¦s claim to Taiwan, and
engaged in some Japan-bashing along the way.
Therefore, it is necessary to clearly understand the nature and the legal status
of the Cairo Declaration: what it is, and what it is not.
First, it was a ¡§declaration of intent¡¨ by the allied leaders. It has no legal
status beyond being a press release at the end of the meeting, and in the
archives of the US Department of State, it is classified as such. Also, it was
not signed by the leaders present, and does not have executive agreement or
treaty status.
It was nevertheless an important document, as it signified the intentions of the
allied leaders after the war. It was also referred to in the Potsdam Declaration
of Aug. 1, 1945, when then-US president Harry Truman, Churchill and then-Soviet
leader Joseph Stalin agreed: ¡§The terms of the Cairo Declaration shall be
carried out and Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu,
Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine¡¨ (Annex II,
article B.8).
However, what actually happened is quite different from the ¡§intent¡¨ of both
Cairo and Potsdam. One month later, on Sept. 2, 1945, US general Douglas
McArthur issued General Order No. 1, designed to formalize the surrender of
Japanese troops, and it was decided, inter alia, that the Japanese troops on
Formosa would surrender to Chiang, who would temporarily occupy the island on
behalf of the Allied forces.
Following McArthur¡¦s instructions, then-Japanese governor-general Rikichi Ando
signed the surrender document with Republic of China (ROC) general Chen Yi (³¯»ö)
in Taipei on Oct. 25, 1945. However, as subsequent statements by the US from
1945 through 1952 clearly indicated, this did not in any way, implicitly or
explicitly, signify a transfer of sovereignty. That was an issue which would be
dealt with in a formal peace treaty.
This peace treaty came seven years later, in the form of the San Francisco Peace
Treaty of 1951-1952, in which Japan formally ceded sovereignty over Taiwan and
the Pescadores. However, it was not decided to whom this sovereignty was ceded.
We may recall that this was the time during which many countries in Asia and
Africa gained their independence, and it was certainly the intention of those
who signed the San Francisco Peace Treaty that the views of the Taiwanese needed
to be taken into account.
The British delegate stated: ¡§In due course, a solution must be found in accord
with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations.¡¨
The Egyptian delegate stated: ¡§The reason behind not specifying the recipient is
to afford the opportunity to take into consideration the principle of
self-determination and the expressed desire of the inhabitants of Taiwan.¡¨
The French delegate stated: ¡§Taiwan¡¦s legal status must be determined one of
these days, taking the wishes of the Formosan population into consideration.¡¨
However, the harsh reality was that during the ¡§temporary occupation¡¨ of
1945-1952, Chiang¡¦s regime had started to harshly repress the local population
(the 228 Massacre of 1947), and in 1949, the Nationalists had had to flee China
to escape the communist onslaught. The following decades thus saw very little
possibility to take the wishes of the Formosan population into account. On the
contrary, Taiwan suffered under 38 years of martial law.
During the following decades, Chiang¡¦s pretense of representing China of course
became increasingly untenable, which led to the ouster of his representatives
from the UN in 1971, and the break of relations with the US in 1979.
Taiwan¡¦s transition to democracy during the late 1980s and early 1990s provided
the first opportunity for Taiwanese to voice their views on their future. The
main conclusions are that they want to remain a free and democratic nation, and
that they want to join the international community as a full and equal member.
To return to the arguments laid out in the beginning of this essay: Trying to
use the Cairo Declaration to either imply it was a ¡§legal¡¨ basis for Chiang¡¦s
occupation of Taiwan, or to claim that it justifies the PRC¡¦s claim to Taiwan
simply does not hold water. The historical facts prove otherwise.
Gerrit van der Wees is editor of Taiwan Communique, based in Washington.
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