Taiwan Today

Japan's policy toward China, as indicated by the utterances of Japanese officials prior to, during and after the Sino-Japanese negotiations in Taipei for the conclusion of a bilateral peace treaty, has been characterized by a vacillating tendency which must have proved quite confusing and puzzling to both the Japanese people and the rest of the world. One Japanese official had no sooner declared that Japan would recognize only the National Government in Taiwan as the legitimate government of China than another would say something diametrically opposite to it. In fact, strange as it may seem, the same official sometimes expressed entirely conflicting views on different occasions. These unusual phenomena, which are something very seldom encountered in international dealings, clearly indicate the inability of the Japanese Government to make up its mind once and for all as to what policy it should pursue toward the Chinese National Government. This is the factor, we believe, which was responsible for Japan's tardiness in entering into negotiations with Free China for the conclusion of a bilateral treaty after the signing of the multilateral peace treaty in San Francisco as well as the ever-changing attitude displayed by the Japanese Government in the course of the negotiations held in Taipei. Obviously it is the same factor which has delayed the Diet's ratification of the Sino-Japanese peace treaty signed on April 28. Eventually this treaty will be ratified by the Diet - at least we hope so. However, even after its ratification, it cannot really be conducive to Sino-Japanese friendship and cooperation if Japanese officials keep on arguing back and forth among themselves whether the National Government is a local regime or the legitimate government of the Republic of China as a whole although the exercise of its authority is temporarily restricted to Taiwan, the Pescadores, and a few other islands along the coast. Mr. Masayoshi Kakitsubo, chief of the Foreign Office information and cultural affairs bureau, told foreign pressmen in Tokyo on June 24 that "the-Nationalist Government is the legitimate government of China" and Japan's "position toward China is substantially similar to that of the United States government." Has Kakitsubo said the last wore for Japan? It is high time that the Japanese Government makes up its mind on this vital issue.