Taiwan Today

With Dec. 7 the 60th anniversary of the ROC government’s relocation to Taiwan, the Academia Historica is presenting an exhibition of late President Chiang Kai-shek’s 1949 diary. The special exhibition, “Critical 1949: President Chiang Kai-shek’s Resignation and Return,” is running in conjunction with a documentary using material from microfilms of Chiang’s diary. Produced by CtiTV Inc. at the commission of the Academia Historica, the film will be shown at the academy and on CtiTV. The microfilms are in the care of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in the United States, where readers are only allowed to make handwritten copies. Their display in the exhibition and documentary is thus especially valuable. The documentary, entitled “Life or Death: the Republic of China in 1949,” covers changes in Chiang’s frame of mind and political decision making in the period from the end of 1948 to early 1950. The film crew took a year going back and forth between mainland China, the U.S. and Taiwan, consulting the diary and drawing on the Academia Historica’s files in Daxi, Taoyuan County, as well as on films in the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Lin Tung-fa, professor of history at Fu Jen Catholic University, says in the documentary that although Chiang used his Jan. 1, 1949 New Year’s Day address to announce that if peace could be achieved, he would not be reluctant to give up the presidency, his diary entry for that evening says, “The enormity of the failures and ignominy of the past year has never been surpassed.” At 10 a.m. Jan. 21 of that year he resigned for the third time. Lin said Chiang’s retaining leadership of the Kuomintang after resigning as president allowed him to continue to govern through party control of the government. On Oct. 1, 1949 the People’s Republic of China was established; nine days later, the ROC on Taiwan celebrated its National Day in Taipei, and on Dec. 7 the government resumed its duties. From that point on, the ROC on Taiwan began its 60 years of governing after being defeated in the Chinese Civil War. The exhibition also displays coded telegrams from before and after Chiang’s resignation between the president and his wife Song Mei-ling, better known in the West as Madame Chiang Kai-shek. The Academia Historica holds roughly 65 telegrams from the period, most from late 1948 when Song was on tour in the U.S. to rally support for the ROC and exchanging telegrams with Chiang, who was temporarily residing in his hometown of Fenghua, Zhejiang province. As the political situation at the time was becoming ever more difficult, in several telegrams Song urged Chiang to retire to Canada to observe developments. Chiang refused to consider this course of action, maintaining that he had to take responsibility, and decided to remain in China. The Academia Historica will convene a conference Dec. 7 and 8 on “The 60th Anniversary of the Government’s Relocation to Taiwan.” Excerpts from the documentary film will be shown at 9 a.m. Dec. 7. The special exhibition also encompasses other historical material from Chiang’s diaries, including the peace talks between the Kuomintang and Chinese Communist Party. (THN)