Retrocession Day

Governmental positions

The official position of both the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) is that Taiwan and Penghu were returned to the Republic of China according to the terms of the 1945 Japanese Instrument of Surrender, which stipulated Japan's compliance with the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. The Potsdam Declaration in turn included the terms of the Cairo Declaration, which required Japan to return all conquered territories to China, including Taiwan and the Pescadores.^[7]

The ROC clarified its understanding of the Cairo Declaration in 2014 as a legally binding instrument.^[8] Among other things, the clarification listed later treaties and documents that "reaffirmed" aspects of the Cairo Declaration as legally binding, including the Potsdam Proclamation, the Japanese Instrument of Surrender, the Treaty of San Francisco, and the Treaty of Taipei:

The post-war status and jurisdiction over Taiwan and its appertaining islands, including Penghu, was resolved through a series of legal instruments—the Cairo Declaration, the Potsdam Proclamation, the Japanese Instrument of Surrender, the San Francisco Peace Treaty, and the Treaty of Peace between the Republic of China and Japan of 1952. The implementation of the legal obligation to return Taiwan and its appertaining islands (including the Diaoyutai Islands) to the ROC was first stipulated in the Cairo Declaration, and later reaffirmed in the Potsdam Proclamation, the Japanese Instrument of Surrender, the San Francisco Peace Treaty, and the Treaty of Peace between the Republic of China and Japan. The Cairo Declaration is therefore a legally binding instrument with treaty status.

In November 1950, the United States Department of State announced that no formal act restoring sovereignty over Formosa and the Pescadores to China had yet occurred;^[9] British officials reiterated this viewpoint in 1955, saying that "The Chinese Nationalists began a military occupation of Formosa and the Pescadores in 1945. However, these areas were under Japanese sovereignty until 1952" and that

[Cairo Declaration] was couched in the form of a statement of intention, and as it was merely a statement of intention, it is merely binding in so far as it states the intent at that time, and therefore it cannot by itself transfer sovereignty.^[10]

In March 1961, in a meeting of the House of Councillors of Japan, a councillor of the Japanese Communist Party brought up the notion that Taiwan had been returned to China according to the Cairo Declaration, Potsdam Proclamation, and Japanese Instrument of Surrender. The then-Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs responded that:

It was specified in Potsdam Proclamation that the articles in Cairo Declaration shall be carried out, and in accordance with Japanese Instrument of Surrender we announced that we would comply with Potsdam Proclamation. However, the so-called Japanese Instrument of Surrender possesses the nature of armistice and does not possess the nature of territorial disposition.^[11]

In April 1971, the U.S. Department of State spokesman stated in a press release that the US government regarded the status of Taiwan as unsettled, and that Cairo Declaration was a statement of purpose of the Allies and was never formally implemented or executed.^[12]

As late as December 2014, the US government still considered Taiwan's status an unsettled issue.^[13]

Other positions

• Supporters of the Taiwan independence movement have argued that Taiwanese retrocession was invalid since there is no precedent in international law in which an instrument of surrender effected a transfer of sovereignty, and they base their belief in part on both a declassified CIA report from March 1949 confirming that Taiwan was not a part of the Republic of China^[14] and President Truman's 27 June 1950 statement regarding Taiwan's "undetermined status", which they hold as proof of the leading Allies' views. In a lengthy legal essay published in Tokyo in 1972, Chairman Ng Chiau-tong, World United Formosans for Independence, analyzed the British Parliamentary records and other documents before concluding that the political status of Taiwan was undetermined.^[15]
• Taiwanese historian Jim Lee [zh] claims the following: After World War II ended, officials of the Republic of China traveled to Taiwan to accept the surrender of Japanese forces on behalf of the Allies. Although they claimed that it was "Taiwan Retrocession", it was actually a provisional military occupation and was not a transfer of territories of Taiwan and Penghu. A transfer of territory requires a conclusion of an international treaty in order to be valid. But before the government of the Republic of China was able to conclude a treaty with Japan, it was overthrown by the Chinese Communist Party and fled its territory. Consequently, that contributed to the controversy of the "Undetermined Status of Taiwan" and the controversy over "Taiwan Retrocession".^[16]
• The Democratic Progressive Party, which rejects the idea of Taiwan being taken back by China, downplayed the event during its two presidencies.^[17][18]
• Because the Republic of China officials who accepted the surrenders of Japanese Forces in 1945 were all representatives of the Allies of World War II,^[19] there are opinions that Japanese forces on Taiwan actually surrendered to the Allies, not to the Republic of China, and therefore the so-called "Taiwan Retrocession Day" is merely "Surrenders of Japanese Forces to the Allies Day", which marked the beginning of military occupation and was not a retrocession. The opinions further believe that "Taiwan Retrocession" is a misleading term.^{[20][21][22][23]}
• Writing in the American Journal of International Law in July 2000, Jonathan I. Charney and J. R. V. Prescott maintained that the Chinese Nationalists (ROC) began a military occupation of Taiwan in 1945 as a result of Japan's surrender,^[24] and that none of the post–World War II peace treaties explicitly ceded sovereignty over Formosa and the Pescadores to any specific state or government.^[25]