I feel like I read somewhere that when the KMT arrived in Taiwan, they started sending timber, coal, and other resources to the fighters on the mainland, a part of which meant tearing up some of the railways to send the metal to China. Did I make that up?
While I’m more aware of Chinese/Japanese history than the average schmoe, I have no clue about this one.
So, here’s your free bump.
I actually found quite a lot in George Kerr’s “Formosa Betrayed.” They apparently did take everything from copper wiring to garbage trucks and send it back to the mainland.
hmmm, I’m no expert on this but when I lived in Taiwan in the 1980’s, ancedotally this was never in the list of grievences the native Taiwanese highlighted.
the big greviences were around 288 incident, discrimination, language, etc
Yeah, it isn’t one of the main grievances. I don’t get the impression that it happened for very long. It seems to be something that happened immediately and for a relatively short period. One thing that did happen at the same time which is still very much a grievance of the native Taiwanese are the assets the Nationalists seized and kept.