History of the Ryūkyū Islands
This article deals with the history of the Ryūkyū Islands , which today are sometimes collectively referred to as Okinawa .
Prehistory
Only prehistoric finds such as the Yamashita caveman dating back to 32,000 BC BC, provide some information about the cultures of the Ryūkyū Islands at that time. Up until now, the finds of prehistoric rubbish heaps dated between 2000 and 500 years before Christ indicated two different cultures. Excavations in 1963 also revealed contacts to the Yayoi culture of mainland Japan. On the further south-west of the island groups Miyako and Yaeyama, however, no evidence of any contact with the Yayoi or the Jōmon culture has been found. Neolithic cultures were predominant until around 1000 AD, in some parts even into the 14th century .
1000–1600 The Ryūkyū of the sovereigns / First Golden Age
The way of life of the Ryūkyū inhabitants became more and more complex. From the year 1000 AD, a hierarchical social system developed and, as a result, social differentiation. The inhabitants became more and more specialized in their skills. For the first time there was contact with Japan. A political and military competition broke out between the various communities, which was led by the regional rulers ("Aji").
Shunten Aji (1166-1237) emerged successfully from this competition and was the first ruler to be able to use his superiority to reach an agreement with other Ryūkyū rulers. In the 14th century, King Satto (1321–95) established diplomatic relations with Korea, Japan and China; first tribute and trade missions were sent to China. Knowledge and culture were exchanged between the countries. B. the sanshin (cf. Shamisen ), a guitar-like musical instrument, was brought to Okinawa and from there later found distribution in Japan. King Shō Hashi (1372–1439) completely united the kingdom of Ryūkyū around 1429 and founded the first Shō dynasty. King Shō Shin (1477-1526) of the second Shō dynasty, which lasted until 1879, disarmed the local warlords. He forced her to live in the capital, Shuri. The administration of the local regions was now taken over by official officials.
In the middle of the 16th century, the catchment area of the Kingdom of Ryūkyū extended over all four main island groups. A social class system developed that resulted in the fact that many residents of the Ryūkyū Islands continued to live in poverty. At the same time the kingdom was reinforced by a standing army.
1609–1879 Ryūkyū under Chinese and Japanese influence
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Until the 16th century, the small kingdom of Ryūkyū was largely independent of Japan and China. The 15th and 16th centuries are considered the Golden Age. In Japan the rulers were engaged in power struggles. China, on the other hand, followed a policy of semi-isolation and was content with regular symbolic tribute missions. The Ryūkyū Kingdom achieved considerable prosperity due to its favorable trading position between Japan and China. Cultural achievements such as B. Karate , the popularity of which has been increased by gun bans, are a sign of this.
But the Satsuma invasion in 1609 marked the end of independence. The enemy, who had firearms ( arquebuses ), had nothing to oppose the Ryūkyū kingdom's armed forces of just 3,000 men and was overrun in just ten days. The northern island group of Amami came under the direct control of the daimyo of Satsuma , while the rest of the time they settled for tax payments. The Ryūkyū government was apparently maintained, so that the Chinese embassies did not notice the changed situation. The dual dependence on China and Japan not only plunged Ryūkyū into an economic crisis, but also led to political and moral confusion.
The Ryūkyū Kingdom was never occupied by the Chinese at any point in history. Nevertheless, there was a considerable influence of Chinese culture at this time, because 36 Chinese families who moved to Okinawa as part of an embassy of the Ming dynasty , ensured extensive knowledge transfer to the residents of Ryūkyūs. One of these envoys was the martial arts expert Kushanku, who is considered to be the link between the Chinese styles and the Okinawan tōde ( Kempo ).
Under the reformers Shō Jōken, Gima Shinjō and Sai On, Ryūkyū was revived during the 17th and 18th centuries. Necessary social, economic and political reforms were carried out. The first Ryūkyū dictionary was written in 1711. With the help of sweet potatoes ("Satsuma potatoes") it was possible to prevent famine. At the same time, sugar cane production became an important economic factor on the islands. Contacts with the West also increased in the 19th century. In 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry landed in Okinawa and set up a coal station. In 1876, Emperor Wilhelm I had a memorial erected on Miyako in gratitude for the rescue of the crew of the wrecked Hamburg schooner RJ Robertson , thus laying the foundation for a direct relationship between Ryūkyū and Germany . Overall, however, the islands did not arouse any substantial interest from the Western powers, despite their strategically favorable location until the Second World War .
With the Reformation of the Japanese nation-state in 1868 and the rapid development in the following decades, the demands of Japan to a complete colonization or integration of Ryūkyū increased. In 1871 the kingdom was only incorporated into the newly founded Kagoshima prefecture and dissolved by decree in 1872 and the Han Ryūkyū was established, although a year earlier all Han had been abolished in Japan in favor of the newly founded prefectures. However, Ryūkyū's relations with China stood in the way of these ambitions. In 1874 the Japanese expedition to Taiwan took place, a retaliatory action which was preceded by a massacre of 54 stranded Ryūkyū fishermen by natives of Taiwan. The expedition planned to invade Taiwan was not very successful as the army was decimated by disease. However, it led to the recognition of Japanese rule over the Ryūkyū Islands by the Chinese Qing Dynasty .
In 1879 the Han was finally dissolved and the Okinawa Prefecture established, the liege lord or former king Ryūkyūs was finally dethroned, while China was awarded the Yaeyama and Miyako archipelagos near Taiwan. This agreement became obsolete due to the victory of the Japanese in the Sino-Japanese War in 1894/95 and these two island groups were also incorporated into the new prefecture. With a policy of assimilation, the Ryūkyū Islands were incorporated into the Japanese nation-state. This was achieved with the spread of Japanese culture and language. The main instrument was the introduction of compulsory schooling.
In the further development of world history, Okinawa does not appear again until the end of World War II. The Battle of Okinawa began on April 1, 1945 and was the only land battle on Japanese territory. In a battle lasting about three months, 12,500 Americans and an estimated 250,000 Japanese soldiers and residents of Ryūkyū lost their lives. The infrastructure was completely destroyed. As the high casualty figures show, neither the Japanese nor the American side showed much consideration for the civilian population. After the end of the war, the United States set up its second largest naval and air force base in East Asia on Okinawa .
1945–1972: Ryūkyū under US occupation
After the war, Okinawa was left as a political orphan. Initially, all areas south of the 29th parallel fell under a US military government. Although the peace treaty of San Francisco of September 8, 1951, the Japanese assured a certain residual sovereignty (a so-called "residual sovereignity") over the Ryūkyū Islands, the Americans retained actual control. In connection with the peace treaty, large parts of the local population accused of a trade as a result of which the Ryūkyū Islands were ceded to the USA and Japan was given independence in return.
The residents of the Ryūkyū Islands were not included in these decisions. Despite a clear majority in supporters of reintegration into the mainland, the Americans pursued their own strategic interests. The US government saw the stationing of troops in Okinawa as a top priority, as the geostrategic location of the Ryūkyū Islands became more and more important in the future political competition of the world. Okinawa served as an important military base for trouble spots in the region, such as the Korean or Vietnam War. The close proximity to Taiwan ( 90 km from the Yonaguni Island of the Yaeyama Archipelago ) certainly increases the strategic importance.
A civil government ( United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands , USCAR) was established with a Deputy Governor (Deputy Governor), later a High Commissioner (High Commissioner) at the head, who was directly appointed by the American government. However, the military on Okinawa always had priority over civil needs and desires, which was in contrast to the democratization of the Ryūkyū Islands propagated by the Americans. However, through skillful negotiation, some concessions could be wrested from the occupiers. For example, in 1950 the Okinawa Advisory Council, founded in 1945, gave rise to the Guntō governments for one group of islands, which were then finally absorbed into the elected government of the Ryūkyū Islands ( Government of the Ryukyu Islands , GRI), which, however, was excluded from important decisions . USCAR's style of government initially caused considerable public resentment. The necessary military bases required substantial land seizures, which were wrested from the owners by force of arms. After a long struggle by the Ryūkyū government, after a long struggle by the Ryūkyū government, a planned one-off payment to the landowners became a periodic payment from November 3, 1958, which increased over time, but is now borne by the Japanese state.
In 1953, the Amami archipelago, which is closest to the main Japanese islands, was returned to Japan as a "Christmas present". This created considerable problems for the residents of Amamis, who commuted to work on the nearby main island of Okinawa , since they had become Japanese since the time the Amamis were returned and therefore had to endure arduous entry processes.
From 1958 onwards, the USCAR's style of government gradually weakened. In 1969, Satō Eisaku and Richard Nixon agreed , also due to ongoing protests from the population, on the reintegration of the American Ryūkyū zone into the Japanese state in 1972. The agreement included an assurance of the continued existence of the US bases and payments from the Japanese government for their maintenance as well as secret agreements about the stationing of nuclear weapons in Okinawa.
To this day, the population of the Ryūkyū Islands has suffered from a relatively poor economic situation and the great burden of the US bases, which are located in the very densely populated area of Okinawa. As a legacy of Japanese-Ryuku history since 1609, the relationship between the Ryūkyū Islands and the main Japanese islands is considered to be heavily burdened. This begins with the Satsuma invasion in 1609, the forced incorporation into the Japanese nation-state in 1879, the US-Japanese agreements at the end of the occupation, which were viewed as treason, through to the continued presence of military forces on Okinawa.
US troops are also stationed in large numbers. In recent years, there has been increasing pressure on the USA to withdraw its troops immediately and completely from the Ryukyu Islands after various scandals of rape of women and girls and murders by members of the US armed forces broke out in Okinawa. Despite considerable resistance from the local population, there is no sign that the Japanese or American sides are prepared to put their own interests behind those of Okinawa.
Tabular overview of the events
| 32,000 BC Chr. | Yamashita caveman |
| 2000 BC Chr. - until birth Chr. |
Development of two different cultures, contacts to the Japanese Yayoi culture |
| 1000 | Specialization, social differentiation |
| 1166-1237 | Ruler Shunten Aji ; unites sovereigns |
| 1321-1395 | King Satto |
| 1372-1439 | King Shō Hashi ; Complete unification of the kingdom |
| 1477-1526 | King Shō Shin ; Disarming the local warlords; Beginning of the second Shō dynasty , which lasted until 1879 |
| from the 16th century | First golden age |
| 1609 | Satsuma Invasion; Dependence on Japan |
| 17th century | Second golden age |
| 1874 | Taiwan expedition to Japan |
| 1879 | Dethroning of the king; Establishment of Okinawa Prefecture |
| 1909 | Establishment of an elected prefectural parliament (in the rest of Japan 1878) |
| 1912 | Okinawa's first participation in elections to the Japanese House of Representatives (rest of Japan 1890) |
| 1921 | Introduction of modern churches (in the rest of Japan 1889) |
| 1945 | Battle of Okinawa ; US military administration begins |
| 1951 | San Francisco Treaty |
| 1952 | Establishment of the Rippōin , the legislature of the US Ryūkyū Islands |
| 1953 | Return of the Amami archipelago to Japan (to Kagoshima) |
| 1968 | First direct election of the civilian governor: the socialist Yara Chōbyō wins. |
| 1969 | US-Japanese agreement on a return to Japanese sovereignty by 1972 |
| 1970 | Election of a representative of Okinawa in the Japanese parliament |
| 1971 | Signing and ratifying the return agreement |
| 1972 | Return of Okinawa Prefecture to Japan |
| 1978 | Reset Okinawa traffic to left-hand traffic |
literature
- George H. Kerr: Okinawa - The History of an Island People . Tuttle Publishing, Boston 2000.
- Josef Kreiner (ed.): Ryûkyû in World History (= Japan Archive. Vol. 2). Bier'sche Verlags-Anstalt, Bonn 2001, ISBN 3-9806179-7-1 .