The Ryukyu Islands were historically independent kingdom but paid tributes to dynastic China until they were seized by the Japanese. After WW2, in the unconditional surrender of Japan, the Allied Powers officially declared that Japan consisted of the 4 main islands of Honshu, Kyushu, Shikoku and Hokkaido. All the islands south of these four islands were to return to their previous owners, ie from the Ryukyu Islands down through Taiwan to the islands in the South China Sea.
The Americans held the administrative rights of the Ryukyu Islands but unilaterally handed this right, not sovereignty to the Japanese in 1972 without the consent of the other 3 signatoriess. Japan does not own the Ryukyu Islands. The natives of the Ryukyus and also of Hokkaido were not ethnically Japanese. Hokkaido natives, the Ainus, were more like eastern Russians. The Ryukyuans were more like Chinese, with many migrated from Fujian Province. Their culture and way of life were more Chinese than Japanese until they were all forced to adopt Japanese name, culture and language. It was cultural genocide in both Hokkaido and the Ryukyus, just like the cultural genocide of North American natives to Christianity and to use the American language.
The Japanese, under the protective umbrella of the American Empire, continue to rule the Ryukyuans quietly and thinking that this fait accompli would soon become normal, and the Ryukyuans would become Japanese, taking Japanese name and Japanese culture. Nobody would remember that there Ryukyuans like there were Red Indians in America. But the Ryukyuans refused to be assimilated and continue to practice their own culture, retaining their language and names as a second name.
During the post war occupation of Ryukyus, China was in a way nonexistence in international relations, struggling to rebuild a war torn country and also isolated by the American Empire. China was inward looking, to solve its own domestic problems of survival and to rebuild a new nation. The last thing China wants to do is to be involved in any external conflicts or wars. So the issue of Ryukyu independence and the interests of the Ryukyuans were fully under the domination and control of the Japanese and the Americans. The whole world turned a blind eye to the fate of the Ryukyuans. The Europeans with their share interests with the Americans, would not say a word for the Ryukyuans. The Asian and SE Asian countries were engrossed in independence movements and then the rebuilding of their newly independent countries. No one has any time to want to know what is happening to the Ryukyuans.
The Americans and the Japanese have a sort of honeymoon period in their rules over the Ryukyuans, too weak and small in numbers to fight back, to be noticed by the world. But the fire of nationalism is still simmering among the Ryukyuan community. They are bidding for their time to regain independence from the Japanese, to be free people again and to have their own country and culture.
The four signatories of the surrender documents of Japan to the Allied Forces must get together to address the issue of Ryukyu Independence. The surrender documents reinforced the principle that no country can seize legal control of foreign land by force. Caveat, colonisation by white men is legal. Legally, ethically, morally, they owe it to the Ryukyuan people the right to be an independent nation state. They must reconvene a meeting to give the Ryukyuans justice and freedom and free them from Japanese Occupation and cultural genocide.
The issue of Ryukyuan independence must be raised in the UN, to recognise the state of Ryukyu. All the legal issues are clear and straightforward. The Ryukyu Islands did not belong to Japan. The administrative right of the islands must be returned to the Ryukyuan people. The UN must recognise the state of Ryukyu. If the Americans and Japanese refuse to do justice to the people of Ryukyu, China and Russia must step forward to fight for the independence of Ryukyu Islands.
The Americans and their gangster allies have been using the same playbook to demonise and attack China by raising the issues of human rights, democracy, Xinjiang, Tibet and Taiwan in every meeting, in every talks, in every international forum. China from now on must use the same playbook to raise the issue of Ryukyu independence in every meeting, talks and international forum. China and the Global South countries must raise their concern about the rights and independence of the Ryukuans. Period. Oops, also the rights of the Ainus.
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