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Taiwan: Islands
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Taiwan was one of the last frontier regions of China to be settled by the Chinese, and foreigners first made the island well known. Portuguese sailors passing it in the late 1500s thought the island was so beautiful that they called it Ilha Formosa (Beautiful Island). The name Formosa became popular for the island among foreigners, but it is no longer widely used.
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As Taiwan is a subtropical island with the south part in the tropics, it cannot hurt to drink a lot, especially during summertime. Drink vending machines can be found virtually everywhere and are filled with all kinds of juices, tea and coffee drinks, soy milk and mineral water.
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Taiwan lies on the western edge of the Pacific "rim of fire," and continuous tectonic movements have created majestic peaks, rolling hills and plains, basins, coastlines, and other wonders. Taiwan sees climates of many types: tropical, sub-tropical, and temperate, providing clear differentiation between the different seasons. There are about 18,400 species of wildlife on the island, with more than 20% belonging to rare or endangered species; among these are the land-locked salmon, Taiwan mountain goat, Formosan rock monkey, Formosan black bear, blue magpie, Mikado pheasant, Hsuehshan grass lizard, and many more.
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The earliest Chinese settlements on Taiwan began in the 7th cent., chiefly from the mainland provinces of Fujian and Guangdong. The island was reached in 1590 by the Portuguese, who named it Formosa [=beautiful]. In 1624 the Dutch founded forts in the south at present Tainan, while the Spanish established bases in the north. The Dutch... succeeded in expelling the Spaniards in 1641 and assumed control of the entire island. They in turn were forced to abandon Taiwan in 1662, when Koxinga, a general of the Ming dynasty of China who had to flee from the Manchus, seized the island and established an independent kingdom. However, the island fell to the Manchus in 1683.
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Taiwan does not possess nuclear weapons. Under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek, the island built its first nuclear reactor at National Tsinghua University in 1956. The PRC conducted its first nuclear test in October 1964, and the island began its own covert nuclear weapons program under the direction of the Institute of Nuclear Energy Research (INER) and the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology. The "Hsin Chu" program, code-named after the city where Taiwan's first nuclear reactor was located, involved procurement and operation of a heavy water reactor, a heavy water production plant, a reprocessing research laboratory, and a plutonium separation plant. The United States convinced Taiwan to give up its nuclear weapons program in 1978.
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From the mid-1660s to 1895, Taiwan was administered by the imperial Chinese government, after which (until 1945) the island was ruled by the Japanese as a colony. In 1945 Taiwan reverted to China, and in 1949 it became the last territory controlled by the Nationalist government. The government of the ROC has continued to claim jurisdiction over the Chinese mainland, whereas the government of the People's Republic of China on the mainland claims jurisdiction over Taiwan; both governments are in agreement that the island is a sheng (province) of China. Taipei—since 1949 designated by the ROC as the provisional capital of the Republic of China—was the provincial capital until 1967, when the capital was moved to Chung-hsing Hsin-ts'un.
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