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Various voices, especially from [[Kagoshima prefecture]], pushed for a military expedition to be sent to Taiwan to exact retribution against the aborigines for killing Japanese subjects. US Resident Minister in Japan [[Charles DeLong]] and former US consul in [[Amoy]] [[Charles LeGendre]] assured the Meiji oligarchs that under Western systems of international law, the Chinese had surrendered any claims of sovereignty in those aboriginal regions, and that Taiwan (or at least parts of it) was thus ''terra nullius'' and free for the taking.  

Various voices, especially from [[Kagoshima prefecture]], pushed for a military expedition to be sent to Taiwan to exact retribution against the aborigines for killing Japanese subjects. US Resident Minister in Japan [[Charles DeLong]] and former US consul in [[Amoy]] [[Charles LeGendre]] assured the Meiji oligarchs that under Western systems of international law, the Chinese had surrendered any claims of sovereignty in those aboriginal regions, and that Taiwan (or at least parts of it) was thus ''terra nullius'' and free for the taking.  

Tokyo decided to organize a military expedition in February [[1874]], and the expedition was launched in May of that year.

Tokyo decided to organize a military expedition in February [[1874]], and the expedition was launched in May of that year. The expedition was largely unsuccessful, with many soldiers dying of tropical disease. The survivors returned, however, with the bodies (or at least the skulls) of many of the original Miyako Islander victims, providing them a proper burial in Wakasa. The burials were later moved in [[1898]] to the Buddhist temple of [[Gokoku-ji (Okinawa)|Gokoku-ji]], where a monument was erected in their memory. The inscription on the monument was written by Governor of [[Okinawa Prefecture]], [[Narahara Shigeru]].

==References==

==References==

*Uemura Hideaki. "The Colonial Annexation of Okinawa and the Logic of International Law: The Formation of an 'Indigenous People' in East Asia." ''Japanese Studies'' 23:2 (2003). pp107-124.

*Uemura Hideaki. "The Colonial Annexation of Okinawa and the Logic of International Law: The Formation of an 'Indigenous People' in East Asia." ''Japanese Studies'' 23:2 (2003). pp107-124.

*Jordan Walker, "Archipelagic Ambiguities: The Demarcation of Modern Japan, 1868-1879," ''Island Studies Journal'' 10:2 (2015), 214.

*Jordan Walker, "Archipelagic Ambiguities: The Demarcation of Modern Japan, 1868-1879," ''Island Studies Journal'' 10:2 (2015), 214.

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