Prosecution of US Military in Taiwan

Yesterday I posted an index page with links to the on-line, declassified CINCPAC history files. These are all documents that were requested by the Nautilus Group under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and there is enough material to keep any history junkie busy for a very long time.

Back in November, 2007, I wrote a series of pieces about the events leading up to the complete withdrawal of US Forces from Taiwan. Most of that information came from another declassified CINCPAC document that I had requested, and one of my postings mentioned the disposition of two military personnel and two dependents who were incarcerated in ROC prisons during the withdrawal.

John Quinn alerted me to a section of the 1971 CINCPAC history that discusses the prosecution of six US military members for crimes committed in Taiwan. You can find detailed accounts of those cases in the 1971 CINCPAC History file, beginning on page 571 and ending on page 576. When you open the document, you'll see two boxes at the top of your Adobe Reader that read "1/756" which means that you're viewing page 1 of 756 total pages in the document. Replace the 1 with 603 and you'll go directly to the printed page 571. You can scroll down from there.

What I found most interesting in all this was on page 607 (575). It states that three individuals named Eaton, Baio and Tipton were the first US military personnel ever incarcerated in Taiwan. I assume that prior to these cases, individuals were tried in military courts and were returned to the States, sentenced to military confinement, or both.