First Taiwan Strait Crisis

The United States recognized Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang government as the sole legitimate government for all of China. On 5 January 1950, United States President Harry S. Truman issued a statement that the United States would not become involved in "the civil conflict in China" and would not provide military aid or advice to the Nationalist forces on Taiwan. As the Korean War broke out, the United States resumed military aid to the ROC and sent the US Navy's Seventh Fleet into the Taiwan Strait. On 27 June 1950, Truman issued the following statement: President Truman later ordered John Foster Dulles, the Foreign Policy Advisor to U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson, to carry out his decision on "neutralizing" Taiwan in drafting the Treaty of San Francisco of 1951 (the peace treaty with Japan), which excluded the participation of both the ROC and the PRC. Each self-claimed legitimate government of China was excluded from the treaty because the question of China's legitimate government remained unresolved after World War II and the Chinese Civil War, and this was considered an intractable sticking point in otherwise comprehensive and multilaterally beneficial peace negotiations. Japan ceded control of Taiwan in the treaty but did not specify a recipient for Taiwan's sovereignty. This situation has been used by supporters of Taiwan independence to argue for their position that the sovereignty status of Taiwan was undetermined, despite the Japanese having already agreed to return Taiwan to Republic of China through their Instrument of Surrender signed at end of the War. According to the author George H. Kerr, a supporter of Taiwanese independence, in his book Formosa Betrayed, the political status of Taiwan was under the trust of the Allied Powers (against Japan). It would be the responsibility of the United Nations if this could not be resolved in near future as designed in the peace treaty. The Government of the Republic of China (now based in Taiwan) maintained as its goal the recovery of control of mainland China, and this required a resumption of the military confrontation with the Red Chinese. Truman and his advisors regarded that goal as unrealizable, but regret over losing China to international communism was quite prominent in public opinion at the time, and the Truman Administration was criticized by anticommunists for preventing any attempt by Chiang Kai-shek's forces to liberate mainland China. Truman, a member of the Democratic Party, did not run for reelection in the presidential election of 1952, even though he was eligible to do so. This election was won by the Republican candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower, a General from World War II. On 2 February 1953, the new president lifted the Seventh Fleet's blockade in order to fulfill demands by anticommunists to "unleash Chiang Kai-shek" on mainland China, hence the Kuomintang regime strengthened its Closed Port Policy of the aerial and naval blockade on foreign vessels on Chinese coast and the high seas, whereas the privacy activities intensified in the summer 1953 after Joseph Stalin's death and the Korean Armistice Agreement till summed up to 141 interference incidents as per the Royal Navy escort reports. The CIA briefing on 13 July 1954 for the White House and NSC indicated the shipping insurance increase across the South China Sea after the Tuapse Incident on 23 June, and certain international liners being deterred midway at Singapore, or had to change plans. The PLA Air Force moved in the Hainan Island to clear another transport route through Yulin and Huangpu ports, but accidentally shot down a Douglas DC-4 (VR-HEU) airliner of the Cathay Pacific Airways with 10 deaths on 23 July, then 2 US aircraft carriers, Hornet and Philippine Sea arrived for a rescue mission on 26 July and shot down 2 PLAAF Lavochkin La-11 fighters . On 2 August, Commander of PLA in the Central Military Commission (CMC), Peng Dehuai convened an executive meeting to establish the tactical command on the East China Military Region as per CMC chairman Mao Zedong's directive to open another front from the north. ==Conflict==

aboard an LCM as ships at anchor await their arrival, 6 February 1955. In August 1954, the Nationalists placed 58,000 troops on Kinmen and 15,000 troops on Matsu. The ROC began building defensive structures and the PRC began shelling ROC installations on Kinmen. Zhou Enlai, PRC premier responded with a declaration on 11 August 1954, that Taiwan must be "liberated". He dispatched the People's Liberation Army (PLA) to the area, and it began shelling both Kinmen and the Matsu Islands. Despite warnings from the U.S. against any attacks on the Republic of China, five days before the signing of the Manila pact, the PLA unleashed a heavy artillery bombardment of Kinmen on 3 September, during which two American military advisers were killed. Mao Zedong sought to avoid United States involvement in the conflict and gave repeated orders that the PLA should avoid engaging with the American forces off the coast. During the crisis, Eisenhower threatened to use nuclear weapons against PRC military targets in Fujian. On 6 March, Eisenhower also reaffirmed his willingness to use nuclear weapons. In response, the NATO foreign ministers warned at a meeting of the alliance against such action. In late March, U.S. Admiral Robert B. Carney said that Eisenhower is planning "to destroy Red China's military potential." At the April 1955 Bandung Conference, China articulated its Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and Premier Zhou Enlai publicly stated, "[T]he Chinese people do not want to have a war with the United States. The Chinese government is willing to sit down to discuss the question of relaxing tension in the Far East, and especially the question of relaxing tension in the Taiwan area." A month later, Mao likewise told Indonesian Prime Minister Ali Sastroamidjojo that all problems, including the status of Taiwan, could be resolved through negotiation. The crisis de-escalated, and the United States and China began ambassadorial-level discussions in Geneva on 1 August 1955. Two years of negotiations with the United States followed, and covered many issues, although no agreement was reached on the primary issue, Taiwan. ==Aftermath==

Some scholars hypothesized the PRC backed down in the face of American nuclear brinksmanship and in light of the lack of willingness by the Soviet Union to threaten nuclear retaliation for an attack on the PRC. Others see the case as an example of effective application of extended deterrence by the United States. On 1 May the PLA temporarily ceased shelling Kinmen and Matsu. The fundamental issues of the conflict remained unresolved, however, and both sides subsequently built up their military forces on their respective sides of the Taiwan Strait leading to a new crisis three years later. Eisenhower's threats to use nuclear weapons during the crisis prompted Mao to begin China's nuclear program. The first of China's nuclear weapons tests took place in 1964 and its first successful hydrogen bomb test occurred in 1967. ==See also==