The assertion of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949 offered American overseas coverage officers with dilemmas: how you can take care of the communist govt at the mainland and what to do approximately Chiang Kai-shek’s holdout Nationalist regime on Taiwan. by means of early 1950 those questions have been urgent difficult upon U.S. civilian and armed forces planners and coverage makers, for it seemed that the crimson military used to be getting ready to invade the island. such a lot observers believed that not anything wanting American army intervention might avoid a communist victory on Taiwan. How U.S. officers grappled with the query of what to do approximately Taiwan is on the middle of this study.

Prior to the book of this ebook, a lot of the old literature in this severe interval in U.S. coverage towards China focused on the query of kin with the hot regime in Beijing. a spotlight on these debates has principally overshadowed the concomitant coverage debates that headquartered round the query of the way to accommodate the Nationalist regime on Taiwan. As this learn exhibits, the 2 matters have been inextricably associated and constructing a Taiwan coverage used to be no simpler or arguable. seriously knowledgeable by way of an research of declassified U.S. govt files and different fundamental assets, this background strongly means that had North Korea no longer invaded the south in June 1950 the U.S. do not have intervened to save lots of Chiang Kai-shek and Taiwan from near-certain invasion.

Beyond the narrative itself, this quantity is additionally a case research into the advanced and occasionally messy approaches through which overseas coverage is made. It explores the tensions that existed in the Truman management among the kingdom division and diverse newly-created entities reminiscent of the dep. of safeguard, the Joint Chiefs of employees, and the nationwide defense Council. certainly, the background of policymaking for China and Taiwan in 1949-50 can also be a case examine within the early improvement of the post-war interagency procedure. It additionally underscores the tensions among the administrative and Legislative branches within the improvement of international policy.

The examine additionally brings to gentle little-discussed and infrequently uncomfortable matters in Taiwan historical past, a few of which nonetheless have relevance to politics at the island even at the present time. those comprise the legacies of the japanese colonial event, the post-war Nationalist profession, and the early stirrings of the “Formosan” independence circulation, to call only a couple.

Today, U.S. coverage towards Taiwan continues to be a highly-charged and essentially divisive factor in U.S.-China kin — particularly the protection dimensions of that coverage. or even at the present time U.S. Taiwan coverage continues to be topic to partisan politics in Washington in addition to in Taipei. if you nonetheless grapple with this factor, this quantity offers the roots of the obstacle and crucial history reading.