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213 The United States has been an integral element of the Taiwan Strait equation from the time that North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950. For the next two decades, American military power and a mutual defense treaty with Taiwan deterred any PRC attempt at a takeover. Through economic assistance and policy guidance, Washington facilitated Taiwan’s rapid economic growth and emergence as a middle-class society. U.S. diplomacy protected the position of the Republic of China in the international system.And Beijing drew the obvious conclusion: that the United States had obstructed its goal of unifying China after a century of disorder and division. That configuration changed after 1969, when first the Nixon and then the Carter administration decided that China would be a useful counterweight against a rising Soviet Union. To secure this strategic asset, Nixon and Carter chose to concede somewhat to PRC demands and reduce America’s commitment to Taiwan. That reduction, which was carried out in 1979 and affected diplomatic relations and security ties, had more to do with form than substance . The United States continued robust yet unofficial relations with Taipei, including close security cooperation.1 As a matter of policy rather than a treaty obligation, it continued the U.S. defense commitment to the island, including selected arms sales.2 Washington’s working assumption, both before and after 1979, was that neither China nor Taiwan was likely to change the status quo in the Taiwan Strait. To be sure, either or both tested that premise from time to time.3 Chiang Kai-shek and Chiang Ching-kuo hatched illusory schemes to “retake the Mainland,” but Washington restricted their freedom of action. Mao 10 Policy Implications for the United States 214 Policy Implications for the United States Zedong twice attacked the offshore islands that Taiwan controlled to test American and ROC resolve, but he met a firm response and backed down. After the United States terminated diplomatic relations with Taipei in 1979 in favor of Beijing, there were new questions about the durability of the status quo. Some Americans believed that the island’s absorption into the PRC was only a matter of time, but the policies of the Reagan administration negated those expectations. With the opening of cross-Strait business relations in the 1980s, the prospect of political reconciliation appeared vaguely on the horizon but vanished like a mirage in less than a decade. At least until the early 1990s, two factors fortified Washington’s status-quo assumption. First, Taipei’s rhetorical goal—the unification of China—did not conflict fundamentally with Beijing’s, although the two governments disagreed on just about everything else. Second, neither China under Mao and Deng Xiaoping nor Taiwan under the Chiangs had enough military strength on its own to end the division of China through force. Of course, Chinese observers believe that the cross-Strait status quo is not just the policy assumption of the United States but also its goal. In the Chinese narrative, American intervention in the protracted Chinese civil war is the key obstacle to ending national division. “By inserting itself and meddling in the Taiwan issue, the United States inflicts severe harm on China’s core interests, and there is no other instance in contemporary international relations where one large nation so severely inserts itself and meddles in the internal affairs of another large nation.”4 America’s purported“scheming designs” began in the 1950s and took a new form after the end of the cold war. In Beijing ’s view, Washington supported both Lee Teng-hui and Chen Shui-bian in separatist adventures. Most offensive to China are U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. In December 20008, Hu Jintao reiterated the long-standing PRC position: “Settling the Taiwan question and realizing the complete reunification of the country is an internal affair of China and is not subject to interference by any foreign forces.”5 For decades, the goal of Chinese policy—at least rhetorically—has been to reduce and end the U.S.-Taiwan relationship. In fact, the sole emphasis of all American administrations since the 1950s has been on the process by which the dispute between China and Taiwan might be resolved. It is an “abiding interest” of the United States that Beijing and Taipei resolve their differences peacefully, without violence or coercion,6 and Washington has long held that the content of any agreement is a matter for Beijing and Taipei to work out for themselves. Washington also has...

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