Nuclear Weapons in the Taiwan Strait Part II

ABSTRACT

During the Taiwan Strait Crisis, which began in the fall of 1954 and ended in the fall of 1958, US President Dwight Eisenhower prepared to attack the People’s Republic of China (PRC) with nuclear weapons to protect the government of Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan. This new examination of the crisis, which includes consideration of documentation from PRC and Soviet archives, demonstrates US threats to attack the PRC with nuclear weapons were not necessary to deter military escalation and were not effective in deterring PRC leaders from pursuing their objectives. Instead of dividing these events into a first and second crisis, this study ties together the earlier and later periods of military activity with the US-PRC negotiations that took place in between. Including the negotiations reveals the greatest danger of US nuclear use was in the spring of 1955 before Eisenhower understood the cause of the crisis. It also demonstrates it was Eisenhower’s willingness to negotiate with the PRC, and not US preparations for nuclear use, which he withdrew during the second period of military activity in 1958, that allowed Eisenhower to avoid military escalation and resolve the crisis.

KEYWORDS:

• Taiwan Strait crisis
• nuclear weapons
• nuclear deterrence
• nuclear diplomacy
• nuclear escalation
• nuclear war

Introduction

This two-part review of the Taiwan Strait Crisis provides a detailed and in-depth look at the historical record from the beginning of the crisis in the fall of 1954 to the end of the crisis in 1958. Part I, published in the same issue of J-PAND, begins with a broad review of the history of the Cold War in Asia from the immediate post-war period through the Korean War to the 1954 Geneva Conference. That is followed by a granular account of what is commonly referred to as the “First Taiwan Strait Crisis” during the fall of 1954 and the spring of 1955. A final section describes the US-PRC negotiations that followed. Part II, below, picks up the history with a step-by-step account of the period covered by the so-called “Second Taiwan Strait Crisis” in the fall of 1958. The paper closes with conclusions about the efficacy of US threats to use tactical nuclear weapons, suggestions for US decision-makers on how to handle the next Taiwan Strait Crisis and encouraging lessons for advocates of nuclear arms control and disarmament.

Military Options Reconsidered

On 29 July 1958, the PRC shot down two ROC aircraft on what the ROC called a “routine patrol” over the PRC-held Dongshan islands. The ROC conducted thousands of flights over the mainland after Zhou Enlai’s speech in Bandung shifted the focus of the offshore islands crisis from military to diplomatic solutions. The PRC occasionally interdicted those flights, but this incident led US Ambassador to the ROC Everett Drumright to warn Dulles the loss of the aircraft “worsened an already tense situation” in Taipei¹. The ROC government, Drumright said, was “uneasy” about “mass mainland demonstrations” and the “shuttling of aircraft between Manchuria and Southeast China.” The ROC defense minister warned there was a possibility some elements in the ROC government might try to take things in their own hands and bomb PRC airfields as an emergency self-defense measure (FRUS 1958–1960, 20).

Keeping a lid on ROC military activity was a constant US concern. Chiang frequently complained about the talks with the PRC and did everything he could to undermine them. More important, Chiang ignored Eisenhower’s advice and stationed more than 100,000 troops on the offshore islands. The chief of US naval operations in the Pacific told Eisenhower, “This had been done deliberately and in fact made Taiwan a hostage.” Secretary of Defense Donald Quarles argued, “Chiang’s policy in this regard was designed to put pressure on us.” Eisenhower “expressed some annoyance over what he considered to be Chiang’s pressure to get us involved.” The ROC president’s most persuasive argument in defense of his behavior had been that holding the islands was essential to maintaining the belief that his government would soon return to the mainland and vital to the survival of his government (FRUS 1958–1960, 52). However, Eisenhower was beginning to question Chiang’s reasoning.

The Joint Chiefs, which took a look at the available intelligence on August 2, saw “no evidence of a Chinese Communist build up or other military moves” (FRUS, 1958–1960, 23). They reached this conclusion with full knowledge of all the PRC preparations that were just starting in spring 1955; the construction of airfields, road, and railroads were now near completion. But at a National Security Council meeting on August 7, Dulles’ brother Allen, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, reported things were “heating up” in the Taiwan Strait. PRC fighter planes were filling hitherto unoccupied bases on the mainland opposite Jinmen. Eisenhower reminded everyone attending that the United States “had no warrant” to defend the offshore islands unless what they were seeing was a prelude to an attack on Taiwan (FRUS 1958–1960, 26).

Dulles met with Quarles the next day and told the secretary of defense that “unlike the situation in late 1954 the offshore Islands were now sufficiently integrated with Taiwan and a sufficiently large proportion of GRC troops were stationed on the Islands.” Because of this, Dulles felt “an attack on the Offshore Islands would now constitute an attack on Formosa itself” (FRUS 1958–1960, 28). Eisenhower disagreed and on August 12 told Dulles that taking the islands would not help the PRC take Taiwan (FRUS 1958–1960, 31). Two days later, he told the NSC there is “no strategic value to the offshore islands;” he reminded the members, “[W]e decided against committing ourselves to the offshore islands” in 1953. Eisenhower warned, “[W]e should be very careful” and “not take instantaneous action” that might widen the conflict (FRUS 1958–1960, 33).

Renewed Debates about the US Use of Nuclear Weapons

Despite Eisenhower’s statements, the Joint Chiefs and Undersecretary of State Robertson continued to push for a presidential commitment to defend the islands. On August 15, Acting Secretary of State Christian Herter called a meeting with the chiefs to discuss the situation. Everyone attending from State agreed with the chiefs that the “loss of these islands would inevitably lead to attacks on Taiwan.” Moreover, the chiefs argued, turning back a direct assault or defeating a long blockade “would require nuclear bombing of mainland bases” (FRUS 1958–1960, 34).

On August 15, after the initial discussion with the chiefs, Herter recommended they inform the Soviets the United States “would prevent the seizure or successful interdiction of the islands.” But as other voices in the administration began to weigh in, pressure abated for preparing to make the US position on the offshore islands clear, and therefore for preparing nuclear contingencies to assure the United States could deliver on that commitment. Assistant Secretary of State for Policy Planning Gerald Smith, who would later be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his work as the chief US delegate to the Strategic Arms Limitation talks with the Soviet Union, argued that the Department of Defense should reexamine options to defend the islands with nonnuclear options. If the chiefs persisted in the view this was not possible, then defending the islands was not worth the risk. Smith argued that the United States should persuade Chiang to withdraw and that the consequences of withdrawal for Taiwan and US credibility in Asia would not be as cataclysmic as others assumed (FRUS 1958–1960, 63).

As planning for nuclear use proceeded over the next several weeks, JCS Chair General Nathan Twining told Dulles that he planned to limit the initial attack to five coastal airbases and would use “7–10 kiloton airburst bombs” that would create “virtually no fallout.” This would destroy the planes and the ground facilities, leaving the runways usable². If that did not stop the PRC, Twining felt the administration “would have to face up to the possibility of having to conduct nuclear attacks deep into China as far north as Shanghai involving Communist nuclear retaliation against our positions in Taiwan, Okinawa and perhaps elsewhere” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

On August 23, Allen Dulles informed his brother that the PRC had “subjected the islands to extremely heavy bombardment.” The Secretary of State’s immediate reaction was to reach out to “the good offices of some acceptable third power” or the UN Security Council to find “the basis for a peaceful modus vivendi.” He later told Acting Secretary Herder the case for holding the islands was not “altogether defensible” since Chiang was using them “as an active base for attempting to ferment civil strife and to carry out widespread propaganda” (FRUS 1958–1960, 41). He then left for a weeklong vacation cruise on Lake Ontario.

The next day Eisenhower called a meeting at the White House to discuss the situation. First, Allen Dulles briefed the meeting on the latest intelligence, which indicated the extremely heavy shelling was a one-day event. Herder thought the United States needed to clarify why the offshore islands were important. Eisenhower put it plainly: “Our involvement with these islands would be for one reason and one reason alone, namely, to sustain the morale of the ROC which had deliberately committed major forces to their defense contrary to our 1954 advice” (FRUS 1958–1960, 43).

Twining then submitted a new draft of the operational directive he intended to give the US Taiwan Defense Command, including a paragraph on the possible use of nuclear weapons. By this time, however, Eisenhower was beginning to evidence serious doubts about the importance of the islands and had increasing reservations about the potential costs of defending them. The president approved the draft but directed the language be revised to make clear that “the matter must be brought back to him again for decision before any such use” (FRUS 1958–1960, 43). On August 29, at a second White House meeting, the language relating to “atomic strikes if ordered” was stripped out of the directive altogether (FRUS 1958–1960, 52).

Later that day, the chiefs cabled the commander in chief of the Pacific to inform him that even if the PRC launched an assault to take the offshore islands, “it is anticipated that atomic weapons would not be used.” Only “when, in the opinion of the United States authorities, the ChiComs have extended the battle to international waters in the vicinity of Taiwan and the Penghus” would the United States “extend action as appropriate.” The cable emphasized that atomic weapons could not be used “until specific authority had been obtained from the President” (FRUS 1958–1960, 53).

Despite Eisenhower’s decision not to use nuclear weapons to hold the offshore islands, Twining continued to press the point. In a September 2 meeting with the chiefs, Dulles asked Twining how he planned to respond if the PRC launched an all-out assault. Twining said they would have to “strike at Communist shore batteries and airfields with small atomic weapons.” He claimed “all the studies carried out by Defense indicated this was the only way to do the job.” His remark followed an observation by Admiral Burke that “our experience in attacking Japanese-held islands in the Pacific in World War II indicates the 85,000 defenders of Jinmen could put up a determined resistance.” The three men reached a consensus that “it was not necessary to have the authority to use nuclear immediately after the commencement of a major attack,” but that “it would be necessary to do so ultimately against a determined enemy” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

Dulles then inquired about a second scenario in which the PRC started “massive shelling” that “threatened to result in a breakdown of the morale of the ROC defenders.” General Maxwell Taylor said that experience in Korea suggested “physical elimination of the gun emplacements could be effected only by nuclear fire,” although US forces could “severely harass” the defenders with conventional fire and napalm. The group then considered a third scenario in which the PRC started a heavy bombing campaign. In this situation, Taylor said, “nuclear weapons would certainly have to be used” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

The conversation then turned to the justification for using nuclear weapons and risking a global nuclear war to hold the offshore islands. Burke said that what was at stake was not just “the loss of some small islands but rather the possible loss of a whole nation.” Dulles agreed, commenting that “nothing seems to be worth a world war until you look hard at the effect of not standing up to each challenge as it is posed.” Burke then proclaimed, “[T]he argument that nothing is worth a world war was the reason why the Communists had been winning all along” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

Dulles mentioned that the US Ambassador to Japan had warned that “if the U.S. initiated the use of nuclear weapons in defense of the offshore islands, the Japanese government might be forced to demand the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Japan.” Dulles then asked, “[I]f anticipated reactions against our use of nuclear weapons were to be so hostile that we would be inhibited from using them … was our reliance on their use correct and productive.” Burke dismissed the opposition in Japan as “inspired by the Communists in order to deter us.” He said it was confined to “leftist labor elements” and “did not reflect the thinking of the government of Japan,” which would eventually “come to realize our action was in their best interest.” If the United States was unwilling to use nuclear weapons, he believed, “we faced the prospect of losing the whole world in ten years.” Twining opined the use of nuclear bombs in Korea would have shortened the war and saved lives. He “did not understand the public horror at the idea of using nuclear weapons and insisted we must get used to the idea” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

Two days later, Smith wrote to Dulles. He argued, “If we use nuclear weapons, our intervention may force Japan, the Philippines and other Asian nations further in the direction of neutralism and eventual accommodation with Peiping.” He characterized a summary on the consequences from the chiefs as “too light a treatment.” Smith told Dulles that the current national intelligent estimate concluded, “If the US used nuclear weapons in meeting local Bloc aggression in the Far East there would be a grave risk the Communists would retaliate in kind.” If the nuclear bombing expanded, as planned, to the cities of Shanghai, Nanjing and Guangzhou, “Peiping and its Soviet ally would probably feel compelled to react with nuclear attacks at least on Taiwan and the Seventh Fleet.” Smith felt they would then be faced with the choice of accepting defeat or “launching SAC in large scale nuclear attacks” that would “very probably lead to general war with the USSR” (FRUS 1958–1960, 63).

The PRC’s Nuclear Calculus

About a month after opening the door to a negotiated settlement at the Bandung Conference in spring 1955, Premier Zhou Enlai explained PRC thinking about the liberation of the offshore islands. In a letter to the Soviet Embassy, Zhou wrote that he saw a chance for a diplomatic solution:

But realistically, before we complete the construction of roads and airfields in Fujian, before we complete the deployment of our forces, while we’re still unable to capture even one or two of the tiny islands in the vicinity, the armed forces of the United States and Chiang Kai-shek are not going to leave Jinmen and Mazu (Shen 2012).

By January 1958, the roads and airfields were ready; the Fujian regional commander put together a plan to bring airplanes into Fujian and prepare for a military campaign to recover Jinmen and Mazu. He hoped artillery bombardment and naval engagement would affect a blockade of the islands. Fighter aircraft would protect the mainland and there would be no engagement in international waters or with US forces (Xu 92). The idea was to compel Chiang to withdraw with the fewest casualties possible.

The PRC leadership approved the plan in early March. The final decision on timing would be left to Mao (Shen 2012).

In early July, a PRC intelligence estimate concluded the United States did not believe the PRC would attempt to liberate Taiwan and would therefore indefinitely avoid holding serious discussions about the Taiwan issue. Progress at the Geneva talks stalled after Life magazine published Dulles’ incendiary comments on nuclear brinkmanship in January 1956 and declined precipitously after the United States downgraded its representation. PRC leaders hoped resuming military pressure on Chiang might get the United States to force Chiang to abandon the offshore islands and negotiate on Taiwan in earnest. When fighting erupted in the Middle East on July 15, Mao decided to set in motion the plan for a military campaign against the offshore islands (Shen 2012).

Mao used Khrushchev’s visit to Beijing in early August 1958 to send a message to the United States about the strength of the Sino-Soviet alliance, but he neglected to tell the Soviet premier he was about to launch a military campaign against the offshore islands. Khrushchev was understandably upset when it started without forewarning not long after he returned home. More important, Khrushchev was alarmed by renewed international concern that the conflict over the offshore islands could lead to nuclear war (Shen 2012).

Khrushchev sent Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko to Beijing on September 5 to inquire about Beijing’s intentions. He was instructed to discuss a letter Khrushchev was preparing to send to Eisenhower. Gromyko met separately with Zhou and Mao the next day, and both Chinese leaders told him the PRC had no intention of occupying the offshore islands or liberating Taiwan. Zhou released a public statement the same day indicating the PRC was willing to return to the negotiating table (Chou 1958). All three agreed on the strategy of using military tension to pressure Chiang and the Americans to withdraw voluntarily, while taking care to avoid US casualties or any military activity outside of the immediate area around Jinmen island (Shen 2012).

Gromyko then brought up the question of Soviet nuclear protection.

Unlike spring 1955, when Eisenhower, Nixon, and Dulles all publicly threatened to use US nuclear weapons against the PRC, Eisenhower did not do so in 1958, despite considerable pressure from both State and Defense to make the necessary preparations and authorize the weapons’ use. However, Eisenhower’s restraint did not stop the United States and the international press from discussing the threat of US nuclear use in stories about the renewal of military activity in the offshore islands.

Mao cryptically told Gromyko that China’s strategy in the event of a US invasion was to “lock the gate and beat the dog.” They would draw US forces into central China and then defeat them. It was a strategy they believed succeeded in the war of resistance against Japan and the Chinese civil war against Chiang’s nationalists. It is unclear if Mao actually believed the United States would attack China or if he was speaking rhetorically. Gromyko took Mao seriously and questioned whether that would work in the nuclear era. Mao reportedly replied, “What’s to be afraid of with the atomic bomb? We don’t have it but will in the future. And though we don’t have it, you do” (Shen 2012).

Mao’s dismissal of the possibility was in keeping with his general view that nuclear weapons were a “paper tiger.” But Gromyko interpreted this to mean the PRC expected Soviet nuclear protection in the form of attacks against US troops if they invaded China.

Gromyko’s aide, though, recalled no PRC expectation of Soviet nuclear protection. The PRC translator remembered Mao saying:

Our policy is to take the complete responsibility for such a conflict ourselves. We don’t need you to get involved. We’re not like the Nationalists. We won’t drag the Soviet Union underwater. War with the Americans is something for the future, not a problem in the immediate present. We’re not going to be attacking Taiwan, please tell that to Khrushchev (Shen 2012).

The next day, Zhou met with Gromyko before he returned to the Soviet Union. The PRC premier told Gromyko the leadership had considered the possibility of a regional war with the United States that might involve the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Chinese cities. If that happened, there was no PRC expectation the Soviet Union would get involved. Only if the United States used larger nuclear weapons and threatened to widen the war should the Soviet Union use its nuclear weapons to give the United States a punitive retaliatory strike (Shen 2012).

Three weeks later, on September 27, the Soviet Central Committee wrote to the PRC Central Committee, thanking PRC leaders for not expecting them to enter the war. The committee also warned the PRC leadership the Soviet Union could not sit on the sidelines if China were attacked:

The Soviet Union possesses terrifying weapons that can not only prevent a war, but can annihilate our common enemy. If the Soviet Union did not help if China suffered a nuclear attack, this would be a great catastrophe for the entire Socialist bloc. We can say, an attack on China would be an attack on the Soviet Union (Shen 2012).

That is exactly what Khrushchev had written in his telegram to Eisenhower three weeks earlier, on September 7:

An attack on the Chinese People’s Republic, which is a great friend, ally and neighbor of our country, is an attack on the Soviet Union. True to its duty our country will do everything in order together with People’s China to defend the security of both states, in interests of peace in the Far East, the interest of peace in the world. Nothing would be further from the truth than an attempt to assess this, my message to you, as an intention to exaggerate unnecessarily and even more to utter some kind of threats (FRUS 1958–1960, 73).

Khrushchev was more explicit in a second telegram, sent on September 19:

Those who nurture plans for an atomic attack on the PRC should not forget that not only the USA but the other side as well possesses atomic and hydrogen weapons and also the appropriate means for their delivery, and if such an attack is made on the PRC, the aggressor will immediately receive a proper repulse with these very means (FRUS, 1958–1960, 110).

The PRC leadership was gratified by this level of Soviet support but it did not last long. Several months later, in part because of reservations about Mao’s decisions during the Taiwan Strait Crisis, Khrushchev halted all Soviet aid to the PRC nuclear and missile technology programs.

The End of Crisis and the Aftermath

US threats to use nuclear weapons did not intimidate the PRC leadership or prevent it from pursuing any of its objectives. But US conventional military support for ROC forces on the offshore islands played a decisive role in finally bringing this four-year episode in US-China relations to a close. The Eisenhower administration ordered the US Navy to help resupply the offshore islands after the renewed heavy PRC shelling severed ROC supply lines in fall 1958. The success of this effort discouraged the PRC leadership, which was not seeking a wider military conflict, especially with the Americans, from continuing to use the offshore islands to create a crisis atmosphere.

Vice Admiral Roland Smoot, commander of US forces in Taiwan, concluded, “Containment of the Taiwan emergency is largely attributed to immediate reaction by the US in positioning of forces.” PRC archives indicate he was right. When it became clear that the US Navy had taught the ROC how to indefinitely resupply the offshore islands, and that PRC attempts to affect a blockade had failed, the PRC dialed back the shelling and announced a unilateral ceasefire (Shen 2012).

Smoot also concluded, “The US reaction very likely deterred the ChiComs from invading one or more of the off-shore islands.” However, PRC archives demonstrate that Smoot was mistaken on this point. At no time did the PRC leadership intend to invade Jinmen or Mazu. Its hope, from the initiation of the PRC military campaign against the two islands in winter 1955 until the abatement of the crisis in fall 1958, was to combine military pressure and international diplomacy to persuade the United States to convince the ROC to withdraw (Shen 2012).

Eisenhower tried but failed to give the PRC precisely what it was hoping for, but Chiang refused to withdraw from the offshore islands. Eisenhower was willing to risk a nuclear war in March 1955 because he believed what Chiang, ROC officials, the US Embassy in Taipei, and the Asia experts at State and Defense were telling him: the loss of the offshore islands would lead to the loss of Taiwan and a loss of faith in the United States throughout Asia. But by fall 1958, Eisenhower had come to question that hypothesis and pushed Chiang to take other steps to stabilize the situation.

On September 29, after confirming the resupply problem had been solved, Eisenhower told JCS Chair General Twining, “[S]omething must be done to make Chiang more flexible in his approach.” An increasingly frustrated president told Twining he “did not like to wage a fight on the ground of someone else’s choosing.” Twining said he would “get some thinking started in the Pentagon as to what could be done with Chiang to get him out of the offshore islands” (FRUS 1958–1960, 140). Eight days later, Eisenhower sent a memo to Dulles suggesting they offer Chiang “an amphibious capability that could lift in one load fifteen or twenty thousand troops” in exchange for an agreement to “remove all or nearly all his garrison from the offshore islands.” Eisenhower reasoned Chiang “could sell both himself and his people on the proposition that by this action he would have increased his strength and his position in the area” (FRUS 1958–1960, 166).

Admiral Smoot echoed Eisenhower’s concerns about Chiang in a mid-October telegram to Vice Admiral Frederick Kivette, commander of the Seventh Fleet:

As I look back over the tension created by artillery bombardment of Jinmen two facts become clear to me. First the resupply problem was in fact never a problem. The panic was created not by the military but by the ROC using the incident to involve the US in their never to die hope of returning to the mainland (FRUS 1958–1960, 187).

Dulles prepared a set of talking points intended to persuade Chiang that maintaining the illusion he could recover the mainland through provocative rhetoric and military harassment of the PRC was a losing strategy. He also offered Chiang an alternative course of action that would protect and strengthen his political legitimacy.

Dulles traveled to Taipei to present the US case to Chiang in person, making four key points:

1. The great danger faced by the ROC is not primarily military, but political. It stems from the world’s longing for conditions of peace and the feeling of almost all free world countries that the relationship between ROC and PRC not only endangers the peace, but that the ROC wants it to endanger the peace.

2. The international political situation today is serious as regards the ROC. Except perhaps for the Republics of Korea and Vietnam, the USA is the only vigorous supporter of the ROC …. It is doubtful whether even the US can long protect the ROC under present circumstances.

3. Free world opinion … wants to see a liquidation of the “civil war” which carries with it the risk of general war.

4. It devolves upon the ROC, and the US, in consultation with it, to find a reply to these dangers, just as we have found a reply to the direct military threats. Such a reply exists, and is, we believe, to be found in a fresh approach to the mission of the ROC as spokesman for Free China (FRUS 1958–1960, 196).

Chiang’s initial reaction was not encouraging. His antipathy toward abandoning the civil war was reinforced by a resumption of PRC shelling after several weeks of relative quiet (FRUS (Foreign Relations of the United States) 1958–1960, 196). Chiang told Dulles his visit provoked the shelling and they should focus their discussion on the use of military means to stop the shelling once and for all. Dulles responded by telling Chiang “he knew of no one in the US military establishment who believed that conventional weapons could be used to knock out deeply emplaced guns. Only nuclear guns could do that job effectively.”

Chiang asked whether tactical nuclear weapons would be sufficient. Dulles told him, “[T]here is no tactical atomic weapon in existence which could be used at Jinmen to knock out enemy gun emplacements that would not have the power of the Hiroshima or Nagasaki bombs. The use of such a weapon at Jinmen would kill millions of people.” Chiang responded by saying he “is not an expert of nuclear physics” and did not “have an appreciation of the effect of fall-out and other aspects of nuclear bombing,” but something must be done to protect his troops on the island. He warned Dulles that if the United States had no viable options, he might be forced to bomb mainland positions himself (FRUS 1958–1960, 204).

Yet, in a joint communique issued two days later, Chiang did exactly what Dulles had asked. He committed the ROC to a new policy where “the principle means of successfully achieving its mission” of “restoring freedom to its people on the mainland” was to become “the authentic spokesman for Free China” and “not the use of force” (FRUS 1958–1960, 209). The following day Eisenhower cabled Chiang to commend him.

I consider it important that your Government should have declared that its success in restoring freedom to the Mainland Chinese depends principally upon the minds and hearts of the Chinese people, and not the use by your Government of force. This free-world principle, not accepted by the Communists, sets us apart from them and morally above them. Your enunciation of that principle will, I am confident, be welcomed throughout the free world (FRUS 1958–1960, 212).

It was. Eisenhower cabled Chiang several weeks later with the evidence. He wrote, “I assure you that reports we have received from capitals around the world are most encouraging and indicate that the communique has met with an almost uniformly favorable response” (FRUS 1958–1960, 237).

Chiang’s agreement to renounce the use of force to recover the mainland ended the offshore island crisis that had begun in September 1954. Eisenhower denied the ROC permission to resume reconnaissance flights over the mainland. He refused requests to resume US naval patrols “which come within the falsely claimed Communist twelve mile limit” (FRUS 1958–1960, 230). Despite considerable resistance from US and ROC officials who were critical of what they described as “a policy of complete non-provocation,” the chief of US naval operations cabled the commander of the Pacific Fleet to report that Eisenhower’s “firm but unprovocative stand is beginning to pay off with gain in public support for the way situation has been handled” (FRUS 1958–1960, 235).

Dulles believed the administration had “initiated a definitive and important reshaping” of ROC policy that put the Republic of China in same category as other countries divided by communism (FRUS 1958–1960, 215). Eisenhower told Twining he believed another “emergency requiring immediate automatic action will not happen” (FRUS 1958–1960, 219). A Special National Intelligence Estimate on “Probable Developments in the Taiwan Strait Crisis” concluded, “Peiping’s leaders are using military power primarily as a political weapon, and that they are not committed to the immediate capture of the islands at all costs” (FRUS 1958–1960, 220).

The PRC continued periodic shelling of the offshore islands until the day it formally established diplomatic relations with the United States in 1979. But the shelling never regenerated a crisis atmosphere or the attendant international concern it might lead to a nuclear war. The ROC still controls the offshore islands of Jinmen and Mazu.

Conclusions from the Past

The historical record presented here, as described in US, PRC and Soviet archives, supports five conclusions about the US threat to use nuclear weapons in the Taiwan Strait.

• It did not alter or contribute to the defeat of PRC objectives.

• It did not help the United States obtain its objectives.

• It did not deter aggressive PRC behavior.

• It did not strengthen the US negotiation position.

• It did not reassure US allies.

Not only were US threats to use nuclear weapons not helpful, but ample evidence indicates they were counterproductive.

PRC Objectives

PRC and Soviet archives reveal the Chinese communist leadership had two key objectives at the outset of a crisis Mao Zedong created to obtain them. The most important was to raise the international profile of the Taiwan issue. The second was to halt ROC military harassment of the mainland from the offshore islands. By the end of the crisis in fall 1958, the PRC had achieved both objectives.

The PRC leadership also hoped, but did not expect, to dislodge ROC forces from the offshore islands. They succeeded in the Dachens but failed in Jinmen and Mazu.

The PRC strategy was to use military force to create a tense atmosphere that put pressure on the United States to negotiate with the PRC on the problems created by ROC forces on the offshore islands and the ultimate status of Taiwan. Eisenhower’s success in getting Chiang to withdraw from the Dachens was an early indicator this strategy might work. Had Eisenhower succeeded in persuading Chiang to withdraw from Jinmen and Mazu, the PRC leadership would have succeeded far beyond its initial expectations.

Chiang’s refusal to withdraw from the two islands led the Eisenhower administration to threaten to use nuclear weapons. Documents from Soviet and PRC archives show that US nuclear threats did not alter PRC strategy or behavior. More important, they did not prevent the PRC from obtaining its objectives. To the contrary, US nuclear threats made the PRC strategy more effective by heightening the sense of crisis. They increased international pressure to a degree that compelled the United States to enter into bilateral negotiations with the PRC and, once those began, to avoid being held responsible if they failed.

US Objectives

The Eisenhower administration sought to both avoid a war with the PRC and preserve Chiang’s government on Taiwan. Unfortunately, it took four years for Eisenhower to realize those objectives had never been in serious jeopardy.

From the outset of the crisis, the PRC consistently took steps to avoid a war with the United States. The archives show that at no time during the four years of the crisis did the PRC leadership intend to launch a major military assault against Taiwan, Jinmen, or Mazu as long as US military forces remained in the region.

Early administration assessments of the fragility of Chiang’s government, particularly the belief that it would collapse if Chiang failed to maintain faith in an imminent return to the mainland, created a sense of panic within the US government. That inhibited more objective and accurate assessments of risks to the ROC’s survival and support for the United States throughout East Asia.

The US threat to use nuclear weapons played no role in furthering US objectives. To the contrary, it increased the fear of war and further undermined already crumbling international support for the ROC. It also accelerated international efforts to accommodate PRC claims to the offshore islands, China’s seat in the United Nations, and Taiwan itself.

Eisenhower responded differently the second time the PRC leadership attempted to use military means to create a sense of panic. He had reassessed the political situation and concluded the greatest threat to Chiang’s government was not PRC military provocations but the ROC’s lack of allied and international support. As a result, Eisenhower minimized the US military response and personally intervened to make sure the crisis did not escalate. He stripped language on the possible use of nuclear weapons out of US planning documents and made no public threats.

The Eisenhower administration finally took steps to address the situation by convincing Chiang to forgo the provocative diplomatic and military behavior he deemed essential to the ROC leader’s political legitimacy. Chiang’s public renunciation of intent to use military force to reunify China dispelled international fears of a wider war and solidified his international position. The PRC then lost the initiative it had gained in the fall of 1954 when Mao provoked the crisis.

Deterring PRC Aggression

At the outset of the crisis, several weeks after the capture of the Dachen Islands, Mao assured a worried Nikita Khrushchev he had no intention of launching a military assault on Taiwan. He also cast doubt on the possibility of a successful military campaign against Jinmen and Mazu:

In order to confidently carry out military operations to liberate Jinmen and Mazu we are expeditiously constructing militarily useful roads and airfields in Fujian province. This preparatory work will take approximately six months to a year to complete. It will take approximately three to four years of effort to extend the rail link from Yingtan in Jiangxi province to Xiamen in Fujian province. It is our view that even when we complete this preparatory work to capture Jinmen and Mazu, the decision whether or not to start military operations will depend upon the disposition of US military forces in the region at that time (Shen 2012).

In spring 1955, the PRC believed that US conventional forces in the region were sufficient to deter the PRC from launching a military assault on the offshore islands and Taiwan. While the United States may not have known this at the time, documents show that its threat to use nuclear weapons was unnecessary, and therefore cannot be said to have deterred the PRC.

Eisenhower was willing, if Chiang would have agreed, to exchange the offshore islands for a PRC commitment to renounce the use of force to settle the Taiwan question. He felt compelled to publicly threaten to use nuclear weapons only because he believed the PRC shelling of Jinmen was a prelude to an imminent assault on Taiwan and the Penghu islands. No such assault was planned. As Mao told Khrushchev:

We ourselves understand that as long as US military forces remain there we will not launch a military campaign to liberate Taiwan and the Penghus. Thus, after the offshore island problem would be settled, the situation in the Taiwan area would naturally calm down. It would then become very difficult to negotiate any outcome concerning the Taiwan question. It is precisely because of this that we have not yet launched a military assault to liberate Jinmen and Mazu and thus kept the situation with the offshore islands constantly tense. Only this has caused the United States to become especially anxious to have the United Kingdom act as an intermediary to explore the possibility of Eden’s so-called “peaceful resolution” (Shen 2012).

Mao’s letter is dated 5 March 1955. Dulles did not threaten to use nuclear weapons against the PRC until March 7. Since the PRC had no intention of attacking Taiwan before the United State issued any threat to use nuclear weapons to stop them, accounts of the crisis that claim such threats deterred a PRC attack on Taiwan or the offshore islands are wrong.

The PRC continued shelling Jinmen for years after the United States issued its first nuclear threats. Mao was never deterred from continuing to use this form of military provocation to attempt to maintain the crisis atmosphere he hoped would lead to a negotiated transfer of Taiwan to the PRC.

Even toward the end of the crisis in 1958, when the Soviet Union, rather than the United States, was concerned about the risk of a nuclear war, the PRC leadership remained undeterred from pursuing its objectives. Both Mao and Zhou Enlai told the Soviets they were willing to risk a US nuclear attack. Moreover, PRC and Soviet archives show the PRC leadership had no expectation the Soviets would retaliate on their behalf.

Mao and Zhou may have been willing to endure these risks because they concluded, as they had in Korea, that the probability of a US nuclear attack was quite low. They believed strikes that created massive fallout and large-scale civilian casualties would invite widespread international condemnation. They also believed the use of tactical nuclear weapons would not be decisive militarily. Dulles’ ultimate rejection of Chiang’s inquiries about the possible use of tactical nuclear weapons against the PRC gun emplacements shelling Jinmen suggests that PRC assessments of the risks of a US nuclear attack were accurate and not, as Khrushchev later came to believe, a product of irrational bravado.

Negotiating Positions

The US government did not want to negotiate with the PRC. It avoided high-level contact with the PRC delegation during the 1954 Geneva Conference and pressured allies into keeping the PRC out of the United Nations. After the experience of negotiating the armistice in Korea, the Eisenhower administration was convinced the PRC would never negotiate in good faith.

The PRC leadership wanted to negotiate with the United States. It sought to raise its international profile, weaken the US economic embargo, and claim representation for China in the United Nations. It also hoped to persuade the United States to abandon Chiang’s government and bring an end to the Chinese civil war, just as Truman had announced he was prepared to do in January 1950.

The US threat to use nuclear weapons magnified a crisis Mao created to get the United States to the negotiating table. The anxiety created by the prospect of nuclear war helped the PRC mobilize international opinion in support of bilateral negotiations between the United States and the PRC.

Once direct talks with the PRC began, the United States sought to obtain what Dulles described to the ROC as “a unilateral renunciation of the use of force by the Communist Chinese.” US ambassador U. Alexis Johnson informed Dulles that the PRC negotiator, Wang Binnan, was close to accepting proposed US language on a joint statement. But not long afterwards Life magazine quoted Dulles lauding the imagined effectiveness of US nuclear threats against the PRC in Korea, Vietnam, and the Taiwan Strait. Wang took personal offense at Dulles’ comments in Life and during the next meeting made an official protest of what he described as an attempt at blackmail. Progress toward a joint statement on the renunciation of the use of force stalled and never resumed.

The US threat to use nuclear weapons undermined US diplomacy in this case, as on other occasions during the crisis.

Allied Responses

The US threat to use nuclear weapons did not reassure a single US ally other than the ROC itself. The United Kingdom, France, NATO, and Japan all felt endangered by the possibility the crisis over the offshore islands could escalate into a wider war between the United States and the PRC, with the potential for precipitating a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union. All expressed their discomfort with the US decision to threaten nuclear use.

The Eisenhower administration acknowledged allied anxieties during its internal deliberations on how to respond to the crisis. In March 1955, Dulles complained to the NSC that the United States could be inhibited from using nuclear weapons because of widespread opposition. He initiated a public relations campaign to try to mitigate that opposition. In the fall of 1958, the US ambassador to Japan warned Dulles a US nuclear attack on China could result in a Japanese request for US forces to leave Japan (FRUS 1958–1960, 62).

When Dulles conveyed that message to the joint chiefs and US military commanders in the region, they dismissed the warning out of hand. They characterized Japanese antinuclear sentiment as the inconsequential product of a small group of Japanese leftists influenced by communist propaganda. They admitted that while initial Japanese reaction to US nuclear use might be problematic, “government and informed leaders would come to realize that our action was in their best interests.”

In fact, not long after the US threat to use nuclear weapons was announced in March 1955, more than a third of the entire Japanese population–32 million people–signed a petition, started by a group of housewives, that called for an end to nuclear testing and the abolition of nuclear weapons. In the fall of 1957, after the first joint nuclear weapons training exercise conducted with the participation of the Japanese Self Defense Force, the joint chiefs themselves received a set of troubling questions from senior Japanese officials concerned about US plans to use tactical nuclear weapons to defend US military bases in Japan (JCS 1958).

A few days after the meeting with the chiefs, Assistant Secretary of State Smith warned Dulles the chiefs were being glib about Japan’s concern and the extent of the antinuclear movement. He said that if the United States used nuclear weapons to try to resolve the offshore island crisis, not only Japan but the Philippines and other Asian nations may move “further in the direction of neutralism and eventual accommodation with Peiping” (FRUS 1958–1960, 63).

The US threat to use nuclear weapons during the Taiwan Strait Crisis had a demonstrably negative effect on US allies, especially US allies in Asia.

Post-Crisis Nuclear Buildup

The documentary evidence demonstrates that US government officials prepared to attack the PRC with nuclear weapons during the Taiwan Strait Crisis because they misunderstood PRC intentions and overestimated both PRC military capabilities and the role nuclear threats would play in influencing PRC actions. These deficiencies continued to influence US China policy. In the wake of the crisis, the United States deployed thousands of nuclear weapons in the region in anticipation of further Chinese communist aggression. By the end of Eisenhower’s term in office, the United States had packed approximately 1,700 nuclear weapons on US military bases in Taiwan, the Philippines, South Korea, Guam, and US-occupied Okinawa. Under Kennedy, the numbers rocketed up to 2,400 and peaked at 3,200 during the final years of the Johnson administration (Norris, Arkin, and Burr 1999).

Two key developments in the early 1970s, both foreshadowed in the events of the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s, contributed to a dramatic reduction in the number of US nuclear weapons deployed in East Asia. The first was Japanese public opposition to the deployment of US nuclear weapons in Japan, which forced the governments of Japan and the United States to agree to remove all US nuclear weapons from Okinawa when it was returned to Japan in 1972. The second was Nixon’s decision to accept the modus vivendi on Taiwan that Mao was willing to offer Eisenhower in 1955 had Dulles been willing to engage in high-level talks with the PRC leadership. The United States halved the total number of US nuclear weapons deployed in East Asia by the time Nixon left office, and no US nuclear weapons remained in Taiwan, Japan, or the Philippines by end of 1977 (Norris, Arkin, and Burr 1999).

The rapid removal of thousands of nuclear weapons from a stockpile the United States spent decades building up in East Asia calls into question the necessity of their deployment in the first place. The PRC remained a communist country with a radical ideology and an abysmal human rights record that did not relinquish any of its territorial claims in the region or the right to use force to resolve them. One thing that did change was US unwillingness to talk with the PRC leadership, which it could have done in 1955, or even in 1949 immediately after the founding of the PRC. Nixon’s 1972 visit changed US public opinion of the PRC almost overnight, even though the PRC, in the midst of Mao’s “Cultural Revolution,” had yet to change at all.

PRC Recognition and the Taiwan Relations Act

The balance of international opinion on the legitimacy of the PRC and ROC governments shifted dramatically and decisively in the PRC’s favor with the October 1971 passage of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2758, four months before Nixon went to China. The resolution did more than simply admit the PRC to the UN, as later UN resolutions would admit East Germany in 1973 and North Korea in 1991. Instead, the United Nations decided to:

restore all its rights to the People’s Republic of China and to recognize the representatives of its Government as the only legitimate representatives of China to the United Nations, and to expel forthwith the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek from the place which they unlawfully occupy at the United Nations and in all the organizations related to it (UN 1971).

The UN vote was the product of continuous PRC efforts to cultivate support among the newly independent nations of Africa and Asia, efforts that began at the Bandung Conference in 1954. It was also a stark repudiation of US China policy since the 1949 establishment of the PRC. The language of the resolution lends international credibility to PRC claims that the ROC government has no international legal standing and that the PRC is therefore entitled to govern all Chinese territories under ROC control.

The United States recognized the PRC as the sole legitimate government of China in 1979. It simultaneously terminated diplomatic relations and withdrew its recognition of the ROC. But Congress, in an extraordinary assertion of legislative authority over the executive branch’s conduct of foreign affairs, qualified the presidential decision to terminate “governmental relations between the United States and the governing authorities on Taiwan recognized by the United States as the Republic of China prior to 1 January 1979.”³

Congress imposed its qualifications through domestic law. It passed the Taiwan Relations Act, “to make clear that the United States decision to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China rests upon the expectation that the future of Taiwan will be determined by peaceful means.” The act empowered Congress to compel the president “to provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character” and “to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan.” It also declared, “Whenever the laws of the United States refer or relate to foreign countries, nations, states, governments, or similar entities, such terms shall include and such laws shall apply with such respect to Taiwan.”

The net effect of the Taiwan Relations Act was to establish Taiwan as an independent legal entity under US domestic law and that its security and well-being were important to the United States. Every US president since Jimmy Carter has accepted the act’s exceptional impositions on the president’s power to conduct foreign affairs with China. In this way, the US government reframed but did not resolve the dispute with the PRC at the root of the Taiwan Strait Crisis. The PRC is not bound by the Taiwan Relations Act and has never renounced the right to resort to force to reunify a divided China.

Lessons for the Next Taiwan Strait Crisis

The US dispute with the PRC over Taiwan remains unresolved, and the people of Taiwan, using democratic reforms to assert their hope for self-determination, are challenging the modis vivendi the two sides reached in 1972. US-China relations are deteriorating, rapidly, and both sides continue to prepare for the next military conflict over the status of the island. Another crisis could erupt at any moment. The most important lesson from the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s is that US threats to use low-yield or nonstrategic nuclear weapons are unlikely to deter the PRC leadership. Actually using them after deterrence fails is more likely to escalate the conflict than end it.

An Evolving Dilemma

Until 1999, when the ROC’s first directly elected president, Lee Teng-hui, unilaterally announced that the relationship between the ROC and the PRC should be established on the basis of a “state-to-state relationship,” the two governments had agreed Taiwan was a part of China (Faison 1999). The United States, the United Kingdom, France, and the Soviet Union consented to the ROC’s recovery of Taiwan from Japan under the terms for Japanese surrender set out in the Cairo Declaration, the Potsdam Declaration, and the Instrument of Surrender that officially ended World War II.

Throughout the course of the Taiwan Strait Crisis, the Eisenhower administration made statements and took actions consistent with the assumption that Taiwan was part of China. None was more important than the 23 October 1958, joint US-ROC communique ending the crisis:

The United States, its Government and its people, have an abiding faith in the Chinese people and profound respect for the great contribution which they have made and will continue to make to a civilization that respects and honors the individual and his family life. The United States recognizes that the Republic of China is the authentic spokesman for Free China and of the hopes and aspirations entertained by the great mass of the Chinese people … . The Government of the Republic of China considers that the restoration of freedom to its people on the mainland is its sacred mission (FRUS 1958–1960, 209).

The language of the joint communique leaves little doubt the US government agreed that the ROC government, which exercised sovereign control over the island of Taiwan, was the sole legitimate representative of all of China. Whatever qualifications Dulles may have expressed during the course of the crisis, particularly in his comments to Molotov questioning China’s historical claim to the island, in the end he viewed Taiwan as an integral part of a divided China. In a memo summarizing the US position articulated in the joint communique, Dulles wrote:

Posture adopted by GRC [Government of the Republic of China] puts Republic of China in same category as other countries divided by Communism. Thus in divided Korea, Republic of Korea accepts armistice which denies it use of force to reunite Korea. GVN [Government of Viet-Nam] also accepts armistice which prevents use of force to reunite Viet-Nam. In Germany Adenauer has renounced use of force to bring about reunification. This declaration of GRC is comparable (FRUS 1958–1960, 216).

Much of official Washington has forgotten its previous, longstanding position that Taiwan is a part of China, but Beijing has not.

The problem with that previous US position is that it never took into account the wishes of the people who live in Taiwan. The US government portrayed Chiang Kai-shek as the leader of a “free” China, but his government was ruthlessly autocratic. The Generalissimo, as he was called, ruled Taiwan as an authoritarian strongman under a permanent declaration of martial law until his death in 1975. He turned the government over to his eldest son, Chiang Ching-Kuo, who ruled until his death in 1988. Both men used extrajudicial violence, including secret police, arbitrary arrests, and torture, to oppress dissent.

It was not until martial law was lifted in 1987 that the people of Taiwan were allowed to speak and assemble freely for the purpose of participating in self-government. Advocates of alternative conceptions of Taiwan not grounded in the history of the Chinese civil war could now express their opinions, organize adherents, and compete in elections.

The PRC responded by trying to intervene in Taiwan’s rapidly evolving democratic politics, with the aim of maintaining the old consensus with Chiang’s ruling Nationalist Party. In 1995, the PRC leadership authorized a series of military exercises, including launching missiles at targets just off Taiwan’s coast. Many US and ROC observers believe the exercises were intended to sway the first direct election of an ROC president in the island’s history. The United States responded by sending two aircraft carrier groups to the region. The incident reignited a sense of crisis in the Taiwan Strait and increased US government anxieties about PRC military capabilities and intentions.

The winner of the ROC election, Lee Teng-hui, was a member of the ruling Nationalist Party but also a native-born Taiwanese. During the election, some opponents accused Lee of harboring the desire for an independent Taiwan – a claim validated by his strong public support for independence after he left office. The opposition Democratic Progressive Party, which is even more closely associated with the idea of independence, held the presidency from 2000 to 2008 and regained it in 2016. Tsai Ying-wen, who won the 2016 election, explicitly rejected the old consensus that Taiwan is part of China but stopped short of advocating independence.

In 2005, the PRC expressed its determination to “never allow the Taiwan independence secessionist forces to make Taiwan secede from China under any name or by any means.” It promulgated an anti-secession law that says the “state shall do its utmost with maximum sincerity to achieve a peaceful reunification.” But should its utmost fail, the law also allows for the use of “non-peaceful means and other necessary measures” if Taiwan’s governing authorities reject the possibility of unification or declare independence.

According to the law, Tsai’s rejection of the old consensus could be considered a justification for non-peaceful action. The current PRC leadership is using increasingly hostile rhetoric and substantive economic penalties to press Tsai to reverse course and accept the old consensus. It is not working. Shortly after her reelection by a large majority in January 2020, Tsai told the BBC, “We don’t have a need to declare ourselves an independent state. We are an independent country already and we call ourselves the Republic of China, Taiwan” (Sudworth 2020).

Lessons for the Next Crisis

The US Taiwan Relations Act mandates that it is “the policy of the United States to consider any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means, including by boycotts or embargoes, a threat to the peace and security of the Western Pacific area and of grave concern to the United States.” Further, the act requires the US government “to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan.”

Today, some US analysts and officials still believe, as did Dulles and Eisenhower, that the United States needs low-yield, nonstrategic nuclear weapons to protect Taiwan and cope with the broader security challenges posed by a “rising” China. But during the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s, US preparations and expressions of intent to use such weapons proved counterproductive. They failed to deter the PRC leadership, undermined international support for Taiwan, and subverted bilateral negotiations that could have resulted in a PRC commitment not to resort to force to resolve the dispute.

At the time, the PRC leadership believed that limited US use of tactical nuclear weapons would not be militarily decisive. It also believed that US use of tactical nuclear weapons in ways that would kill large numbers of civilians was highly unlikely because of the moral, diplomatic, and geopolitical costs to US standing in East Asia and the world.

After carefully considering their options, Dulles and Eisenhower eventually came to the same conclusion. Toward the close of the crisis in fall 1958, Dulles told Chiang Kai-shek that US nonstrategic nuclear weapons were not the military solution he imagined they might be when the crisis started:

The danger lies not in the size of the bomb but in how it is exploded. If an atomic bomb is exploded on or in the ground, then there would inevitably be a heavy loss of human life. On the other hand if an atomic bomb was exploded in the air, the explosion would have no effect on gun positions (FRUS 1958–1960, 204).

There is no indication the current PRC leadership would view US threats to use nuclear weapons differently in a future Taiwan Strait Crisis. Moreover, greater PRC confidence in its own conventional military capabilities and its ability to retaliate with nuclear weapons if the United States uses them first are more likely to strengthen rather than weaken PRC resistance to future US nuclear threats. A classified textbook on the operation of China’s missile forces instructs, “The principal form a future regional war will be conventional fighting under conditions of nuclear deterrence.” The authors imply that China can continue to prosecute a conventional war with no fear of US nuclear escalation as long as China maintains an effective ability to retaliate with nuclear weapons (Yu 2004).

Some US analysts and officials believe the United States could use a limited number of regionally deployed low-yield, nonstrategic nuclear weapons to stop an attack on Taiwan. Brad Roberts, deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear and missile defense policy under President Barack Obama, has argued that such an attack “might not be seen to be inviting or legitimizing a nuclear retaliatory strike” by the PRC leadership (Roberts 2016). Elbridge Colby, deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development under President Trump, has argued that China would be unwilling to retaliate with nuclear weapons because it “would mean courting defeat or near-suicidal escalation” (Colby 2018).

It is impossible to know for certain how the PRC leadership would respond, but the same classified PRC textbook instructs that “after suffering a nuclear attack,” China’s nuclear forces would conduct “limited but centralized” retaliatory strikes on “influential targets of great strategic value” that would “create great terror in the psychology of the enemy and in this way achieve the strategic objective,” which in this case would be halting continued US military action in support of Taiwan (Yu 2004).

This disconnect between how US officials think contemporary PRC leaders would respond and what those leaders may be preparing to do draws attention to another important lesson from the Taiwan Strait Crisis. The US government’s unwillingness to engage the PRC leadership after it won the Chinese civil war and expelled its Nationalist rivals from the mainland made it almost impossible for US analysts and officials to adequately assess PRC intentions.

The US misjudgments identified in this short paper are considerable. The US government mistakenly assumed PRC leaders supported Kim’s decision to try to unify Korea. It ignored PRC warnings not to cross the 38^th parallel and unnecessarily prolonged the fighting in Korea by trying to bomb PRC leaders into submission. It misjudged the intent of PRC efforts to negotiate during the Geneva Conference of 1954 and misinterpreted the shelling of Jinmen and Mazu as a prelude to an invasion of Taiwan. If Dulles had decided to talk to the PRC leadership about their intentions instead of assuming he already knew what they were, Eisenhower would have learned that Mao was willing to negotiate an agreement on Taiwan that would have changed the US calculus on Vietnam and the conduct of the Cold War with the Soviet Union in 1955 instead of 1972.

While there is a much greater degree of communication between PRC and US leaders today, misunderstanding and miscommunication continue to trouble US-China relations. In the 1950s, US assumptions about PRC intentions were based on academic ideas about monolithic communism and the “domino theory.” Today, they are based on international relations theory and questionable hypotheses about the behavior of “rising” powers rather than frank discussions with the PRC leadership. Most important, there is surprisingly little official discussion of the Taiwan issue, and no active efforts to search for diplomatic alternatives to the current use – by both sides – of political posturing and threats to resort to force to address the most likely cause of a future military conflict between China and the United States.

US unwillingness to engage PRC leaders in substantive discussions about Taiwan troubled US allies in the 1950s, and it continues to trouble US allies today. At the time of the crisis, the ROC enjoyed very little international support, even among US allies. Allied and neutral nations were extremely wary of the potential consequences of a US first use of nuclear weapons and incredulous that the Eisenhower administration would risk those consequences to protect the government of Chiang Kai-shek.

Only a handful of nations maintain diplomatic relations with Taiwan today. Many have signed agreements with the PRC consenting to its claim that Taiwan is a part of China and that the PRC is the sole legitimate representative of China. While the current ROC government most likely enjoys far greater international sympathy than Chiang Kai-shek did, it is unclear how many nations, including US allies, would support having the United States start a nuclear war to defend a Taiwanese declaration of independence.

Whatever that number might be, it is reasonable to assume, based on the international experience of US nuclear threats during the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s, that more nations might be willing to support a US effort to preserve Taiwanese rights to self-determination if it were clear the United States took the option to start a nuclear war off the table.

Near the end of the crisis in September 1958, the simple ability of the US Navy to teach ROC forces how to keep the offshore islands resupplied proved to be the key to solving the military problem at the heart of the crisis. The alarming assessments originally presented by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Secretary of State in March 1955 – assessments that had President Eisenhower convinced that using nuclear weapons to prevent the PRC seizure of two small islands was the only way to avoid a “collapse of Asiatic resistance to the Communists” – proved to be gross exaggerations (FRUS 1955–1957, 41). Thus, another lesson from this experience for contemporary US decisionmakers is the importance of questioning military advice, consulting diverse opinions, exercising independent judgment, and acting with patience. Eisenhower’s ability to do all those things prevented a nuclear war. Had General Radford been president in 1955, the outcome might have been very different.

There is no guarantee the US electorate will always elect a president with Eisenhower’s combination of knowledge, experience, and temperament. As a result, the history of US deliberations on the use of nuclear weapons in the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s suggests it is imprudent to permit a single person to launch a nuclear attack. As long as nuclear weapons exist, an effective way to prevent the next Taiwan Strait Crisis from triggering a nuclear war is to build requirements for consultation and deliberation into the process of authorizing their use.

There is one final lesson from the Taiwan Strait Crisis, not for decisionmakers but for the people of the United States. Public demonstrations of concern about the consequences of nuclear war and citizen-supported statements opposing the use of nuclear weapons can constrain US decisionmakers and prevent rash decisions to start a nuclear war.

At the beginning of the crisis Dulles complained to the NSC, “We might wake up one day and discover we were inhibited in the use of these weapons by negative public opinion” (FRUS 1955–1957, 146). Toward the end of the crisis, the US ambassador to Japan warned Dulles that Japanese public opposition to the use of nuclear weapons could create a situation where “if the U.S. initiated the use of nuclear weapons in defense of the offshore islands, the Japanese government might be forced to demand the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Japan” (FRUS 1958–1960, 62). The Assistant Secretary of State for Policy Planning added that public opposition to the use of nuclear weapons in “the Philippines and other Asian nations” might push their governments “further in the direction of neutralism and eventual accommodation” with the PRC (FRUS 1958–1960, 63).

Regardless of whether these assessments were correct, they were a constraining factor in US deliberations on the use of nuclear weapons. Dulles posed a question to the military commanders in the Far East: “If anticipated reactions against our use of nuclear weapons were to be so hostile that we would be inhibited from using them except in the NATO theater or in retaliation against a Soviet attack, was our reliance on their use correct and productive” (FRUS 1955–1957, 146)? That the Secretary of State felt compelled to ask that question demonstrates that sustained expressions of concern from a critical mass of ordinary people can impact US decisions on the use of nuclear weapons.

It is discouraging that the seminal dispute igniting the Cold War in Asia remains unresolved. It is disappointing that decisionmakers in the United States and the People’s Republic of China continue to prepare to settle the issue with military force. Indeed, official US and PRC assessments repeatedly conclude that a future conflict over Taiwan is the primary driver of an accelerating arms race between the two nations.

This examination of the role of nuclear weapons in the Taiwan Strait Crisis of the 1950s concludes that US preparations and expressions of intent to use nuclear weapons were counterproductive. They advanced the interests and objectives of the PRC and undermined the interests and objectives of Taiwan and the United States. The historical evidence lends no support to current US proponents of deploying low-yield or nonstrategic nuclear weapons in East Asia. It argues against the United States making public policy pronouncements of an intent to break the taboo on the use of nuclear weapons that has held since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

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Notes on contributors

Gregory Kulacki

Gregory Kulacki the China Project Manager of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists and a Visiting Fellow at RECNA, Nagasaki University. His research focuses on China’s nuclear arms control policy and US extended nuclear deterrence policy in East Asia, where Gregory has lived and worked for the better part of the last thirty years.

Notes

¹ On July 17, the PRC Central Military Committee ordered Minister of Defense Peng Dehuai to begin moving fighter aircraft into recently constructed airfields on the southern Chinese coast in Fujian and Guangdong. He put the airfields on alert but also said the planes should not fly outside of PRC airspace. This was one of a series of military steps taken for a planned resumption of heavy shelling of Jinmen and Mazu Island. On July 27, Mao ordered the air force and navy not to attack ROC aircraft unless attacked first. The two ROC planes were downed two days later (Xu 1992).

² Twining noted that ground bursts would be better but were too “dirty.”

³ Taiwan Relations Act. Public Law 96–8. U.S. Statutes at Large 14 (1979): 14–21. https://www.congress.gov/bill/96th-congress/house-bill/2479.