![handle is hein.crs/govelyl0001 and id is 1 raw text is:
Congress&cna2 fRes
anfrming Ih leg ilive deba
Updated June 13, 2023
President Reagan's Six Assurances to Taiwan
introduction
Under the U.S. one-China policy, the U.S. government
has, since 1979, maintained official relations with the
People's Republic of China (PRC or China) and unofficial
relations with self-governed Taiwan, over which the PRC
claims sovereignty. The Biden Administration presents
today's U.S. one-China policy as guided by three sets of
documents: the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA, P.L. 96-8; 22
U.S.C. §3301 et seq.); three U.S.-China joint communiques
concluded in 1972, 1978, and 1982; and Six Assurances
that President Ronald Reagan communicated to Taiwan's
government in 1982. Since 2017, Congress has affirmed its
support for the Six Assurances in law eight times, without
specifying whether all or only some of the assurances
should guide future U.S. policy.
H istorical Context
In the 1978 U.S.-PRC joint communiqud, the two countries
announced that they had agreed to establish diplomatic
relations on January 1, 1979. In an accompanying
statement, the U.S. government said it would terminate
diplomatic relations with Taiwan on the same date. With
some Members portraying the moves as a betrayal of
Taiwan, Congress passed the TRA, enacted on April 10,
1979. Among the TRA's provisions is that the United States
will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and
defense services as necessary for Taiwan's self-defense. In
1982, with continued U.S. arms sales to Taiwan pursuant to
the TRA a major irritant in the U.S.-China relationship, the
Ronald Reagan Administration sought to address the issue
through negotiation of a third U.S.-PRC joint communiqud.
In that communique, known as the August 17th
Communique for the day in 1982 on which it was released,
the PRC affirmed a fundamental policy of striving for a
peaceful reunification with Taiwan. The United States
stated that it understands and appreciates the Chinese
policy of striving for a peaceful resolution of the Taiwan
question. With those statements in mind, the United
States stated that it does not seek to carry out a long-term
policy of arms sales to Taiwan, that its arms sales to Taiwan
will not exceed, either in qualitative or in quantitative
terms, the level of those supplied [since 1979], and that it
intends gradually to reduce its sale of arms to Taiwan,
leading over a period of time, to a final resolution.
The Reagan Administration understood that the
communique would be viewed with alarm in Taiwan. On
July 10, 1982, a month before its release, then-Under
Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger sent a cable to
James Lilley, Director of the unofficial U.S. representative
office in Taiwan, the American Institute in Taiwan,
instructing him to seek a meeting with Taiwan President
Chiang Ching-kuo. Eagleburger provided Lilley with
talking points authorized by President Reagan. The talking
points included a set of statements on what the United
States had not agreed to in the negotiations with the PRC
over the communique. Those statements later came to be
known as the Six Assurances. Lilley first delivered them to
President Chiang on July 14, 1982. Taiwan's government
subsequently requested U.S. permission to make the Six
Assurances public. In a cable sent the day of the
communiqud's release, then-Secretary of State George
Shultz provided Lilley with a reworded version of the Six
Assurances for Taiwan's government to release. The same
day and the day after, in Washington, DC, then-Assistant
Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs John
H. Holdridge testified before Congress about the just-
released communiqud. He wove references to the Six
Assurances into his testimony, but did not label them as the
Six Assurances or disclose that President Reagan had
offered the assurances to Taiwan's president the previous
month. The three U.S. government versions of the Six
Assurances are presented in Table 1.
Differing Texts
For nearly 38 years, the sole publicly-released U.S.
government version of the Six Assurances was the language
in Holdridge's 1982 testimony before Congress. The
Eagleburger and Shultz cables remained classified. In the
absence of authoritative stand-alone text for the assurances,
some sources asserted that they included an assurance that
the United States would not formally recognize Chinese
sovereignty over Taiwan. House Concurrent Resolutions
introduced in seven congresses cited that purported
assurance: H.Con.Res. 69 (109th Congress), H.Con.Res. 73
(110th), H.Con.Res. 18 (111th), H.Con.Res. 122 (112th)
H.Con.Res. 29 (113th), H.Con.Res. 124 (115th), and
H.Con.Res. 117 (116th)
In 2016, the 114th Congress for the first time united behind
a definitive text when the House passed H.Con.Res. 88 and
the Senate passed S.Con.Res. 38. Both resolutions included
in whereas clauses relevant quotes from Holdridge's
1982 testimony. Both resolutions affirmed that the Taiwan
Relations Act and the Six Assurances are both cornerstones
of United States relations with Taiwan, and urged the
President and Department of State to affirm the Six
Assurances publicly, proactively, and consistently as a
cornerstone of United States-Taiwan relations. Then, in
2020, the Trump Administration declassified the
Eagleburger and Shultz cables, making public for the first
time authoritative U.S. texts for two more versions of the
Six Assurances. Three U.S. government-released versions
of the Six Assurances that now exist in the public record,
with their language differing in some key respects.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.crs/govelyl0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
What Is HeinOnline?
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most