Summary

In the 1970s and 1980s the United States and China developed cooperative relations to enhance security against the USSR. Conventional wisdom claims Washington and Beijing agreed to ‘shelve’ conflictual issues; where conflict occurred, diplomatic error or domestic politics are blamed. This book shows, however, that US-China cooperation was fragile precisely because of ongoing conflicts, notably that over Taiwan. The author disputes Kissinger’s claim that only he and Nixon understood Taiwan’s unimportance. China never found the US stance on Taiwan acceptable, and the issue required constant attention. The book shows how the two powers built cooperative relations despite Taiwan. It explains how negotiations were conducted, and why the two powers at times compromised and at times accepted the status quo. It examines why relations on occasion became acrimonious and why the acrimony subsided.