Taiwan: Background and U.S. Relations
Changes from December 26, 2024 to August 15, 2025
This page shows textual changes in the document between the two versions indicated in the dates above. Textual matter removed in the later version is indicated with red strikethrough and textual matter added in the later version is indicated with blue.
https://crsreports.congress.gov
Updated December 26, 2024
Taiwan: Background and U.S. Relations
Introduction
Taiwan was a colony of Japan for 50 years, 1895-1945. After Japan's defeat in World War II, the ROC assumed control of Taiwan and its outlying islands. Over the next four years, while the military forces of the ROC government and those of the Communist Party of China (CPC) fought for control of mainland China, the ROC's ruling party, the Kuomintang (KMT), imposed harsh controls and one-party rule on Taiwan. In 1949, facing defeat at the hands of the CPC, senior ROC leader Chiang Kai-shek moved the seat of the ROC government to Taiwan and imposed martial law. As many as two million KMT supporters fled mainland China with Chiang, joining an existing Taiwan population of approximately six million. Chiang maintained authoritarian rule on Taiwan until his death in 1975. His government privileged "mainlanders"—those whose families had arrived on Taiwan with the KMT—over the larger local "Taiwanese" population. Bowing to popular pressure, his son, President Chiang Ching-kuo, lifted martial law in 1987, paving the way for political liberalization. His successor legalized opposition parties in 1989, and, in 1991, terminated the "temporary" provisions that had suspended parts of the ROC constitution for the previous 43 years.
Figure 1. Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen, and Mazu Source: Graphic by CRS based on data from NGA (2017); Department of State (2015); Esri (2014); and DeLorme (2014). Note: Taiwan also administers Tungsha Island (Pratas) and Taiping Island (Itu Aba) in the South China Sea. Taiwan held its first direct election for the Legislative Yuan, Taiwan's unicameral parliament, in 1992, and its first direct presidential election in 1996. Since 2000, the presidency has three times passed peacefully between Taiwan's two leading parties, the KMT and the current ruling party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). In January 2024 elections, the DPP's Lai Ching-te (also known as William Lai) won the presidency with 40% of the vote in a three-way race. The KMT presidential ticket won 33% of the vote, and the Taiwan People's Party (TPP), won 26%. The DPP champions a strong sense of Taiwan identity separate from mainland China and sees risks in cross-Strait exchanges. The KMT champions an ROC identity, with its conception of the ROC including mainland China. The KMT holds the door open to unification with a democratic mainland China in some distant future, and supports lowering tensions across the Taiwan Strait through engagement with the PRC. The TPP portrays itself as an alternative to the two leading parties and a champion of good governance. No party won a majority in the 113-seat legislature in the 2024 elections. KMT and KMT-aligned independents control 54 seats, the DPP controls 51 seats, and the TPP controls 8 seats. The KMT and TPP caucuses have worked together to check the DPP administration, creating a stand-off that has paralyzed Taiwan's political system for most of Lai's term to date. In 2025, in an effort to tip control of the legislature to the DPP, party supporters mounted an unprecedented mass recall campaign against KMT legislators. In a first round of recall elections, voters retained all 24 targeted KMT legislators. Seven more KMT legislators are scheduled to face recall votes on August 23. Since 1979, U.S. government policy has been to follow a U.S. "one-China policy," under which the United States maintains official relations with the PRC and unofficial relations with Taiwan. Like its predecessors, the second Trump Administration describes this policy as guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, three U.S.-PRC joint communiqués concluded in the 1970s and 1982, and "Six Assurances" that President Ronald Reagan communicated to Taiwan's government in 1982. (See CRS In Focus IF12503, Taiwan: The Origins of the U.S. One-China Policy, and CRS In Focus IF11665, President Reagan's Six Assurances to Taiwan.) Key provisions of the Taiwan Relations Act include that:Taiwan, which alsoTaiwan: Background and U.S. Relations
Introduction
Taiwan, which formally calls itself the Republic of China (ROC), is a self-governing democracy of 23.4 million people located across the Taiwan Strait from mainland China. The United States terminated diplomatic relations with the ROC on January 1, 1979, in order to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC), which claims sovereignty over Taiwan. At that time, the U.S. government also agreed to withdraw U.S. military personnel from Taiwan and terminate a U.S.-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, and stated that it would henceforth maintain “cultural, commercial, and other unofficial relations with the people of Taiwan.” The 1979 . Its popularly-elected leaders govern 23.4 million people on the main island of Taiwan and on outlying islands, including the archipelagoes of Penghu, Kinmen, and Mazu. Since the 1950s, the U.S. Congress has shown a strong interest in Taiwan, first as a bastion of resistance to communism during the Cold War, now as a thriving democracy and a semiconductor manufacturing powerhouse, and throughout, as a potential global flashpoint that could involve the United States in a conflict with the People's Republic of China (PRC). A central question facing the 119th Congress, as it has been for Congresses over the decades, is whether—and, if so, how and how much—to support the people of Taiwan in the face of the PRC government's determination to take control of Taiwan, potentially by force. Since 1979, U.S.-Taiwan relations have been unofficial in nature.
Unofficial Relations
The United States terminated diplomatic relations with the Taiwan-based ROC on January 1, 1979, to establish diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC), which claims sovereignty over Taiwan but has never controlled it. In recognizing the PRC diplomatically, the U.S. government "acknowledge[d]," but did not endorse, "the Chinese position that there is but one China and Taiwan is part of China"; agreed to withdraw U.S. military personnel from Taiwan; and agreed to terminate a U.S.-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty that had been in effect since 1955. A U.S. statement issued at the time announced that henceforth, "the American people and the people of Taiwan will maintain commercial, cultural, and other relations without official government representation and without diplomatic relations."
The Carter Administration's announcement of these moves took most in Congress by surprise. Concerned about Taiwan's future security, Congress insisted on the inclusion of security provisions in legislation to provide a legal basis for unofficial relations, the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act ( (TRA, P.L. 96-8; 22 U.S.C. §§3301 et seq.). Pursuant to the act, the United States carries out unofficial relations with Taiwan through the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT), a non-profit corporation that operates under a contract with the U.S. Department of State. AIT Taipei performs many of the same functions as an embassy and is staffed by U.S. government personnel.
Modern History
Current Politics
U.S. Policy Toward Taiwan
; 22 U.S.C. §§3301 et seq.) provides a legal basis for unofficial relations.
In its most recent fact sheet on U.S. relations with Taiwan, issued in 2022, the U.S. State Department refers to the United States and Taiwan as enjoying “a robust unofficial relationship.” The fact sheet describes Taiwan as “a key U.S. partner in the Indo-Pacific,” and states that the United States and Taiwan “share similar values, deep commercial and economic links, and strong people-to-people ties.”
Figure 1. Taiwan
Source: Graphic by CRS.
Modern History
Taiwan was a colony of Japan from 1895 to 1945. The government of the ROC, then based on mainland China, assumed control of Taiwan in 1945, after Japan’s defeat in World War II. In 1949, after the forces of the Communist Party of China (CPC) wrested control of mainland China from ROC forces in a civil war, the Kuomintang (KMT)-led ROC government retreated to Taiwan, and the CPC established the PRC on mainland China. The United States continued to recognize the ROC government on Taiwan as
the government of all China. In 1971, UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 recognized representatives of the PRC as “the only legitimate representatives of China to the [U.N.],” and expelled “the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek,” the ROC’s then-leader. In a December 15, 1978 U.S.-PRC communiqué, the United States recognized the PRC government as “the sole legal Government of China.”
The KMT enforced martial law on Taiwan from 1949 to 1987, when the party yielded to public pressure for political liberalization. Taiwan held its first direct election for the legislature, the Legislative Yuan (LY), in 1992, and its first direct election for president in 1996.
2024 Political Transition
In January 2024 elections, Lai Ching-te (William Lai) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won the presidency with 40.05% of the vote in a three-way race. He and Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim, a former unofficial Taiwan representative to the United States, were inaugurated in May 2024. The DPP is the first party in Taiwan’s history to win a third consecutive presidential term by direct election. Lai’s predecessor, Tsai Ing-wen of the DPP, served the maximum two four-year terms allowed.
The 2024 elections produced divided government. The DPP lost its majority in the 113-seat LY; no party won a majority, the first such outcome since 2004. The KMT, now Taiwan’s leading opposition party and supportive of greater engagement with the PRC, won 52 seats, to the DPP’s 51, and soon after won a contest for LY speaker. KMT-aligned independents won 2 seats. The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), founded in 2019 to challenge the dominance of the DPP and KMT, won 8 seats.
The DPP has long viewed Taiwan as a sovereign, independent country, while the KMT sees it as part of a larger ROC that should include mainland China. Former President Tsai trod carefully in her public statements on Taiwan’s political status, often embracing ambiguity in an effort to unite diverse political constituencies at home, avoid a showdown with the PRC, and maintain support from a U.S. government that has long stated its opposition to unilateral changes to the status quo. Lai has appeared less inclined toward ambiguity. His central position on sovereignty is inherited from Tsai: a statement that, “The Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China are not subordinate to each other,” suggesting that the PRC and ROC exist side-by-side as separate countries. Tsai first coined the formulation in her second term, in 2021, as the second of four commitments on cross-Strait relations. Lai has made it the core of his cross-Strait policy.
U.S. Policy Toward Taiwan
Since 1979, U.S. government policy has been to follow a U.S. “one-China policy” with regard to Taiwan. The Biden Administration describes this policy as guided by (1) the
Taiwan: Background and U.S. Relations
https://crsreports.congress.gov
TRA; (2) U.S.-PRC joint communiqués concluded in 1972, 1978, and 1982; and (3) “Six Assurances” that President Ronald Reagan communicated to Taiwan’s government in 1982. (See CRS In Focus IF12503, Taiwan: The Origins of the U.S. One-China Policy, and CRS In Focus IF11665, President Reagan’s Six Assurances to Taiwan.)
Key provisions of the TRA include the following: • U.S. relations with Taiwan shall be carried out through
the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT), a private corporation. (AIT Taipei performs many of the same functions as U.S. embassies elsewhere.)
• The United States “will make available to Taiwan such
will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and defense services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.”
• "; and
It is U.S. policy “"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.”
On the eve of Taiwan’s 2024 election, a senior Biden Administration official said President Biden had outlined U.S. policy to his PRC counterpart, Xi Jinping, in November 2023, as: “[W]e oppose any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side. We do not support Taiwan independence. We support cross-Strait dialogue, and we expect cross-Strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means, free from coercion, in a manner that is acceptable to the people on both sides of the Strait. We do not take a position on the ultimate resolution of cross-Strait differences, provided they are resolved peacefully.”
The TRA creates “strategic ambiguity” by not specifying whether the United States would defend Taiwan in the event of a PRC attack. Since 2021, President Biden has four times stated that the United States would defend Taiwan; White House officials said U.S. policy was unchanged.
As a 2024 presidential candidate, President-elect Donald J. Trump was more equivocal about defending Taiwan. In a July 2024, interview with Bloomberg Businessweek, Trump said, “Taiwan should pay us for defense.” Comparing U.S. support for Taiwan to “an insurance policy” and referencing the wealth generated by Taiwan’s semiconductor manufacturing industry, Trump asked, “Why? Why are we doing this?” In a September 2024, interview with a Washington Post columnist, Trump stated that the PRC would not attack Taiwan during his presidency, but predicted, “eventually they will.” He asserted that Taiwan should increase its defense spending from 2.6% to 10% of gross domestic product.
PRC Policy Toward Taiwan
The Taiwan Relations Act creates "strategic ambiguity" by not specifying whether the United States would defend Taiwan from a PRC attack. Asked in February 2025 whether it was his "policy" that China would "never take Taiwan by force" during his presidency, President Donald J. Trump responded, "I never comment on that," adding, "I don't want to ever put myself in that position." In February 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed longstanding U.S. policy in stating, "We are against any forced, compelled, coercive change in the status of Taiwan." In April 2025, President Trump announced a 32% tariff on imports from Taiwan, with exceptions, later suspending the tariff until August 1 and imposing a 10% interim tariff. On July 31, 2025, the Trump Administration revised the tariff rate for Taiwan to 20% (effective August 7, 2025) while negotiations continue. (See CRS In Focus IF10256, U.S.-Taiwan Trade and Economic Relations.) In 2022, PRC leader Xi reiterated the CPC's preference for "peaceful unification" with Taiwan. Xi also restated that the CPC "will never promise to renounce the use of force." The FY2025 reconciliation act (P.L. 119-21) appropriates $20 million for "Indo-Pacific Command military exercises" and $850 billion for the "replenishment of military articles," funds that could be directed to Taiwan-related activities. House-passed bills include those that seek to prevent double taxation (H.R. 33; S. 199), support Taiwan's admission to the International Monetary Fund (H.R. 910; S. 1900), require periodic review and reissuance of State Department guidance on contacts with Taiwan (H.R. 1512/S. 821), use financial tools to deter a PRC attack on Taiwan (H.R. 1716), support Taiwan's participation in international organizations (H.R. 2416), and appropriate funds for the Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative (H.R. 4016). Senate-passed S. 524 would support closer U.S.-Taiwan coast guard ties.The PRC’s Anti-Secession Law, passed in 2005, states that in the case of Taiwan’s “secession” from China, or if the PRC concludes that possibilities for peaceful unification have been exhausted, “the state shall employ non-peaceful means and other necessary measures to protect China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”"Relations Across the Taiwan Strait
In 2005, the PRC passed an Anti-Secession Law. It states that in the case of Taiwan's "secession" from China, or if the PRC concludes that possibilities for peaceful unification have been exhausted, "the state shall employ non-peaceful means and other necessary measures to protect China's sovereignty and territorial integrity." In 2024, the PRC cited that law and two others in issuing judicial guidelines allowing for trial in absentia and the death penalty for “"diehard ‘'Taiwan independence’' separatists." Its public list of such "separatists" includes Taiwan's current Vice President, National Security Council Secretary-General, and Minister of National Defense, and DPP legislators.
Legislation in the 119th Congress
separatists.”
At the CPC’s 20th Party Congress in 2022, PRC leader Xi referred to unification with Taiwan as necessary for “the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.” He reiterated the CPC’s preference for peaceful unification, and its proposal for a “One Country, Two Systems” approach to governance of Taiwan. Xi also restated that the CPC “will never promise to renounce the use of force” to unify with Taiwan.
Beijing cut off communication with Taiwan’s government in 2016, citing then-President Tsai’s unwillingness to endorse a KMT-CPC-agreed formula, “the 1992 consensus.” It holds that Taiwan and mainland China are parts of “one China,” with different interpretations of what “China” means. President Lai has rejected the formulation. The PRC has long sought to isolate Taiwan internationally, including by inducing Taiwan’s diplomatic partners to recognize the PRC diplomatically instead. (See CRS In Focus IF12646, Taiwan’s Position in the World.)
Taiwan’s Security
In 2023, CIA Director William J. Burns stated that Xi had instructed the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to “be ready” to “conduct a successful invasion” of Taiwan by 2027, but added, “that does not mean that he’s decided to conduct an invasion.” (See CRS In Focus IF12481, Taiwan: Defense and Military Issues and CRS Report R48044, Taiwan Defense Issues for Congress.) The PLA launched military drills around Taiwan after President Lai’s May 2024 inauguration speech and October 2024 National Day speech as “punishment” for alleged Taiwan “separatist” acts and rhetoric. The PLA also conducted unannounced major military exercises around Taiwan in December 2024, after Lai’s return from his first trip abroad as president, including transit stops in Hawaii and Guam. (See CRS In Focus IF12371, Taiwan Presidents’ U.S. Transit Visits.)
U.S.-Taiwan Economic Ties
Taiwan was the seventh-largest U.S. merchandise trading partner in 2023, a key link in U.S. global semiconductor and technology supply chains, and the global center for the production of advanced chips. In June 2023, the United States and Taiwan signed the first agreement under a U.S.- Taiwan Initiative on 21st Century Trade. (See CRS In Focus IF10256, U.S.-Taiwan Trade and Economic Relations.)
Taiwan and the 118th Congress
In the 118th Congress, enacted legislation related to Taiwan includes the United States-Taiwan Initiative on 21st-Century Trade First Agreement Implementation Act (P.L. 118-13), the Indo-Pacific Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2024 (P.L. 118-50), the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for FY2024 (P.L. 118-31), and the Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and NDAA for FY2025 (H.R. 5009). The FY2025 NDAA authorizes a Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative to enable “the military, central government security forces, and central government security agencies of Taiwan to defend against coercion and aggression.” The Building Options for the Lasting Security of Taiwan through European Resolve (BOLSTER) Act, also in the FY2025 NDAA, requires consultations with European partners on plans for sanctions against the PRC in the case of PRC hostilities against Taiwan.
Susan V. Lawrence, Specialist in Asian Affairs
Taiwan: Background and U.S. Relations
https://crsreports.congress.gov | IF10275 · VERSION 83 · UPDATED
IF10275
Disclaimer
This document was prepared by the Congressional Research Service (CRS). CRS serves as nonpartisan shared staff to congressional committees and Members of Congress. It operates solely at the behest of and under the direction of Congress. Information in a CRS Report should not be relied upon for purposes other than public understanding of information that has been provided by CRS to Members of Congress in connection with CRS’s institutional role. CRS Reports, as a work of the United States Government, are not subject to copyright protection in the United States. Any CRS Report may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety without permission from CRS. However, as a CRS Report may include copyrighted images or material from a third party, you may need to obtain the permission of the copyright holder if you wish to copy or otherwise use copyrighted material.