At the end of WWII, the fighting between the Guomindang (GMD) and the communists resumed. The US continued to give substantial support to the GMD. Mao and Stalin formed a treaty (the 1945 Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Alliance) and Stalin offered support to Mao’s forces.

President Truman sent George Marshall to try to negotiate a peace settlement, but the Marshall Mission ended in failure. The Chinese Civil War continued, with the Soviets establishing training camps in Manchuria and the USSR for the communists, and sending weapons and medicine to China.

However, as the end approached, Stalin suddenly told Mao not to continue the fight but to accept a negotiated settlement. Mao refused, but the demand caused tension to increase between the Soviets and the Chinese. As Mao Zedong’s communist regime established the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, and the defeated GMD fled, transferring the Republic of China (ROC) to Taiwan, the Truman administration published the “China White Paper”, describing the takeover of the communists as “ominous.” Fingers were pointed in Washington as the question “Who lost China?” was asked. The conclusion of the White Paper was that the US had done all it could to support Jiang Jieshi’s nationalist Guomindang (GMD) in its fight against communism.

In 1950, Mao traveled to Moscow to negotiate the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance. However, Mao resented Stalin’s evident assumption that the USSR would be the more powerful partner in the relationship, and Zhou Enlai was needed to help conclude the negotiations. The mutual defense treaty also guaranteed loans from the USSR to the PRC, technical support, and training for Chinese engineers and scientists. Initially, the Truman administration was open to dealing with the PRC.

However, the beginning of the Korean War in 1950 ended that openness. Truman’s policy of containment demanded action to prevent the spread of communism. In the Korean War, the North Koreans led by Kim Il-Sung, rapidly overwhelmed the South. The US-led UN coalition pushed the North Koreans back almost to the Yalu River, the border with China. China then invaded, prompting Douglas MacArthur to demand that the US use nuclear weapons against China.

The USSR provided some military aid, but the Chinese loss of a million men was costly; Mao felt Stalin had not born his share of the burden. When Eisenhower became president in 1953, he ended the Korean War. He also formed the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in 1954, an organization similar to NATO aimed at providing collective defense for its members. This action appeared threatening to Mao, who responded by attacking territory in the Taiwan Strait claimed by the ROC: the islands of Kinmen and Mazu and the Dachen Islands.

To prevent China from escalating the Taiwan Strait Crisis (1954-55) Eisenhower signed the U.S.-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty forming an alliance with Taiwan. Talks led to an agreement in which the ROC and PRC shelled each other’s emplacements for the next 20 years on alternate days. The relationship between the USSR and the PRC deteriorated further in 1956, with Khrushchev’s “Secret Speech” in which he criticized Stalin’s cult of personality; the Chinese had honored Stalin’s cult for years and Mao also viewed this as a criticism of his own cult of personality.

In 1958, a second Taiwan Strait Crisis arose, spurred by the installation of US missiles in Taiwan. Mao asked Stalin for help in a war against Taiwan, but Stalin refused. Eisenhower sent a naval force to the Taiwan Strait, and the crisis, again, was resolved by talks. Meanwhile, although the USSR continued to provide technical assistance to China. Through the 1950s, the USSR had supported China’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons. However, in June 1959, Soviet nuclear scientists were withdrawn from China.

Furthermore, the Soviets criticized Mao’s economic policies in the Great Leap Forward. In 1960, the Sino-Soviet Split emerged. Soviet aid to China was stopped and in 1961, Zhou Enlai walked out of the CPSU Congress. In 1964, China exploded its first nuclear bomb, and in 1967, it detonated its first hydrogen bomb. In 1969, there was fighting along the Sino-Soviet border. That same year, Mao decided that China needed to make overtures to the US for support against the USSR; in 1970, Mao invited Nixon to China.

“Ping pong diplomacy” set the stage for further interactions between the US and China, including Henry Kissinger’s 1971 visit. In October, the US allowed the PRC to take a seat at the United Nations. 1972 brought a meeting between Mao and Nixon, and the US began to withdraw its forces from Taiwan.

In 1978, China and the United States agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations in 1979; this “normalized” the relationship between the two countries. Furthermore, Carter agreed to accept the One China policy. Throughout the early 80s, China and the US expanded their trading relationship and exchanged cordial diplomatic visits, agreed to US sales of weapons to China (1984) and in 1985, they signed the U.S.-China Nuclear Cooperation Agreement.