No. 75
Message From the President to the Congress1

[Extract]

. . . . . . .

In June 1950, following the aggressive attack on the Republic of Korea, the United States Seventh Fleet was instructed both to prevent attack upon Formosa and also to insure that Formosa should not be used as a base of operations against the Chinese Communist mainland.

This has meant, in effect, that the United States Navy was required to serve as a defensive arm of Communist China. Regardless of the situation in 1950, since the date of that order the Chinese Communists have invaded Korea to attack the United Nations forces there. They have consistently rejected the proposals of the United Nations Command for an armistice. They recently joined with Soviet Russia in rejecting the armistice proposal sponsored in the United Nations by the Government of India. This proposal had been accepted by the United States and 53 other nations.

Consequently there is no longer any logic or sense in a condition that required the United States Navy to assume defensive responsibilities on behalf of the Chinese Communists, thus permitting those Communists, with greater impunity, to kill our soldiers and those of our United Nations allies in Korea.

I am, therefore, issuing instructions that the Seventh Fleet no longer be employed to shield Communist China.2 This order implies no aggressive intent on our part. But we certainly have no obligation to protect a nation fighting us in Korea.

. . . . . . .

  1. Source: President Eisenhower’s first annual message to Congress on the State of the Union was delivered in person before a joint session of Congress on Feb. 2; the complete text may be found in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953, pp. 12–34.
  2. See telegram 546 to Taipei, Document 79.