More Strait Talk: Ten Years After the Taiwan Missile Crisis

On July 21, 1995, in response to Taiwan’s then-President Lee Teng-hui’s controversial visit to his alma mater in the United States, China fired a volley of nuclear-capable missiles into the sea 90 miles north of Taipei. Those were followed by more missile firings that same year and in early 1996, and the United States moved aircraft carrier battle groups toward the Taiwan Strait. Cross-Strait relations turned taut as hostility intensified. Lee’s visit, his defiant speech at Cornell University, and China’s provocative response sparked a decade of mutual distrust across the Taiwan Strait that continues to this day.