Before Nixon decided to pursue normalization with China in 1971, US arms sales policy to Taiwan was stable due to the Vietnam War effort and the global containment strategy. The United States integrated Taiwan into its global policy without much debate, given that the choice for Taiwan was indeed limited and its economic strength as well as its defense capacity were relatively weak. While the United States recognized the PRC as a fait accompli, the process of establishing new relations with China and Taiwan engaged lawyers and diplomats beginning in 1972 and especially during 1978. From the end In the 1970s, the triangular struggle between the United States, the PRC and the Republic of China defined the main directions of the United States. arms sales policy in Taiwan. This article briefly examines U.S. arms sales to Taiwan between the late 1970s and early 1990s, with the aim of explaining their evolution and understanding how the United States managed to balance its own global strategy and their national interests. The first part discusses the configuration of the legal framework for US arms sales to Taiwan and highlights its ambiguity. Parts two and three explore the evolution of arms sales from the Carter administration to the GH Bush administration. The final part concludes with how U.S. arms sales to Taiwan have been successfully used as a political instrument to serve U.S. global strategy and national interests. LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND STRATEGIC AMBIGUITY ON ARMS SALES On December 16, 1978, a joint Sino-American communiqué announced the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between Washington and Beijing from January 1, 1979. The United States agreed in the communiqué to sever all official relations with the Government of the Republic of China and to terminate the MDT, but also noted that "the people of the United States will maintain cultural, commercial and other... middle of document...... es Gregor, Arming the Dragon: US Security Ties with the People's Republic of China (Washington, DC: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1987), p. 99-100; Edwin K. Snyder, A. James Gregor, and Maria Hsia Chang, The Taiwan Relations Act and the Defense of the Republic of China (Berkeley, CA: Institute of International Studies, 1980), pp. 68-69. Aviation Week and Space Technology, (March 26, 1979), p68. Edwin K. Snyder, A. James Gregor and Maria Hsia Chang, The Taiwan Relations Act and the Defense of the Republic of China, p69. Henry Kissinger, On China (New York: The Penguin Press, 2011), pp.411-412. See Nancy Tucker, Strait Talk (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), pp.169-179. Nancy Tucker, Strait Talk ( Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), pp.192Øystein Tunsjø, US Policy on Taiwan: Building the Triangle (New York: Routledge, 2008), p.81.