Nuclear security

Declassified: US Attempts to Rein in Chiang Ching-kuo's Nuclear Ambitions

The United States government has, for the first time, declassified in full documents that shed insight into Taiwan’s work on nuclear technology with possible weapons applications in the late 1970s. Throughout the 1970s, the United States was determined to prevent unilateral Taiwanese efforts to acquire advanced nuclear technology, which could potentially lead to a Taiwanese nuclear weapon.

The United States’ position was primarily based around concerns that Taiwan’s pursuit of a nuclear weapon would sharply spike tensions in the Taiwan Strait. For Taipei, China’s acquisition of a nuclear weapon in the 1960s significantly increased its interest in acquiring the capability itself. As Denny Roy has cataloged, Taiwan’s nuclear weapons program kicked off in the late-1960s and involved several attempts to acquire foreign nuclear technology and develop its own enrichment technology.