Six Assurances
The Six Assurances are six key foreign policy principles of the United States regarding United States–Taiwan relations. They were passed as unilateral U.S. clarifications to the Third Communiqué between The [United States of America|the United States] and the [People's Republic of China] in 1982. They were intended to reassure both Taiwan and the United States Congress that the US would continue to support Taiwan even if it had earlier cut formal diplomatic relations.
The assurances were originally proposed by the then Kuomintang government of the Republic of China on Taiwan during negotiations between the U.S. and the People's Republic of China. The U.S. Reagan administration agreed to the assurances and informed the United States Congress of them in July 1982.
Today, the Six Assurances are part of semiformal guidelines used in conducting relations of Taiwan#United States|relations] between the US and Taiwan. The assurances have been generally reaffirmed by successive U.S. administrations. Prior to 2016, they were purely informal, but in 2016, their formal content was adopted by the US House of Representatives and the Senate in non-binding resolutions, upgrading their status to formal but not directly enforceable.
Legislative history
The United States House of Representatives passed a concurrent resolution on May 16, 2016, giving the first formal wording for the Six Assurances by more or less directly adopting how the former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs John H. Holdridge expressed them in 1982 :A similar resolution passed the Senate on July 6, 2016.
Reaffirmation
The State Department has reaffirmed the Six Assurances repeatedly.On May 19, 2016, one day before Tsai Ing-wen assumed the Presidency of the Republic of China, U.S. Senators Marco Rubio, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and Bob Menendez, former chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and co-chair of the Senate Taiwan Caucus, introduced a concurrent resolution reaffirming the Taiwan Relations Act and the “Six Assurances” as cornerstones of United States–Taiwan relations.
The 2016 Republican Party platform affirmed the Six Assurances to Taiwan, supported the Taiwan Relations Act, opposed unilateral changes to the status quo, and endorsed peaceful resolution of cross-strait issues.
The Asia Reassurance Initiative Act states that it is the policy of the U.S. to enforce commitments to Taiwan consistent with the Six Assurances. As of September 2018, the Donald Trump administration "has stated that the U.S.-Taiwan relationship is also 'guided' by 'Six Assurances'".
In November 2020 U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo stated “Taiwan has not been a part of China, and that was recognized with the work that the Reagan administration did to lay out the policies that the United States has adhered to now for three and a half decades, and done so under both administrations.” which was seen as invoking clause 5.
The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021 reconfirmed the Taiwan Relations Act and the Six Assurances as the foundation for US-Taiwan relations.
On August 2, 2022, Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, in a statement from a visit to Taiwan, made reference to the United States' continuing support of the TRA, Three Communiqués, and the Six Assurances.
The Six Assurances to Taiwan Act, introduced in the US House in May 2025, will, if passed, codify the Six Assurances into law.