Canadian diplomacy and the Offshore Islands Crisis, 1954 1955: A limited national interest
In September 1954 forces from the People's Republic of China began shelling Chinese Nationalist positions on the tiny offshore islands that lay between the mainland and Formosa (present day Taiwan) The outsized US response to this routine harassment sparked a Cold War confrontation that soon threatened to escalate out of control. This paper explores Canada's stake in that crisis. It follows Ottawa's early reaction to the events in the straits and traces foreign minister Lester B. Pearson's mediatory efforts to promote negotiations and a peaceful settlement. Pearson's liberal internationalist impulses, the paper argues, were always balanced and shaped by a realist calculation of where Canada's national interest lay. His doubts about the wisdom of US policy and his commitment to allied unity ensured that he beat a dignified retreat when the circumstances for peacemaking proved unpropitious.