U.S. immigration policy toward the People's Republic of China bloc. In February 1950, after months of hard bargaining, China and the Soviet Union signed the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance, valid until 1980. Many Americans were at a loss of what to do in regards to foreign policy concerning mainland China. The debate which took place in the United States as a result of the removal of the Kuomintang and Chiang Kai-shek to the island of Taiwan centered on Republican charges that the Democrats "lost" China. "Without question, the critics had by early 1949 convinced many Americans that Truman was, shockingly, abandoning China, China being equivalent with
Taiwan independence movement and change the island's name from the “Republic of China” to “Taiwan,” and apply for membership in the United Nations. A second view is that Taiwan is already an independent nation with the official name “Republic Of China,” which has been independent (i.e. de facto separate from mainland China) since the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, when the ROC lost control of mainland China, with only Taiwan (including the Penghu islands), Kinmen, the Matsu Islands off the coast of Fujian Province, and some of the islands in the South China Sea remaining under its administration. Although previously