In 1790, the new President of the United States George Washington and Secretary of War Henry Knox ordered General Josiah Harmar to launch the Harmar campaign, a major western offensive into the Shawnee and Miami country. General Harmar's ultimate goal was Kekionga, a large Native American city that was important to the British trade economy, and that protected a strategic portage between the Great Lakes Basin and Mississippi watershed. Washington, as early as 1784, had told Henry Knox that a strong U.S. post should be established at Kekionga. Knox, however, was concerned that a U.S. fort at Kekionga would provoke the Indians and denied St. Clair's request to build a fort there. St. Clair, in 1790, had told both Washington and Knox that "we will never have peace with the Western Nations until we have a garrison there." Western native leaders, meanwhile, met at Kekionga to determine a response to the Treaty of Fort Harmar.