I was pleasantly surprised today when my “google alert” for Ronald Reagan sent me an article from Focus Taiwan titled “U.S. senators introduce bill to prevent changes to ‘Six Assurances'“. I guess I was surprised because it’s been a while since I reread what I wrote in Chapter IX: The United States & China, Part I of my book, The Reagan Files 2025: The First Term (abridged) which covers some of the discussions leading up to the “Six Assurances”.
Here’s a little sneak peak into my research...
I’ve been really fascinated by Reagan, Trump and Free Trade as so many of us have lately thanks to the advertisement featuring President Reagan speaking about his disdain for tariffs. That ad featured a 1987 speech — I actually prefer the Nov. 11, 1983 speech to the Japanese National Diet in Tokyo (scroll to the end for that video).
What’s really interesting is that, yes, Reagan spoke out against tariffs all his life. A line he repeated or at least the sentiment he shared with the Japanese...
The Reagan Files is back.... sort of... I can't believe it was about 15 years ago that I started the original Reagan Files website. At the time digitization at the Reagan Library was practically non-existent and I had so much material I wanted to share that putting it up on a website became a must-do at the time. I loved that website and I particularly loved some of the collaborations I was able to put together.
Fast-forward to about 10 years later and all of a sudden the National Archives...