In a context in which Deng Xiaoping had become incapacitated by advanced age, Jiang Zemin sought to stamp his authority on this major issue of the identity and unity of China by putting forward in Jannuary 1995 what were called his eight points for bringing about peaceful unification. Lee Teng-hui answered these in April, and it was then announced in May that a meeting between the (unofficial) representatives of the two sides would take place in Beijing in July. It was at this point that Clinton gave in to bipartisan pressure in Congress to allow Lee Teng-hui to make a private visit to his alma mater, Cornell University, in June to receive an honorary doctorate. Only a little earlier, Secretary of State Warren Christopher had assured his Chinese counterpart, Qian Qichen, that the visit would not take place. Contrary to what he had led his hosts to expect, Lee then delivered a highly political speech. Ever suspicious of Lee’s possible separatist agenda, especially as Washington supposedly encouraged it, Beijing decided that it had to show that it was serious about its preparedness to use force to stop Taiwan from separating from the mainland. In July, amid a campaign of vilification of Lee, Beijing launched several missile salvor into the Taiwan Strait, some eighty-five miles north and south of Taipei, and it also conducted threatening military exercises on its side of the Strait.