Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
"The reality was more prosaic. China was on its knees after two decades of bitter warfare, the population was impoverished, the enemy --Chiang Kai-shek's nationalists--we're still not defeated, having withdrawn to the island of Taiwan, and October 1 was just an arbitrary date for the celebrations." [1001 Days]
"By 1949, many in the Truman administration had given up support of Chiang Kai-shek in disgust, viewed the “rump” government in Taiwan with contempt, and were thinking of following the British in recognizing Mao’s Communist regime." [Kennedy: Great Powers, p. 383]