Deng Xiaoping and China's Foreign Policy [1 ed.] 1138221694, 9781138221697

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Deng Xiaoping and China’s Foreign Policy

Deng Xiaoping is widely acknowledged as the principal architect of China’s economic reforms, but how far was he also responsible for shaping China’s foreign policy that emphasized peace and development? This book explores Deng’s foreign policy and shows how he established basic principles for China to have a foreign policy that supported economic development, stressed “harmony” in the world rather than “hegemony,” and which avoided conflict and nurtured a peaceful approach. The book outlines how Deng worked to normalize relations with both the United States and the Soviet Union, how he was disappointed by the lack of reciprocation by the United States, where relations are still portrayed in terms of “the China threat,” and how the principles established by Deng continue to be adhered to. Ronald C. Keith is an adjunct professor in the Department of International Business and Asian Studies at Griffith University, Australia.

Routledge Contemporary China Series

For our full list of available titles: https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Contemporary-China-Series/book-series/ SE0768 174 Interest Groups and New Democracy Movement in Hong Kong Edited by Sonny Shiu-Hing Lo 175 Civil Society in China and Taiwan Agency, class and boundaries Taru Salmenkari 176 Chinese Fans of Japanese and Korean Pop Culture Nationalistic narratives and international fandom Lu Chen 177 Emerging Adulthood in Hong Kong Social forces and civic engagement Chau-kiu Cheung 178 Citizenship, Identity and Social Movements in the New Hong Kong Localism after the Umbrella Movement Edited by Wai Man Lam and Luke Cooper 179 The Politics of Memory in Sinophone Cinemas and Image Culture Altering archives Edited by Peng Hsiao-yen and Ella Raidel 180 China’s Soviet Dream  Propaganda, culture, and popular imagination  Yan Li 181 Deng Xiaoping and China’s Foreign Policy Ronald C. Keith

Deng Xiaoping and China’s Foreign Policy Ronald C. Keith

First published 2018 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business  2018 Ronald C. Keith The right of Ronald C. Keith to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Keith, Ronald C., author. Title: Deng Xiaoping and China’s foreign policy / Ronald C. Keith. Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2018. | Series: Routledge contemporary China series ; 181 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017030975| ISBN 9781138221697 (hardback) | ISBN 9781315409696 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Deng, Xiaoping, 1904-1997. | Statesmen—China— Biography. | China—Foreign relations—1949Classification: LCC DS778.D46 K45 2018 | DDC 327.51009/048—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017030975 ISBN: 978-1-138-22169-7 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-40969-6 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Swales & Willis Ltd, Exeter, Devon, UK

In Memoriam: Professor Stuart R. Schram

Contents

List of abbreviations Preface and acknowledgements 1 Judging Deng Xiaoping’s foreign policy “pragmatism” 2 The roots and implications of Deng’s “independent foreign policy”

viii ix 1 68

3 Sino-American normalization without closure

122

4 Ideology and the Five Principles in Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian normalizations

172

5 Deng’s “independent foreign policy” and “independent globalization” 204 6 Deng and China’s contemporary foreign policy Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy References Index

235 263 269 278

Abbreviations

ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations CCP Chinese Communist Party CCPCC Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party CPSU Communist Party of the Soviet Union CPSUCC Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union FBIS Foreign Broadcast Information Service FRUS Foreign Relations of the United States MAC Military Affairs Committee (CCPCC) NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization PLA People’s Liberation Army PRC People’s Republic of China SCO Shanghai Cooperation Organization SEZ Special Economic Zone SWZEL Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, 2 vols. SWDXP Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, 3 vols. SWHJT Selected Works of Hu Jintao, 3 vols. SWJZM Selected Works of Jiang Zemin, 1 vol. SWMTT Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung (Mao Zedong), 5 vols. UN United Nations US United States USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics WTO Warsaw Treaty Organization XJPTZG Xi Jinping Talks on Ruling and Governance, 1 vol.

Preface and acknowledgements

I have been thinking about writing this book since the early 1990s publications of my Macmillan/St. Martin’s The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai and its three separate, 1990, 1991 and 2013 Chinese translations in Beijing. Now is perhaps the right time to publish a sequel, Deng Xiaoping and China’s Foreign Policy. Since then the debate surrounding China and whether it constitutes a “threat” still seems one-sided, and the unreserved extension of Cold War “realism” in the explanation of contemporary China has become more baffling in its persistence in the postCold War world. Moreover, since the early 1990s, a new generation of Chinese international relations scholarship has emerged, and with the elapse of time it is easier to assess the extent of the contemporary relevance of Deng’s foreign policy. I would make several preliminary comments. First, in the West, while Deng Xiaoping’s contribution to China’s economic reform has been widely recognized, his foreign policy has been underappreciated, when in fact it was one of the most successful foreign policies of the twentieth century. Deng’s relevance to China’s contemporary foreign policy, after almost forty years of changing international relations, is still quite salient. Succeeding Chinese leadership generations and their policies have deliberately reflected a continuity of perspective and method of analysis in their approach to new levels of multipolarity, economic globalization, international financial crisis, bilateral and regional free trade agreements, rising religious and ethnic clashes and spreading non-traditional security threats. Second, Western perspective on the “China threat” is a serious distortion that has stood in the way of positive foreign policy adaptations to China’s constructive engagement in international affairs, and this book seeks a correction to the related assumptions underlying the criticisms of Western realism. As the “world’s largest developing state” with an ancient civilization, Chinese foreign policy cannot be captured in the conventional understanding of the “rise and fall” of great powers. Deng’s emphasis on “development” has guided foreign policy formation since at least 1978. Third, Chinese emphasis on “peace” has often been described as a strategic deception that obscures China’s underlying aggressive motivation. The recent Chinese use of Chinese imperial history in the explanation of Chinese foreign policy has become the subject of Western cynicism stemming from assumptions melding China’s “totalitarianism” to Chinese civilization. Such criticism underestimates the importance of the inner content of Chinese foreign policy thinking

x  Preface and acknowledgements in a world where realism has increasingly squeezed out the remaining vestiges of idealism from the conduct of international relations. Furthermore, I completed this book in retirement and am grateful for related university funding for travel and provision of services and resources at the Department of International Business and Asian Studies and the Griffith Asia Institute at Griffith University, Australia. I would also thank Hou Kuikui for double-checking the Chinese characters. Finally, I have dedicated this book to the memory of my mentor and former School of Oriental and African Studies supervisor, Professor Stuart R. Schram. Professor Schram’s contribution to the study of Mao Zedong and modern China was inspiring, and behind his no-holds-barred intellectual force, there was a kind person. I would not like to burden him further with any of my interpretations, but he once told me that, like Luther, I should nail my thesis to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. This I have tried to do with the publication of the present book.

1 Judging Deng Xiaoping’s foreign policy “pragmatism”

When Former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt got together with Singapore’s former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew to reminisce about their heyday in international relations, Schmidt asked Lee who was the greatest leader of the twentieth century. Lee immediately replied: “Deng is undoubtedly the most impressive international leader I have ever met.”1 Schmidt had wanted to put Churchill in first place, but he agreed that Deng was “by far the number one communist who has been successful.” Lee interjected, “No, he is really not a communist. He is a pragmatist.”2 Schmidt and Lee did not consider whether it is possible to be a “communist” and a “pragmatist” at one and the same time. And this issue is one of the most important keys to understanding the nature and content of Deng’s foreign policy. Deng, himself, although he often spoke in the relevant terms of praxis and the need “to seek the truth from the facts” 实事求是, did not identify himself as a “pragmatist” as such. The closest he got was to suggest that he might be considered the leader of the “seeking the truth from the facts” faction. Deng sought to achieve his primary foreign policy goal of “peace and development” 和平与发展 on the basis of the “unity of theory and practice.” In these terms, his foreign policy was a striking success. So successful, in fact, that much of the structural edifice and fundamental qualitative assumptions of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” 独立自主外交政策 still lie at the core of contemporary Chinese foreign policy. In fact, in terms of its consistency, internal coherence and flexible achievement of its objectives, Deng’s “independent foreign policy” may be one of the most successful foreign policies of the twentieth century. Deng had impressive success in his overall objective to achieve a timely peaceful regional and international environment during which he laid the foundations for quadrupling of China’s GDP between 1980 and 2000. His “independent foreign policy” established an enduring policy framework by which China would modestly engage a changing world while focusing on the enormous challenge of domestic economic development. Deng assigned himself several major tasks. He surprised his Western critics when, despite major differences in social system, he brought to fruition Hong Kong’s transition to the mainland. This recovery of sovereignty was in and of

2  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” itself an amazing feat given the stark structural differences between the PRC’s socialist and Hong Kong’s capitalist systems. Deng similarly put to work the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence in order to end containment and to establish diplomatic relations with the US. His greatest regret was not having solved the Taiwan Question. Responsibility for the lack of real progress on the Taiwan Question may not be exclusive to Deng personally, as the Taiwan Relations Act threatened to transform America’s Taiwan policy into America’s China policy. Deng, however, managed despite weakened Sino-US normalization not only to avoid conflict, but also to accelerate national economic development with the help of US investment and technological transfer. When relations with the US were severely tested in the attempt to sanction China for the suppression of demonstrators in Tiananmen Square in 1989, Deng was matter-of-fact, saying: “If there is nothing else we’re good at, we’re good at withstanding sanctions.”3 In the face of the worldwide media storm after Tiananmen Square, and by applying “dual tactics” and playing the “economy card,” he staved off another round of benighted containment. Deng’s sponsorship of a widening pattern of state-to-state normalizations based on the Five Principles also pre-empted Soviet encirclement of China and helped undercut Soviet expansionism in Asia. Deng initiated normalization with the US, Japan and Europe, and this pattern ultimately developed to include the Soviet Union, Russia, India and even Vietnam. While Deng arrested the development of Vietnamese control over Cambodia and Laos, he lived to see the signing of a joint communique of friendship with Vietnam. His calm leadership weathered the apocalyptic implosion of the Soviet Union and the creation of fifteen new states in its wake. His foreign policy effectively dealt with a wide range of related old and new border issues. The Soviet collapse could easily have generated perennial conflict, but China positively cooperated with the Russian Federation to ensure border stability in the near abroad. Indeed, success in Central Asia prepared the way for the later development of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, again based on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. With such regional developments, the “great game” increasingly passed into history as new concepts of security took hold.

Understanding Deng’s “pragmatic” foreign policy Deng Xiaoping has a reputation in the West for “pragmatism” in all areas of policy pertaining to modernization and economic development, but what are the specific origins of his supposedly “pragmatic” foreign policy, and how is the latter to be judged and analysed? The discussion throughout this book explains the roots and implications of Deng’s foreign policy with inclusive reference to his values, ideology, and personality as well as to Chinese history, society and culture. At the outset, it is important to note that Deng, while he revised ideology, he never repudiated ideology itself. He was particularly interested in an ideological synthesis of “idealism” and “realism” stressing the “unity of theory and practice” 理论和实际统一. His idealism centred on ensuring China’s economic

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  3 development to the benefit of the Chinese people. His “realism” focused on how to flexibly achieve his ideals through the dialectical calculation of advantage and disadvantage that informs the contradictions that shape reality. For Deng, dialectical observation was so inductively disciplined as to constitute a form of “scientific” inquiry. Foreign observers often think of Deng as interested in practice in the sense of solving real problems as opposed to theorists who indulge in flights of ideological fancy. However, Chinese analysis has a different understanding of Deng’s practice and influence. Party General Secretary Hu Jintao, for example, in a 2007 speech at the Great Hall of the People at the end of a month-long celebration of the birth centenary of Deng Xiaoping, stressed the potentiality of Deng’s “scientific theories”: “Comrade Deng Xiaoping is a great man of the world whose remarkable achievements and scientific theories will, as they already did, continue to change and influence China and the world at large.”4 Popular Western definition often takes “pragmatism” as antithetical to ideology. One of the world’s most widely acclaimed “pragmatists,” former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, on looking back on the trials and tribulations of the SinoAmerican relationship, asked: “Is pragmatism enough” 实用主义就够了?5 The question is, itself, problematic. It presumes that beyond expediency there is some kind of ultimate end, and it presumes across states and societies there is a consistent definition of “pragmatism” that can serve as a common yardstick to measure how different foreign policies have managed changing international relations. Kissinger argued that in the conduct of international relations simple expedient response to power is not enough to sustain peace. One of his Western-trained Chinese biographers, Zhou Yijun, has suggested that Kissinger’s own “realism” was moderated by his concern that states recognize each other’s respective interests.6 Values, especially order, must be articulated and applied in foreign policy. Peking University professors Gong Honglie and Gao Jinhu’s study of Kissinger’s foreign policy confirmed this a priori interest in order and cited Kissinger: “If history teaches us anything, it is that there can be no peace without the balance [of power] and no justice without limits.”7 Indeed, in the West, “pragmatism” and “realism” are often synonymous particularly in deference to the expediency of power in dealing with the shortcomings of the human condition and the anarchy of the state system. Deng Xiaoping, like many Chinese leaders of his generation, saw in the balance of power a negative trend spawning disorder and war. Alliances fostered challenges to the sovereign equality of states. Great power responsibility often became a form of “bullying,” and “hegemony” usually came at the manifest expense of smaller states’ national self-determination and development. Deng could readily agree that “pragmatism” is not enough; however, he was more focused on achieving social justice rather than order. He could not imagine politics without ideals. The very idea of expediently dealing with reality without reference to the achievement of ideals was foreign to his thinking and experience. Deng built his foreign policy on the basis of a specifically Chinese synthesis of “idealism” and “realism,” and this synthesis is best explained with comprehensive

4  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” reference to Deng’s personality, revolutionary experience, and to his values and ideological and political commitments. Interpretation of Deng’s synthesis of idealism and realism fundamentally challenges the assumption of a “China threat.” Deng’s “independent foreign policy,” which focused on “peace and development,” disagreed with Western “realism,” which according to the Dictionary of World Politics “. . . in one form or another has dominated both academic considerations of world politics and the thinking of foreign policy-makers themselves.”8 This book contends that the Cold War fear of Chinese domination was predicated in a flawed identification and interpretation of the substantive internal priorities of China’s foreign policy. This resulted in one of modern history’s greatest lost diplomatic opportunities for the full and cooperative inclusion of China in a more progressive world order. The relatively benign, if not refreshingly positive, nature of Chinese foreign policy under Deng Xiaoping has explicitly and comprehensively conflicted with the notion of “China threat”中国威胁. Indeed, even after Chinese foreign policy rejected alliances and “card-playing” and flexibly overcame US-led containment to establish a healthy open-ended range of diplomatic relations, this manufactured “China threat” has seemingly inexplicably compounded the lost opportunity of the Cold War years down to the present.

Deng Xiaoping as a personality and as a leader The study of Deng’s foreign policy needs some biographical context. Chinese biographers Deng Rong and Gao Yi lauded Deng, who regarded himself as a “son of the Chinese people” 中国人民的儿子.9 Deng and Gao claimed that in thought and action Deng always put the needs of the Chinese people first. The question is how did he do this? Deng Xiaoping’s personality comprised a series of dualisms that, whilst striking different chords, often resolved into a resonant harmony. Mao praised Deng, noting his “God-given talent” and “firm character behind a gentle appearance.”10 Deng was modest, honest and patient, yet ambitious, self-confident and depending on the circumstances, either cautious or decisive in his foreign policy. He was both a Party man devoted to public service and a very effective Party leader who could bring complex policy to a successful conclusion. He was unassuming yet known for his sharp observations in Party debate. During his seventy-year career in the Party leadership, he had been through the distress and anomie associated with three falls from power or “three falls and three rises” 三落三起.11 Deng was a seasoned survivor who late in his career implicitly, at least, drew the contrast between Mao’s arbitrary arrogance and his own personal modesty. He studied the big picture but would not suffer fools with big ideas and no experience. He was direct in speech and economical in his use of words. He strongly believed in ideals and discipline, yet he was extraordinarily flexible in achieving his goals. At times, he exhibited flashes of anger; however, in the

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  5 context of existential crisis, he was calm and steadfast while everyone around him was losing their heads. He was usually cautious in his use of force, but he would not back down in defending China against great power “bullying” and those who would “play the tyrant.” How did he place himself and China in the wider world? Deng was born in 1904 before the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1911. He was a young nationalist before he became a socialist. As an impressionable young nationalist, he witnessed the angst of China’s youth who genuinely feared China’s very destruction. He travelled a long way from the countryside of Sichuan. From the outset, Deng strongly believed in learning particularly as he wished to make himself useful to China. As former Party General Secretary Hu Jintao put it in 2016, Deng was completely focused on “saving the country, and saving the people” 救国救民.12 During World War I, at the age of sixteen, Deng went to France. Although he did not learn French, he was keen to expand his horizons and engaged with the European world, joining the Communist youth movement under the mentorship of Zhou Enlai. He then studied at the Sun Yat-sen University in Moscow for one year. Mao Zedong, himself, confirmed in his own autobiography that he had also considered going to France, but decided to stay behind. Mao conceded that he was not good at foreign languages and needed to know more about his own country.13 Possibly, there was more than one way to serve the Chinese people. There is a more important comparison between Mao and Deng. Mao is often associated with the notion “study, study and study some more” 学习, 学习, 再 学子. They both believed that it was important to study “the strong points of all countries” so as to learn something that could benefit China. Both deliberately thought about China and the world. Their study called for open-minded but critical independent thinking that investigated reality on the formal basis of dialectics. Both believed that it was very important to learn from the outside world, but they were equally impatient with the dogmatic copying of foreign experience without regard for China’s specific conditions. The importation of ideas, organization and technology required conscious adaptation to the latter. How did Deng conceptualize learning particularly in light of China’s tremendous literary tradition and respect for erudition? Deng professed at the end of his selected works: “I haven’t read many books, but there is one thing I believe in: Chairman Mao’s principle of seeking the truth from the facts.”14 Deng and Mao agreed on the key relation between knowledge and praxis. Without practice, knowledge was little more than bookishness. Praxis helps define alternative strategies and gives rise to creative thinking; thus, it is the key to success in flexibly dealing with changing realities. Deng is credited with statements supporting the thinking that comes with practice: “If a party, a state or a nation proceeds in everything on the basis of books, is rigid in its way of thinking and practices blind worship, it will not be able to advance and its life will cease.”15 Mao felt the same way. In a rather interesting insight on how those with “little learning” can overthrow those “with more learning,” he took the following cue from Ming dynastic history:

6  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Only two of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty did well, T’ai-tsu and Ch’eng-tsu. One was illiterate and the other only knew a few characters. Afterwards . . . in the Chia-ch’ing reign when the intellectuals had power, things were in a bad state. . . To read too many books is harmful.16 As for reading Marxist books, Mao thought reading “a few dozen” would be sufficient. He believed that time and space are infinite and that philosophy could not handle an infinity of contradictions. Its weakness was that “it hadn’t produced practical philosophy, but only bookish philosophy.”17 Deng was not against books per se. He enjoyed reading. However, he shared Mao’s impatience with “book worship,” which he contrasted with the importance of praxis based on “seeking the truth from the facts” 实事求是. According to the recollections of his children, Deng liked to read Lenin’s Collected Works, the Selected Works of Marx and Engels, the Selected Works of Mao Zedong and the History of the Twenty-Four Dynasties, The Annals of the Three Kingdoms, as well as the biographies of famous foreigners such as Marshal Zhukov and foreign classical novels such as Tolstoy’s War and Peace.18 Deng continuously espoused modesty as essential to learning, but to use the Western idiom, he was a “straight shooter.” When he wanted to make a point with foreign leaders, Deng did not dally with diplomatic niceties. On the one hand, Deng liked modesty, especially when learning. On the other, he disliked opportune or obsequious self-deprecating modesty. Like Zhou Enlai, he was naturally genuine in dealing with differences of opinion and conflict that characterized the changing political and economic realities of international relations. Mao no doubt agreed with Deng that Marxism is a “plain thing, a very plain truth.”19 Conceptually, however, Marxism was both an ideology and a science. Deng believed in Mao’s ideology, but he hated “empty talk” 空话, especially that of Mao’s ultra-leftist supporters. A key point of modern temporal reference was the Cultural Revolution of 1966–76. It was full of “empty talk.” It deliberately sought to destroy China’s tradition. It broke the relation between words and deeds; it led to lying and the failure to solve problems, and the widespread malicious destruction of the reputations of comrades. Deng believed in ideals, and he believed in praxis.20 His leadership style reiterated the importance of honesty and modesty explicitly as part of the inductive science of the Party’s mass line and implicitly as part of the historical preferences of the Chinese people. The ancient philosopher, Han Fei-tzu (280–233 B.C.) had once claimed that “honest advice hurts the ears” 忠言逆耳, but “it induces good conduct” 利于行. Deng’s solution to “empty talk” and political dishonesty was to apply the “scientific” basis of Mao Zedong Thought particularly where it recommended “seeking the truth from the facts.” Deng’s insistence on honestly dealing with reality explains his foreign policy objections to the exaggeration of China’s national power. His related low-posture foreign policy was not self-effacing, but it was almost always on the mark in accepting the limits of China’s national power.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  7 Deng was a leading party organizer for most of his career. He had absorbed the Leninist notion of leadership in Moscow in 1926. In post-1949 China, he often took the lead in Party-building and especially important was his Party-building after the Cultural Revolution. Deng became a steady helmsman. He was a better Leninist than Mao, who at times would purposefully, and more often than not opportunistically, descend into “chaos.” Deng did not share Mao’s fascination with the somersaulting Monkey King, Sun Wukong, who had mastered seventy-two metamorphoses. As a Party man, Deng did not like personality cults. He, however, was useful to Mao in that he helped Mao overcome the spreading implications of Stalin’s personality cult in China. Deng’s mandate was the same as the Party, namely, “seeking the truth from the facts” 实事求是. As paramount leader, unlike Mao, Deng’s picture was not prominently displayed over the entrance to the imperial palace in Beijing.21 He tutored the whole Party in its “three great work styles” 三大作风 that included integrating theory with practice, forging links with the masses and practicing self-criticism. In what must have been a painful personal eulogy on the death of Zhou Enlai, Deng stressed that what he admired most about his “elder brother” was his prudence and modesty. In solving problems, he deployed the latter Party “workstyle” that had successfully solved the real problems of China’s revolution and transition to socialism through empirical investigation and rigorous dialectical understanding. Bureaucratic formalism and organizational apathy were political sins. Deng loathed “discussions without decisions, decisions without implementation, and endless procrastination and delays in solving problems.”22

“Pragmatism” and Deng’s Chinese socialist ideology Deng was pragmatic as both a nationalist and a socialist. He had a strong commitment to his ideals, but in attaining his ideals he was an “old soldier” who would not be so silly as “to throw an egg against a rock” 以卵投石. He would not throw himself against a wall of enemy steel in a futile gesture of defiance. He was, however, incredibly flexible in his achievement of his ideals. How far he was prepared to go in sacrificing socialism’s truth to his intuitive “pragmatism”? There is a significant division of opinion on this, both in China and the West. On his 81st birthday, the Chinese press honoured Deng with a new song singing his praises: “Xiaoping, hello. Lands frozen in the past today are becoming fertile/ Ships grounded in the past today weigh anchor and sail/ Things lost in the past today are returning twofold.”23 His much vaunted “pragmatism” has often been captured in his favourite metaphor, “groping the rocks on the river bed to cross to the other side of the river” 摸着石头过河. Cheeky 1980s’ Chinese rock and roll lyrics had suggested, however, that he was so busy staring at the riverbed and feeling his way from rock to rock on the riverbed that he forgot to look up to see socialism on the far bank of the river. If Deng’s “groping for rocks on the riverbed” was often seen as a metaphor for his “pragmatism” in Western commentary, the underlying assumption appears to be that if Deng was a “pragmatist,” he could not be a Marxist. Capitalism was

8  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” expected to spawn pragmatism. Deng knew full well that Western observers were interested in whether or not he had turned to capitalism and away from Marx. Several times, Mao had favourably commented on Deng’s dialectics and his ideological talents, but in 1976 he faulted Deng one last time for having failed genuinely to support class struggle. Mao’s last pronouncement on Deng was mealy-mouthed: “He has never been a Marxist.”24 When the US TV correspondent Mike Wallace interviewed him in 2 September 1986, Wallace cleverly enquired what would Marx and Mao have to say to him when he goes to see God. Deng simply said: “I am a Marxist. . . . We made the revolution, seized power and founded the People’s Republic of China because we had this faith and this ideal.”25 Any assumption that Deng was a closet capitalist whose pragmatism superceded his ideology might well have been put to rest in light of Deng’s strident defence of Chinese socialism during the Tiananmen Square events of the spring of 1989. A critical Party biographer and former associate of Party General Secretary Hu Yaobang, Ruan Ming, has alternatively suggested that Deng was all about Deng. Deng’s much vaunted “pragmatism” was not so much about the liberation of thought, as suggested in the Chinese press, nor about economic efficiency, as suggested in Western praise of his economic reform. It was nothing more than an opportunist’s ambition to stay in power. In summing up Ruan’s Deng Xiaoping: Chronicle of Empire, Professor Andrew Nathan succinctly summed up this point of view when he said Deng’s “pragmatism” was “not about guiding China across the river to a specified place on the other bank, but about crossing the river without slipping on the rocks.”26 Deng has both admirers and detractors in the West. He occasionally did “slip on the rocks,” but he had extraordinary resilience. He could be brutally honest. He never claimed the personal grace of Zhou Enlai. He once confessed: “I have three vices. I drink, I spit, and I smoke.”27 His accuracy with the spittoon was legendary. Henry Kissinger, who had been charmed by the gracious Mandarin-like sophistication of Zhou Enlai, reportedly described Deng as a “nasty little man.”28 Kissinger did not have the same natural rapport with Deng. In On China, Kissinger acknowledges that he needed time to “adjust to Deng’s acerbic, no-nonsense style, his occasional sarcastic interjections, and his disdain of the philosophical in favor of the eminently practical.” Kissinger then wrote that over time he came to have “enormous regard for this doughty little man with the melancholy eyes.”29 The late MIT expert on Asian political culture and former president of the American Political Science Association, Professor Lucien Pye, amplified the “nasty little man” characterization. He held Deng down on his psychiatrist’s couch. He described him as “a short man sitting in an overstuffed chair” whose “ritualized, cackled laugh” shows “no real feelings.”30 Pye’s extraordinary list of Deng’s personal shortcomings included a “limp” handshake, a “provincial Chinese haircut,” a “garbled” Sichuan accent and a neck so short that it was “almost missing.” Despite his short stature and missing neck, Deng was very popular with foreign leaders and delegations. Professor Ezra Vogel’s 2011 magisterial biography

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  9 offers a convincing and extraordinarily documented interpretation of Deng’s style and his positive impact on foreigners: But even when they did not like what he had to say, foreign visitors, from different social positions and different parties, from large countries and small, ended up feeling comfortable with him. They felt he was someone with whom they could do business.31 Mao cultivated his personal mystique and liked to speak in grand philosophical metaphors. He left his guests with a sense of wonder and awe even if they were not sure what he meant. Deng respected foreign leaders by saying exactly what he meant. There was no shilly-shallying. Vogel cites Zbigniew Brzezinski’s shrewd characterization of Deng after a two-hour meeting and dinner: Deng immediately appealed to me. Bright, alert and shrewd, he was quick on the uptake, with a good sense of humour, tough and very direct. . . . I was impressed by his sense of purpose and drive; . . . The Chinese side speaks straightforwardly about their views and ideas.” Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew painted a picture altogether different than Pye in his May 2012 tour d’horizon with former West German Chancellor Schmidt: “A physically small man, but a giant of a leader – Deng is undoubtedly the most impressive international leader I have ever met.”

Differing views on Deng’s “pragmatism” When President Reagan’s secretary of state, Alexander Haig, contended with others in the US administration over China policy, he argued that Chinese pragmatism could serve as a “bridge” between the First and the Third Worlds. Haig summed up: [China’s] present leaders, practical men weary of impractical theory and revolutionary religiosity, are trying within the limits of prudence to bring about [the meeting of the First and Third Worlds]. And within the limits of prudence, the United States must join them. . . . In this I was stubbornly opposed by other men in the administration who could not bring themselves to believe that not all Communists are the same, that national interests are at least as reliable guide to national behaviour as ideology, and American interests can sometimes be served by arrangements with such people as the leaders of China.32 Indeed, not all Communists are the same! Nixon had personally noted this very same point in his dialogues with China’s leaders in Beijing. However was Nixon aware that Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping all shared the same negative perspective on American “pragmatism”? There is plenty of room for disagreement.

10  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Kissinger was enamoured of Zhou’s pragmatism. He was less qualified than Nixon. Nixon claimed that his “most vivid memory” of his February 1972 “journey for peace” was “the unique personality of Chou En-lai.” Nixon thought of Zhou as both rigidly ideological and extremely knowledgeable “in broad terms about men and history.”33 Nixon may have come closer to the mark than Kissinger in that he sensed the Chinese leadership was somehow, at one and the same time, ideological and pragmatic. Peking University Professor Ye Zicheng’s study of Chinese foreign policy thought has suggested that the “realism” 现实主义 that underlie Deng’s foreign policy was rooted in his adherence to “seeking the truth from the facts,” which is premised in the unity of theory and praxis, and in his personal “optimism” 东观主义.34 On reviewing both Western and Chinese eulogy and criticism, this book concludes that Deng was a strong leader with ideals. Over the years, he did not abandon his commitment to ideals, but he did seek to realize these ideals through the deliberate unity of theory and praxis. “Pragmatism” brought together theory about ideals and values with practical experience in applying theory. Deng believed in theory, but he was not above changing it in light of practice, and in his pursuit of China’s modernization, his praxis included bold experiments. Deng was determined to realize his goals of national economic development. He had not only actively led an unprecedented national process of economic development, he was also the architect of a closely related foreign policy that greatly facilitated this development. His economic reform needed a companion foreign policy that maximized China’s technological imports, trading and investment opportunities while ensuring China’s “independence and self-reliance” and avoiding extraneous and costly alliance commitments. Arguably, ideology has been devalued in Western analysis of Chinese foreign policy. Professor Samuel Kim once wrote that while Chinese theoretical concepts had a “major impact on the shaping and legitimation of a PRC political identity,” there was no reason to conclude that such theory had provided a “pervasive and long-lasting operational guide for seeking China’s proper role in a state-centric world.”35 This is to underestimate the role that ideology has had in helping shape as well as legitimate Chinese foreign policy. Some observers have faulted China experts for gorging on the forbidden fruits of official Chinese ideology in their explanation of the understanding of the nature of the Chinese regime and its policies. Professor Lucien Pye’s obituary of Deng claimed to detect a “bias” that is “all too common among China scholars” and that is the tendency to regard unduly “Beijing’s official positions” as “the focus of analysis.”36 Rather than dismissed out of hand, such positions ought, however, to be included in the comprehensive analysis of Chinese policy. A careful, social scientific reading of such positions can yield critically important insights into Chinese thinking and decision-making. Contemporary realists have claimed, however, that foreign policy and diplomacy, predicated in “official positions,” are largely irrelevant to the Chinese consideration of power. Regardless of such recriminations, Deng’s foreign policy

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  11 needs explanation with appropriately qualified reference not only with respect to Deng’s explanation of the realities of power but also with respect to his own hard-fought values and the ideological emphasis on Chinese nationalism. Deng never said that he wanted to become an American pragmatist. His revolutionary experience produced a modern Chinese ideology that he was not about to disavow because of foreign sensitivities. Deng was deeply impressed with Western technology and knowledge, but he was also forthright in his criticism of Western society: “The people in capitalist countries do not, and cannot possibly, share any common ideal; many of them simply don’t have any ideals at all.37 Perhaps it is a point worth debating. Certainly, Deng’s own motivation was clear. He was a strong advocate of the “open door” policy, but he warned that “undesirable foreign things” could smash through China’s door like a “battering ram.” He acknowledged that he was sometimes frustrated with prying foreign “bourgeois scholars” who “oppose the very things we believe in.”38 In response to the related dangers of “bourgeois liberalism,” Deng emphasized the importance of Party “ideals” and “discipline” in the critically independent sifting of foreign ideas. In this, he and Mao were surprisingly on the same wave length, and this goes a long way to explaining his rather complicated relationship with Mao Zedong, who was so instrumental in shaping Deng’s later career. Also, as a self-proclaimed “son of the Chinese people,” Deng practiced “seeking the truth from the facts.” Rather than dismissing ends in politics, he sought the best practical way to achieve his Chinese socialist ends. He was open to Western ideas and experience that could serve China. He was also a Chinese socialist critic of, and, not an admiring student of, Western realism. Deng, however, was no xenophobe. His nationalism was strong, but neither “narrow,” nor “raw.” As outlined in this chapter and the next, in inner Party debates, he repeatedly rejected Chinese exceptionalism. He was very interested in learning from the West but on his own Chinese terms. Helmut Schmidt and Lee Kuan Yew were agreed that Deng was “prepared to learn” and that this was the key to his impressive leadership.39

“Pragmatism,” party politics and Mao and Deng It is well known that Deng was mentored and supported by Premier Zhou Enlai over his entire career. However, Deng also had a long-standing and critically important political relationship with Mao. Ideologically, Deng’s position on praxis was formally the same as that of Mao Zedong. Deng often enjoyed Mao’s respect because of this. Politically, at key points in Party crisis such as in January 1935, he was there for Mao when others opportunistically distanced themselves from him in inner Party struggles. Classical Chinese wisdom remarks on how important such loyalty can be: “integrity shows itself clearly in adverse circumstances. Certainly Deng was more than a fair-weather friend 酒肉朋友. In 1953, in a major plot to unseat Mao, influential Party leader Gao Gang solicited Deng’s support. Much to Gao’s discomfort Deng openly sided with Mao.40 When Deng, in 1956, was responsible for reporting on Party matters and

12  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” the serious question of personality cult, Deng took some of the heat off Mao by identifying him as the author of the March 1949 Party regulations prohibiting the “glorification” of individuals and interdicting Party leader birthday celebrations and the naming of public places after the leaders.41 “Chinese comrades” were not to be placed “on par with Marx, Engels, Lenin or Stalin.”42 While lauding collective leadership and democratic centralism, Deng generalized the issue of personality cult. Rather than focusing specifically on the leadership of Stalin and Mao, he drew attention to “another kind” of “people” whom be criticized for “revers[ing] the relations between the Party and people.” Such people, who were “swollen with conceit and self-complacency,” were responsible for “exaggerating the role of the individual.”43 Claiming that a lesson had been learned at the 20th National Congress of the CPSU, Deng also insisted: “Love for the leader is essentially an expression of love for the interests of the Party, the class and the people, and not the deification of the individual.”44 Deng subsequently supported Mao on decisions concerning the Anti-Rightist Campaign and the Great Leap Forward. One of his biographers, Professor David Goodman, has suggested that Mao found Deng to be so politically reliable such that Deng acted as Mao’s “eyes and ears.”45 In his last years, Mao descended into a vortex of heady contradictions. The great dialectician was unable to practice dialectics. Although he had been on the receiving end of Mao’s denunciations, Deng refused to support de-Maoification. As a “son of the Chinese people,” he himself had suffered the humiliating arbitrariness of Mao’s leadership but he still regarded Mao as the very “symbol of our country.” Deng had personally witnessed and was not impressed with de-Stalinization. He told the Italian Journalist, Oriana Fallaci: “We will not do to Chairman Mao what Khrushchev did to Stalin.”46 Deng did make changes to, or re-interpreted some of Mao’s key policies, but he kept Mao’s ideology to legitimate the “four modernizations” and “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” In a major speech of 30 March 1979, Deng clarified: “The cause and the thought of Mao Zedong are not his alone: they are likewise those of his comrades-in-arms, the Party and the people. His thought is the crystallization of the experience of the Chinese people’s revolutionary struggle over half a century.”47 In sum, to overturn Mao’s thought would not only involve overturning the Party, but also Chinese history, itself. Deng revised Mao’s foreign policy in important ways, but he anchored his foreign policy in the generational wisdom of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. Most importantly, this Thought had a lot to do with solving problems through the application of dialectics that sought to identify and resolve contradictions in changing domestic and international social and political reality. Such analysis also encouraged thinking about how domestic and international affairs are linked. Deng claimed that both Mao and Zhou had originated the notion of “four modernizations.” The latter had to be achieved on the basis of Mao Zedong’s credo of “seeking the truth from the facts.” Western observations were not especially sensitized to the relevance of Deng’s ideology to his foreign policy. Deng rejected

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  13 the extreme ideology of the Cultural Revolution. On the other hand, he canonized Mao Zedong Thought so as to legitimate modernization policies. And while modernization required new levels of trade and investment, Deng still insisted in the post-containment context on opposing “hegemonism” in world affairs. He rejected “superpower” status for China even as he sought to open China’s door wider to allow China to participate in the “world technological revolution.” Late in the Cultural Revolution, Mao turned against ultra-leftist revolutionary diplomacy that had focused on ever-widening class struggle at the international level and the export of Mao’s thought throughout Asia. Over the vociferous objections of his wife, Jiang Qing, Mao ordered Vice-Premier Deng to make the first speech by a senior Chinese leader to the UN General Assembly on 10 April 1974. Deng’s New York debut was the first opportunity for a Chinese leader to appear before the UN to set out for the world the conceptual base for China’s foreign policy. It was one of the most extraordinary moments in modern Chinese diplomatic history.

Deng’s UN debut: “China will never become a superpower!” Deng’s UN debut was personally poignant and immensely gratifying, as he had been pilloried by extreme leftists in the Cultural Revolution for “national betrayal” and for having undermined Chairman Mao’s principle of “self-reliance.” In choosing Deng to go to New York, Mao rejected leftist “revolutionary diplomacy” and returned to the pre-Cultural Revolutionary policy of “independence and self-reliance” that he and Zhou Enlai had sponsored in the mid-1950s. It had been a long and arduous political struggle to acquire the China seats at the UN. The UN victory was sweet, but there was little Chinese triumphalism. China’s new UN diplomacy professed a curious modesty. Deng took the lead, but participated with Zhou Enlai and Foreign Minister Qiao Guanhua in preparing the speech that Mao ultimately approved. Rather than claiming new power status for China, Deng insisted that China would never become a “superpower”: China is not a superpower, nor will she ever seek to be one. What is a superpower? A superpower is an imperialist country which everywhere subjects other countries to its aggression, interference, control, subversion or plunder and strives for world hegemony. . . . should [China] change her colour and turn into a superpower, if she too should play the tyrant in the world, and everywhere subject others to her bullying, aggression and exploitation, the people of the world should identify her as social-imperialism, expose it, oppose it and work together with the Chinese people to overthrow it.48 What an interesting moral disclaimer! This was not how great powers were supposed to rise. China was not going to “play the tyrant” in the world and would not “bully” the developing countries. China’s vice-premier made a sweeping gesture. He issued an open invitation to overthrow Beijing should China ever become a “superpower.” Deng later claimed that if China with its huge population was to take

14  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” the “capitalist road” and seek “hegemony,” this would be a sorry “retrogression of history” and “a disaster for the world”.49 American observers were not impressed. Kissinger did not think that Deng was very forthcoming and wondered if he was on some sort of training mission. American diplomatic opinion also suggested that Deng’s emphasis on national independence and self-reliance represented a retrogressive economic nationalism that conflicted with rising interdependence in the modern world economy.50 Deng had claimed that no matter what happens in the future, China would “never play the tyrant” and for all time would reject the hypocrisy of playing the great power game. Such protestation challenges Western realist assumptions that Deng was intuitively a card-playing realist who once unleashed would project China’s power on to the world stage. Deng had no such “theatrical pretensions”! Deng was a self-conscious revisionist. He politically challenged the realities of classical great power politics, but he also adopted a low posture in his foreign policy commitments that was rational and logical. The 1974 statement was later followed by a revision to the state constitution in 4 December 1982 that facilitated Deng’s new policy emphases on modernization. The constitution’s preface linked peaceful coexistence with development and acclaimed high moral principle that challenged great power politics: The future of China is closely linked with that of the whole world. China adheres to an independent foreign policy as well as to the five principles [of peaceful coexistence] of mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence in developing diplomatic relations and economic and cultural exchanges with other countries; China consistently opposes imperialism, hegemonism and colonialism, supports the oppressed nations and the developing countries in their just struggle to win and preserve national independence and develop their national economies. . . .51 Declining great power status for China and extolling China’s “independence and self-reliance” was not necessarily a matter of strategic deception or feigned modesty. It was formally predicated in the Party’s political experience and thinking about China’s place in the world. This thinking and experience resulted in a pragmatic understanding of China’s actual position in the international system; and this reading of comparative national power logically required a low-posture foreign policy. Despite or maybe because of all of the “turmoil under heaven,” Deng’s dialectical reading of national and international realities acknowledged China’s comparatively limited national power and negligible international outreach. No matter where its sympathies lie, China had its own poor developing economy to deal with and was hardly in a material position to contribute significantly to the leadership of the Third World. For Deng, the diversion of China’s scarce and precious resources to achieve

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  15 superpower status would have been both immoral and self-defeating. After so many years of relative isolation during which China had made little, or no contribution to the world, it would take some time for China’s development to catch up and support an effective contribution to the world. Former Foreign Minister Huang Hua spoke highly of Deng’s ability “to apply the principles and methods of Marxism and Leninism in accordance with the reality of China.”52 In particular, he elaborated on Deng’s relevant instructions to China’s diplomatic corps concerning the need “to take a low profile while playing our due role”: . . . Deng Xiaoping instructed us not to be very active in diplomatic affairs compared with other countries. [and] that China should make sure it didn’t become the leader of other countries, since our national strength was not great enough, and we could not do everything required, otherwise we might lose many initiatives. We should quietly immerse ourselves in hard work and handle our domestic affairs well. This itself would be a contribution to the world.53 A low posture in foreign policy came with Deng’s policy self-realization that China could only make a very modest contribution to world affairs. Chinese policy clearly sought to avoid the kind of commitments required in realist understanding of the rise and fall of great powers.

How can realism be squared with idealism? Deng did not feel obliged to choose between ideals and realities. Moreover, he regarded Mao Zedong Thought and its focus on dialectics as the antidote to “empty talk.” His specific blend of idealism and realism needs to be examined in sharp relief with reference to Western assumptions concerning Chinese “pragmatism” or “realism.” The famous Cambridge historian, Edward H. Carr, in his well-known analysis of the twenty years crisis between the First and Second World Wars, wrote of the League of Nations’ failures in facing realpolitik. Carr warned future practitioners of statecraft not to focus too exclusively on either idealism or realism. Carr’s “complete realist” was so fixed on “the causal sequence of events” that s/he lost the opportunity to change reality, whereas the “complete idealist” ignored the “causal sequence of events” and, as a result, was unable to change reality. At least some Western theorists and practitioners – Henry Kissinger is a case in point – believed that “realism” cannot be so easily separated out from idealism. “Realism” is, for example, seen to focus on power in relation to values and norms. In Kissinger’s case, order is an especially important value that has to be considered in the mix along with power considerations. This reservation is discussed, for example, in Paul Viotti and Mark Kauppi’s International Relations Theory as follows:

16  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” As an image of politics, . . . realism is concerned with power and power politics among states but . . . many realists (including Morgenthau) have also been concerned with values and norms and the role they play in ordering international politics. In our view, realism is not the opposite of an idealism preoccupied with values and norms to the exclusion of power considerations, although the degree of emphasis placed on power and values among realists varies widely.54 In his early career as a Harvard professor, Henry Kissinger seemed to move in the opposite direction. He had claimed without qualification that diplomacy with any state that focuses on a single ideological version of the truth is not possible. As national security adviser and later as secretary of state, Dr. Kissinger acquired an international reputation for consummate pragmatism, and in his visits to Beijing he often viewed Chinese opposition to Soviet hegemonism as part of a balance of power based on a “quasi alliance” with the Chinese. As the reflective author of Years of Renewal and On China, however, he again expressed his unease with “foreign policies largely shaped by ideologues who drive societies and the international system beyond their capacities,” but he sided with Carr in rejecting the “dichotomy of pragmatism and morality”: The alleged dichotomy of pragmatism and morality seems to be a misleading choice. Pragmatism without a moral element leads to random activism, brutality, or stagnation; moral conviction not tempered by a sense of reality leads to self-righteousness, fanaticism, and the erosion of all restraint.55 In China’s socialist setting, foreign policy formally encompassed “socialist idealism” 社会主义理想主义, as distinguished from liberal idealism. The latter sees the state as a social contract originating in reason, while the former idealism is oriented towards the practical achievement of means and ends in a new and just society. Liberal idealism apparently fostered a false consciousness as to the realities of American imperialism, whereas “socialist realism” 社会主义现实主义, drawing on “seeking the truth from the facts,” fully understood China’s comparative weakness as the world’s largest developing country. This was a fact that had to be recognized, and ultimately such weakness would then be more appropriately addressed and overcome.

Deng’s unconventional view of power in the state system Western realism’s fascination with the balance of power has generated a great deal of confusion in relation to the study of modern Chinese foreign policy. With the exception of North Korea, China has, by choice, no treaties of alliance. This should not be interpreted as a weakness in China’s foreign policy. Synthesized Chinese socialist idealism and realism self-consciously rejected the classical European balance of power politics purposefully to focus on China’s independence and development. The balance of power was regarded as an inconvenient

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  17 hierarchy that sacrificed the equality of the developing states and also sacrificed their opportunity to participate freely in a wide range of state-to-state relationships with non-allies. A senior Chinese authority on international relations, Han Nianlong, outlined Chinese objection to balance of power politics as a threat to China’s sovereign independence and as a source of “bullying”: History has also brought home that a non-aligned policy with the big powers helps China to keep the initiative in its own hands in independently combating hegemonism. This is because an alliance with big powers would hinder our effort to reject and oppose hegemonist transgressions and even reduce us to being a pawn in the big powers’ designs against other nations.56 Professor Gerald Segal, whom former foreign Minister Qian Qichen (1988–98) believed “became notorious for concocting the ‘China Threat’,” examined Chinese participation in “triangular diplomacy” with the Soviet Union and the US and argued that, regardless of their protestations, the Chinese have all along been “realists.”57 This view is hard to credit in light of Deng’s clear rejection of the opportunities for alliance, and this rejection stands in stark contrast to US practice in the Asia region. Deng’s position was incompatible with Western “realism.” His position reflected a self-conscious approach to power and morality. His own Chinese realism accepted the comparative weakness of China in the international community even while his socialist idealism expresses confidence in China’s ability to go it alone without the help of any of the great powers. Deng was both pragmatic and optimistic. His own character and thinking reflected the greatest lesson of the Party’s revolutionary experience, and it was this same lesson in dialectical learning that Deng used to explain and legitimate all policy including foreign policy. Deng’s optimism was sorely tested in the oftenbrutal realities of Chinese politics. Three times he had risen from the politically dead like a Chinese Lazarus. Deng was candid in his remarks to Japan’s Prime Minister Nakasone. The “saddest period” in his life was the Cultural Revolution,” (1966–76), but even then he survived “. . . because I was optimistic.”58 As a Chinese and as a Marxist, Deng might well have been interested in John Dewey’s ideas on education and science, but he disagreed with American “pragmatism.” The key to understanding his worldview is to see how he used his own Chinese thinking to define and to operationalize his end goals. Ideology provided both ideals and a method for achieving them. Even if China was not a superpower, it still had to focus on its independence and self-reliance vis-a-vis the great powers and their tendency to maximize the balance of power to their own benefit. Deng’s value system especially drew from an extraordinary, if not transcendental, political experience in responding to China’s national conditions. The latter were understood on the basis of an ideology that stressed praxis at home and abroad. The relevance of ideology to Chinese foreign policy has, for example, been argued by Professor Mark Mancall, who has called into question foreign observation that sees in Deng’s rise the triumph of Chinese self-interest:

18  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” . . . even China’s interpretation of its self-interest took place well within its ideological construction of the world. China was demonstrating that what the West, particularly the Americans, took to be rigid and increasingly ideological structure was, in fact, a versatile analytical tool that could account for the remarkable pragmatism that China was exhibiting. . . .”59 Deng saw Western “pragmatism” 实用主义 as an expedient and illegitimate manipulation of power. He alternatively built on praxis 实际 as part of the “unity of theory and praxis 理论和实际统一. What could American “pragmatism” offer Deng apart from rejection of the Chinese revolution as a horrid example of ideological extremism? Western liberal opinion often warmed to the appearance of capitalism in China, but Western “realism” in its focus on power somewhat inconsistently judged Chinese ideology as frustratingly irrational and cunningly deceptive at one and the same time. Stephen Mosher, for example, has claimed that the “role of hegemon is deeply embedded in China’s national dream work.”

“Hiding capabilities and biding time”: defensive logic or a strategy for world domination? Western realist critics have suggested that the Chinese ideology of peace is clever artifice. Apparently, the low posture of China’s foreign policy is a ruse summed up in “hide China’s capabilities and bide our time” 韬光养晦. The Chinese need time in order to build up their power so as to launch a future grand offensive strategy. Lee Kuan Yew suggested that there are two ways of looking at the Chinese propensity for “hiding capabilities”: “One, that the Chinese will quietly become strong and quietly increase their influence without acting like a bully. The other, that they’ll flex their muscles and try to browbeat everyone.” Lee anticipated that the Chinese would opt for the first option while at the same time “growing their muscles.”60 Was such “hiding” a defensive, or an offensive reflex to get potential enemies to drop their guard and not seek a margin of force? Was the entire edifice of Chinese policy thinking merely designed for purposes of deceiving foreigners so as to prepare for future war? On the other hand, it could be argued that Deng’s new focus on development within a peaceful environment was an entirely legitimate policy concern. In 1989 through 1990, the Chinese Communist Party was internationally stigmatized as the result of the Tiananmen Square event. In an incredibly short space of time, the world had changed unalterably. The regime was rocked by the neardeath experience of Tiananmen Square anarchy, the overthrow and execution of the Romanian leader, Nicolai Ceausescu, the bringing down of the Berlin Wall and the “end of days” collapse of the USSR. The potential for run-away bourgeois liberalism within China seemed very real. Deng seriously believed: “The Western countries are staging a third world war without gunsmoke 没有硝烟的第三次世界大战. By that I mean they want to accelerate the ‘peaceful evolution’ 和平演变 of socialist countries into capitalist countries.”61 This notion of “peaceful evolution” had been bandied about for some time, but now it

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  19 became deeply entrenched in Deng’s mind, and it still inhabits the minds of China’s leaders up to the present. Deng calmly faced what was such a sudden and bewildering change in epoch that threatened the legitimacy and survival of Chinese socialism and the Chinese Communist Party. He projected self-confidence while still continuing to maintain a “low-posture” foreign policy that avoided costly international commitments and allowed an even greater focus on accelerating domestic economic development. Deng had to worry about members of his own Party losing hope. Deng advanced his much cited twenty-four characters, namely, “observe with a cool head, hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time, stand firm, calmly reply, make friends and know what is what” 冷静观察, 韬光养晦, 站稳脚跟, 沉着应付, 朋友要交, 心 中有 数. This strategy, or “policy spirit,” underscored the dictum, “never claim leadership.” This is what some Chinese authors have described as “realist foreign policy” 现实主义外交.62 Certainly, the notion was consistent with a low-posture foreign policy. In this advice, Deng likely drew on Zhou Enlai’s experienced counsel; for example, Zhou had advised the first Chinese diplomatic delegation to the UN that China will refrain from the abuse of its new veto power and will “never assume the air of a big power and interfere in the affairs of other countries.” China’s new UN diplomats were told to be cautious and modest and sometimes bold when the circumstances called for it. They were to be disciplined and not panic in times of difficulty. They were to live up to the expectations of the Chinese people and the peoples of the Third World. They were to “. . . boost the morale of the world’s peoples and deflate the arrogance of the superpowers.”63 Critics might suggest that the Chinese were shirking their international duties, but the logic of their foreign policy discourse is compellingly realistic. Deng also devised a corollary strategy responding to the failed August 19 coup in the Soviet Union with a new 12-character principle, “Enemy troops are outside the city wall. They are stronger than we. We should mainly be on the defensive” 兵临城下敌强我弱以守为攻. The notion “mainly be on the defensive” once again was based on an astute dialectical reading of the underlying realities of domestic and international affairs. Informed CCP sources glossed “mainly on the defensive” as it related to the thematic bias of the bigger 24-character principle. Its “policy spirit” was summed up as “. . . we do not bother ourselves with others outside, nor do we argue with the Soviet Union over views it currently holds, but we must state our position clearly inside the Party because there is a difference between the inside and outside. . . .”64 The influential Chinese Deng Xiaoping scholar, Gong Li, has used “hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time” 韬光养晦 to describe the fourth and last stage of Deng’s foreign policy development.65 The particular reference to “hiding capabilities and biding our time” has attracted a lot of hostile Western commentary on the original meaning of the Chinese classics and their contemporary strategic pertinence for China’s international relations.

20  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Chinese commentary has strongly challenged what it sees as the distorted foreign misrepresentation of “hiding capabilities and biding our time.” Foreign realism claims to discover lurking in these four characters a clever deception that confirmed the “China threat.” Chinese commentaries were emphatic that this was to turn white into black. Deng, even while sorely tested, had re-affirmed a low posture and avoided claims to international leadership so as to focus defensively on domestic development.66 In other words, to flip the terminology of Professor Jonathan Mearsheimer, Chinese commentary stressed what might be described as “defensive” rather than “offensive realism.” In On China, Kissinger recommends the gloss of “hiding capabilities” that appeared in State Councilor Dai Bingguo’s 2010 “Persisting with Taking the Path of Peaceful Development.” Kissinger paraphrases Councilor Dai: Peaceful development, Dai argues, is neither a ruse by which China “hides its brightness and bides its time” (as some non-Chinese now suspect) nor a naive delusion that forfeits China’s advantages as some within China now charge. It is China’s genuine and enduring policy because it serves Chinese interests and comports with the international strategic situation.67 Dai cited Deng’s wisdom to the effect that China cannot afford arrogance considering its commitments to the sovereign equality of states, its own modest level of development and the huge domestic challenges that China faces. Perhaps, the most definitive official Chinese explanation of the real meaning of “hiding capabilities” was provided in Party General Secretary Hu Jintao’s explanation at a Party central work conference on diplomatic work on 21 August 2006. Hu clarified that the essential meaning was positive rather than negative. As China’s capabilities grew, he suggested China would attract foreign hostility that could compromise China’s opportunities for further development. Hu, who was frustrated by other countries’ failure to understand China’s motivation, said: “Our first responsibility at the present stage is to wholeheartedly focus our complete attention on development without interruption increasing China’s comprehensive national power and without interruption improving our people’s livelihood.”68 Hu gave additional explanation at a 2009 meeting with Chinese diplomats arguing that “hiding capabilities” was the means by which to “avoid contradictions” and “struggles” that would distract from Chinese adherence to “peace and development.”69 Deng had come to power hoping to moderate external fears of China’s development that might serve as a burden to China’s development. His strategy was predicated in an honest recognition of China’s comparative weakness. China could not, therefore, claim leadership. Deng clearly explained the point behind “never claiming leadership”: Some developing countries would like China to become the leader of the Third World. But we absolutely cannot do that – this is one of our basic state policies. We can’t afford to do it and besides we aren’t strong enough. There

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  21 is nothing to be gained by playing that role; we would only lose most of our initiative. China will always side with the Third World countries, but we shall never seek hegemony over them or serve as their leader. . . . We should act in accordance with the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and never deviate from them.”70

Deng Xiaoping and the Western realism Deng was not Don Quixote. He “opposed hegemonism.” He did not, however, tilt at the windmills of imperialism. Political opposition is one thing, and serious material commitment another. Moreover, “exporting revolution” had been rejected in 1954–55 and was no longer the key to Chinese foreign policy. “Selfreliance and independence” was the key, especially after Zhou Enlai’s tremendous demarche at the Geneva Conference on Indochina. Deng’s “pragmatism” easily recognized China’s weakness and the need to focus internally on development. He was willing to tap science and technology from any source, whether socialist or capitalist. Deng refused to make alliance commitments, and with the exception of the deliberately brief punitive expedition against North Vietnam in 1979, he managed to keep China out of conflict so as to focus on domestic economic development. As a Chinese Marxist, Deng co-opted realism in the service of idealism. Even as he engaged the world, he believed in the centrality of ideals and discipline. Chinese scholarship has been quite vocal about the failure of Western theory to explain Deng and modern China. Huang Xiang, former Director of the State Council’s International Studies Centre and a leading expert on Chinese international relations theory, for example, candidly remarked that “shallow” Western theories of realism, 现实主义, behaviouralism 行为主义 and the balance of power 实力均衡 ought to be studied in the Chinese interpretation of reality, but they were not to be copied in the Chinese’s own understanding of international realities.71 Deng’s underlying optimistic assumptions often contrast sharply with those commonly associated with European and American “realists” such as Niccolo Machiavelli, Otto von Bismarck, Hans Morgenthau, Kenneth Waltz and more recently Jonathan Mearsheimer. Deng Xiaoping’s foreign policy challenged related Western perception of international relations in terms of great powers imposing order on the natural condition of international anarchy. In Deng’s thinking, realpolitik 现实政治 is a negative phenomenon in the history of the state system. The relation of “realism” to Chinese foreign policy is not easily explained, especially in light of supposed Chinese ideological intransigence. In a memorandum preparing for the presidential visit to Beijing, Kissinger offered seemingly incongruous advice to President Nixon. Apparently, the Chinese were “fanatics, committed to revolution.” At the same time, they were “highly pragmatic.”72 Kissinger said to expect them to be firm on principles but “flexible on tactics.” Then Kissinger personally went to Beijing, where he ran into an unexpected but

22  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” such a refreshing geopolitical sophistication. He lauded Zhou as his “first teacher” on Chinese affairs.73 He described Mao and Zhou as “scientists of equilibrium” and “artists of relativity.” He proclaimed that China was “in the great classical tradition of European statesmanship.”74

Classical realism and classical European statesmanship When Henry Kissinger met Mao and Zhou in Beijing on 17 February 1973, he recounted how he had come face to face with a “modern Machiavellianism.” He reported that Mao had taken “. . . great pains to show the slogans scrawled on every wall in China were meaningless, that in foreign policy national interests overrode ideological differences.”75 Kissinger, instead of finding ideology in Beijing, found a familiar realism. What elements are there in the thought and experience of Zhou Enlai, Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping that suggest even an intuitive Chinese parallel with Kissinger’s “classical European statesmanship”? There is more in sharp contrast than comparison between European and Chinese ideas on the subject of power and relations between states. Niccolo Machiavelli 尼科洛 马基雅维里 (1469–1527) is possibly the most well-known proponent of Western classical realism. Elizabethan dramatists portrayed “Old Nick” as the devil incarnate. Marx was sufficiently intrigued to recommend Machiavelli’s History of Florence to Engels.76 Machiavelli’s The Prince had been read by Cardinal Richelieu, Frederick the Great of Prussia, Bismarck and Clemenceau, and Hitler considered it bedtime reading. Mao, Zhou and Deng did not comment on Machiavelli, so in what sense could they have harboured a “modern Machiavellianism”? One of China’s foremost experts on the US, Wang Jisi, has claimed that during the period of Nixon and Kissinger, “the realist theory completely dominated US diplomacy,” and he argued: “As a theorist, Kissinger shared many common grounds with [George] Kennan, and they all belong to the school of traditional realists.”77 More recently, there has also been scholarly dispute in the West as to Kissinger’s own ambivalent understanding of “realism,” including his particular relation to “modern Machiavellianism.” In his 2 November 1972 interview with Oriana Fallaci, Kissinger may have sensed Fallaci’s deep antipathy towards power.78 At any rate, he disavowed suggestion that he, himself, was “much influenced” by Machiavelli. Kissinger abruptly told Fallaci: “There is really very little of Machiavelli that can be accepted or used in the modern world.”79 Kissinger claimed to prefer Kant to Machiavelli. This would appear to be in line with Kissinger’s sensitivity to critics who perhaps simplistically claimed that, as he had grown up in Nazi Germany, he therefore preferred order over justice.80 Writing several years later, Kissinger claimed that Mao supported a “modern Machiavellianism,” which Kissinger defined as follows: “Each side would be expected to insist on its principles; but each had an obligation not to let them interfere with the imperatives of national interest – a classic definition of modern Machiavellianism.”81

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  23 His reference to Kant and China, however, seems like a less than helpful distraction. In particular, Kant’s general prescription for “perpetual peace” required that all states become republics. Modern Chinese foreign policy is alternatively designed to cope with and even to celebrate the differences between states, societies and cultures. Differences are not identified with anarchy, but Chinese thinking anticipates contradictions and regards international reality as constantly undergoing change. Mao, Zhou and Deng all formally subscribed to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as an excellent way of accepting and coping with different values and basic regime and constitutional differences. Moreover, imperial Chinese governance, including its notion of “peace under heaven” was based on the authority that evolves from individual moral self-examination and the related setting of moral example by the emperor and his officials to create harmony “under heaven.” Despite his philosophical reservations, Kissinger often deferred to Machiavelli’s reasonings and style, and it is no surprise that he has had trouble shaking his off reputation as a dyed-in-the wool “realist.” Even his famous Harvard colleague, Stanley Hoffman, described him as a Machiavellian “who believe[s] that the preservation of the state . . . requires both ruthlessness and deceit at the expense of foreign and internal adversaries.”82 Deception is often integral to “strategy”; in this regard, Machiavelli has been compared to Sun Tzu, the ancient Chinese strategist and the darling of contemporary Western business studies.

Strategy as deception and limiting the resort to war Professor Lawrence Freedman, author of Strategy: A History, has suggested that Machiavelli and Sun Tzu both believed: “All warfare is based on deception.”83 Freedman, himself, defined “strategy” as having “. . . elemental features . . . common across time and space. These include deception and coalition formation, and the instrumental use of violence.”84 “Strategy” then by definition necessarily requires deception. Is this too exclusive? Strategy could involve positive cooperation as suggested in the rebuttals to modern “game theory” and the “prisoner’s dilemma,” but realist strategy devalues diplomacy and argues that stated intentions on war and peace are not as reliable as taking the measure of a potential enemy’s capabilities and relying on the margin of force to deter potential enemies. Kissinger’s interpretation of Sun Tzu’s insights cites the following use of deception: “Feign inability; When deploying troops, appear not to be. When near; appear far; When far, appear near.”85 This emphasis on deception has been especially appealing to Western strategists; however, it has to be placed within the Confucian tradition that also focuses on honesty and the meaningful correlation of “words” and “deeds.” This correlation certainly has something to do with the substantive relations between states. In considering a comparison of China and imperial Germany in relation to the balance of power, Kissinger offers an essentially “realist” perspective on the nature of “strategy”:

24  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Can strategic trust replace a system of strategic threats? Strategic trust is treated by many as a contradiction in terms. Strategists rely on the intentions of the presumed adversary only to a limited extent, for intentions are subject to change. And the essence of sovereignty is the right to make decisions not subject to another authority. A certain amount of threat based on capabilities is therefore inseparable from the relations of sovereign states.86 Deception has often been practiced, but what of cooperation based on subscription to the “coexistence” of principle and pragmatism in “ambiguous equilibrium”? Kissinger uses the latter to explain American and Chinese success in avoiding the Taiwan Question so as to gain geopolitical cooperation. As discussed in Chapter Three, the two sides agreed that Chinese people on both sides of the straits believed in one China; and the two sides were able to further their geopolitical interests by postponing the final solution to the Taiwan Question. They avoided setting a fixed timetable to solve the problem. Sun Tzu is often celebrated in the West for his clever use of deception so as to “subdue the enemy without fighting.” It was a defensive political stratagem designed to avoid the unpredictable nature of war and its potentially high costs to Chinese society. Mao Zedong commented several times on Sun Tzu and approvingly cited the dictum of Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831), “war is the continuation of politics by other means.”87 Sun Tzu endorsed an economy of force and was interested in achieving victory without the resort to full-scale war. War and violence were practically acknowledged as possible but as neither necessary nor inevitable. Sun Tzu’s On the Art of War was the most studied of the Seven Military Classics; however, in the full historical sweep of the Confucian tradition, military thought On the Art of War was disparaged along with the profession of arms. Machiavelli believed that the way to win a state is to be skilled in the art of war. Force was recognized as sometimes necessary, but it was supposedly the last resort in the Confucian imperial tradition – a tradition that, at least formally, preferred honesty as opposed to deception in human relations. This same tradition associated “bad government” with “punitive military expeditions” 征伐. The loot that comes with conquest was regarded as a decadent distraction from the real requirements of imperial rulership focusing on the moral nurturing and feeding of the people at home. Confucian and Legalist officials disagreed over whether the conquest of territories outside of China proper was beneficial. Reflecting their commitment to sedentary agriculture as the moral basis of social life, the Confucians were not too interested in the arid areas beyond the Great Wall, and they wanted whatever material resources the court had to spare to go to relieving those who cultivated agriculture within the Great Wall. Machiavelli had witnessed the gross hypocrisy of Italian city-state politics and the venal mercenary opportunism of ruthless condottieri whose fickle loyalties were daily bought and sold. He cynically proclaimed his disinterest in idealism as the search for truth. In fact, the latter could only lead to political ruin. Power, and not morality, informed Machiavelli’s “reality.” This was

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  25 the necessary basis for understanding the destiny of peoples and the actions of states. Order was best kept through fear and the dread of punishment. Machiavelli may have anticipated later realist reasoning embodied in “si vis pacem, para bellum” (if you want peace, prepare for war). He advised rulers “. . . never tolerate having one’s plans upset in order to escape a war. This would only serve to postpone war to one’s disadvantage.”88 Machiavelli served as a diplomat himself, but he failed to hone the craft of modern diplomacy. Satow’s Guide to Diplomatic Practice refers to how diplomacy in Machiavelli’s era had been “paralysed by mutual distrust.” Diplomacy had become the victim of frenzied religious difference. Sir Earnest Satow sums up: “. . . the ‘Machiavellian’ expedients of spying, conspiracy and deceit brought the reputation of the resident diplomatic agent to its nadir. Raison d’etat took unquestioned precedence over morality.”89 Europe had to wait for the beginnings of “the age of classical European diplomacy” until after the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia, when monarchical order gained the upper hand over fierce religious differences. At that point of development, diplomacy was increasingly characterized by well-defined rules and civilized conventions that supported the conduct of relations between states by peaceful means. The French were leaders in the development of a highly civilized concept of “classical European diplomacy.” Cardinal Richelieu’s (1585–1642) advice to Louis XIII of France reads quite differently than Machiavelli’s advice to Caesar Borgia. Diplomacy becomes in his words an absolute necessity: “. . . it is absolutely necessary to the well-being of the state to negotiate ceaselessly, either openly or secretly, and in all places, even in those from which no present fruits are reaped and still more in those for which no future prospects as yet seem likely.” Richelieu argued that one loses nothing “by keeping abreast of events,” and with diplomacy one is more likely “to find the right instant to attain his ends.”90 France never had to cope with the diplomatic problems associated with non-recognition and containment as was the case in post-1949 China, but Richelieu might well have approved China’s post-1954 diplomatic challenges to US containment on the dual basis of governmental and non-government relations that sought “friends everywhere.” How did Kissinger conduct himself once he first went to Beijing as national security advisor? Was he closer to Machiavelli or Richelieu? Focusing on the balance of power, Kissinger attributed “classical European statesmanship” to the Chinese. Mao and Zhou, however, disapproved of the balance of power. Mao revelled in “strategically despising the enemy” and was more skilled in his selfindulgent art of “cursing” than in Satow’s art of diplomacy as the “intelligent application of tact.” Moreover, prior to the Treaty of Westphalia, diplomacy had been diminished in the contest between religions in Europe. As Harvard Professor, Kissinger published in 1957 World Restored. He argued that diplomacy cannot be practiced where there is revolutionary order and that the revolutionary state’s “absolute security means absolute insecurity for others”; hence, he concluded: “Diplomats can still meet but they cannot persuade.”91 Kissinger advised: “Diplomacy can

26  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” play no role where foreign policy is conceived as enforcement of a claim to universal authority, the promotion of the true faith against heretics, or as the pursuit of self-regarding interests that take no account of the interests of others.” Once Kissinger went to Beijing, all of this seemed moot because what he found there was an edifying variant of “classical European statesmanship.” If this was the case, why was the long containment of China so necessary? Had US foreign policy failed to understand China? Henry Kissinger studied power as opposed to ideology, whereas Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong studied power from within ideology that was a “sinified” Marxism-Leninism.92 Kissinger seemed to think that order was as much a moral value as a workable structure. For the Chinese, they were interested in creating a new world order that would guarantee peace through justice and equality. Indeed “pragmatic” thinking was going on either side of the negotiating table, but the two sides did not have the same purpose.

The relevance of the recent revolutionary and the deep Chinese imperial past Deng Xiaoping’s modern focus on peace and development has been increasingly grounded not only in the recent history of the Party-led Chinese revolution, but also in a growing focus on deeper dynastic history and the development of Chinese civilization and culture. Summing up three hundred years of Chinese foreign policy, Professor Mark Mancall noted the comparative lack of an “aggressive mission” in Chinese imperial history: China’s sense of its own civilization did not include an aggressive mission either to civilize the rest of the world or to shoulder its burdens. . . . the Chinese were always welcoming to those who wished to transform themselves into members of civilization, but did not like the French, English and Americans in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, try to civilize the world by subduing it and turning it into a replication of themselves.93 The mix of domestically informed idealism and realism in Deng’s foreign policy is explained best with reference to both the recent revolutionary past and deeper Confucian imperial history.

The foreign policy legacy of the deep imperial past The deep imperial past presumed a meaningful cosmos within which politics had moral connotations. Good governance and the moral unity of the population were considered as the best guarantee of the security of the Chinese imperial state. The Confucian tradition’s struggle with military aristocracy started with a positive assumption that there is moral meaning in human relationships. There was a continuum of meaningful relations expressed in “cultivate the self, regulate the family, rule the kingdom and then [there is] peace under heaven” 修身齐家治国平天下.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  27 Moral development at the lower level fostered moral development at the next level. Moral development in a kingdom’s society was expected to inform the quality of any kingdom’s moral interaction with other states. In domestic politics and in the relations between kingdoms, the ruler and his officials were expected to “teach by one’s own example” 身教. Such an example was assumed more efficient than an example professed in written imperial rescripts; hence, personal example is superior to teaching by words 身教生于言教. The self-cultivation of the benevolence inside a person is reflected in that person’s human relations and is manifest in moral action; hence, the Emperor and his officials by “rectifying” themselves encourage others to do the same; hence, “they rectify themselves and others are rectified” 正己而无正者也. To some extent, this claim to the power of moral example seems to anticipate the modern variant of Chinese “soft power.” At the level of the relations between kingdoms, the moral example of the ruler was highly regarded. The Confucian tradition contrasted “the way of the hegemon” 霸道, as an immoral and flagrant resort to force, with the “way of the king” 王道. The latter invoked a sagely resonance with the morality optimistically manifest at the interacting levels of man, the state and the cosmos.94 The entry in the influential 1931 missionary-researched Mathews’ Chinese-English Dictionary sets out the key difference: “霸道 to act unreasonably or violently; to intimidate; the way of might, as contrasted with the way of right 王道.”95 Moreover, the authoritative Zihai draws on classical text to amplify the distinction the “hegemon” ruling with “tools” and the kingly way that extolls righteousness, belief and compassion.”96 The difference between right and wrong could not be reduced to feigned morality. Distinguishing between right and wrong was part of the bedrock of the Confucian tradition and it was the subject of the ninth of Mao’s great ten relationships of April 1956. Confucianism often focused on harmony in politics and society. Morality rather than force was seen as the basic ingredient of governance within and between kingdoms. China as the “Middle Kingdom” was placed at the moral centre of human civilization; however, the Confucian tradition ideally contemplated the relations between princes and princes and emperor in terms of moral reciprocity that was reflected in the applications of decorum or li, 礼. The contrast with Thucydides’ famous account of the “Melian discourse” is stark. Appealing to “fair play and just dealing,” the Melian islanders wished to put “forward their views in a calm atmosphere.” The truculent Athenians bluntly rejected the notion of debate and told the residents of the Island of Melos that they were about to be slaughtered and their children and women enslaved. The Athenians infamously concluded: “. . . the standard of justice depends on the quality of power to compel and that in fact the strong do what they have the power to do and the weak accept what they have to accept.” The reasoned claim to neutrality was denied. The Melians were put to the sword because they had traded with Athens’ enemy, Sparta. The Athenians may have had their own version of modern “dominoes” as they believed that if they honoured Melian independence, this would encourage other states to disregard Athens.97

28  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” The Confucian tradition’s contrast with the Melian focus on the weak’s utter acceptance of power is intriguing. The Confucian text Tso-chuan quoted Han Hsuan-tzu: “War is destructive to the people, an insect that eats up the resources [of a State], and the greatest calamity for small states.” The same text claims that the great and small states are to be placed within a reciprocal and mutually beneficial hierarchy of moral obligation: “It is by good faith that a small State serves a great one, and benevolence is seen in a great State’s protecting a small one.”98 The philosophy of Mencius later revisited the relation between great and small states in terms of the moral personification of the relations between states. The powerful are still required to act with reciprocity towards the weak; hence, when King Hsuan of Tse’ asked how to regulate his relations with neighbouring small kingdoms, Mencius advised: “. . . it requires a perfectly virtuous prince to be able, with a great country to serve a small one. . . . he who with a great state serves a small one, delights in heaven.”99 The importance of reciprocity in the context of personal and material inequality is reinforced in the social notion of “friendship” in human and state relationships. The loyalty 忠 – one of the key Confucian virtues – is the basis of “friendship” and regardless of differences in moral achievement the latter cannot be based on a sense of superiority. Even today, Chinese foreign policy idealism grates on the nerves of Western realists who accept that there are of course costs to the necessary exercise of great power responsibility. The Chinese viewpoint seems so frustratingly didactic in its protested continuity of high-minded moral principle. Why do they insist on the equality of the small states, and especially the equality of the developing states? In the mind of the “realist,” the idea of the powerful treating the weak with reciprocity to the disregard of the hierarchical realities of the material world is exasperating. China’s moral tradition is treated as a vexing matter of rhetoric rather than of strategy and morality. However, such “rhetoric” served as a way of thinking about human relationships that has influenced how the Chinese have viewed the relations between states. It is as if the Chinese converged with Professor Kenneth Waltz’s first and second images referring to the determinations of rulers and the relations of people within states.100 It is important to point out that the protestation of moral principle does not necessarily imply that Chinese foreign policy became hidebound and inflexible in its approach to the identification of reality and the resolution of problems. As discussed herein, Chinese foreign policy has often demonstrated an extraordinary flexible adaption to reality, particularly when it comes to “foreign relations as the continuation of domestic politics” 外交是内政的延续. Also of critical importance is the traditional Chinese comparison of “the way of the hegemon” and the “way of the king” in terms of the comparative utilities of force and morality and the potential for war and peace. The best way for a state to defend itself against enemies was for the ruler to focus inside his own kingdom to generate the contented repose of its people. In the Confucian Analects, Confucius is asked about the comparative importance of military equipment in the following exchange:

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  29 Tsze-kung asked about government. The Master said, the requisites of government are that there be sufficiency of food, sufficiency of military equipment, and confidence of the people in their ruler. Tsze-kung said, “If it cannot be helped, and one of these must be dispensed with, which of the three should be foregone first?” “The military equipment,” said the Master.101 Mengzi, the most famous of Confucius’ followers, elaborated in his advice to an inquiring king: If your Majesty will indeed dispense a benevolent government to the people . . . making the taxes and levies light, so causing that the fields shall be plowed deep . . . that the strong-bodied . . . shall cultivate their filial piety, fraternal respectfulness, sincerity, and truthfulness . . . you will have a people who can be employed, with sticks . . . to oppose the strong mail and sharp weapons of the troops of Ts’in and Ts’oo.102 Xunzi, one of the most prominent of Confucius’ later disciples, focused on the particular issue of the people’s confidence in the ruler. Threatening enemies are deterred when the ruler projects a benevolence and justice that morally binds the people to the ruler and thereby makes a state impregnable: Benevolence is above everything; justice is above everything. When benevolence is above everything, everybody without exception will be close to the ruler. . . . Relying on the invincible strength and political principle to conquer the hearts of the people, he will be able to defeat anybody without waging war and will possess lands without attacking others.103 The Confucian tradition believed that the moral example of the ruler and his officials would provide for perfect governance and that “personal example is better than the imperial writ” 身教生于言教. The Confucian tradition provided little philosophical support to the vocation of arms, as “benevolence” was assigned such great primacy in bringing about the moral coherence of the state. Mencius, for example, went directly to the point: “There are men who say –‘I am skilful at marshalling troops, I am skilful at conducting a battle!’ – They are great criminals. If the sovereign of a state love[s] benevolence, he will have no enemy in the empire.”104 These ideals persisted despite invasion, military conquest and the spectacular collapses of dynastic houses in Chinese history. The emperor, in his own personal example, was expected to follow nine standard rules, the last two of which included the “indulgent treatment of men from a distance” and “the kindly cherishing of the princes of the states.”105 “The Doctrine of the Mean” added: “By the ruler’s cultivation of his own character, the duties of universal obligation are set forth.” “Sincerity” – one of the five constants including benevolence, righteousness, decorum, knowledge – is highly recommended as the “way of Heaven,” and its attainment requires “the extensive study of what is

30  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” good, accurate inquiry about it, careful reflection on it the clear discrimination of it, and the earnest practice of it.”106 The Confucian Analects also noted that in the honest practice of human relations, deeds are superior to words; hence, it is best to be “slow in words” and “earnest in conduct.” Confucius claimed: “The cautious seldom err.”107 And the “superior man” is distinguished by the fact that “He acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his actions.”108 While deeply suspicious of military elites, the Confucian tradition was not so idealistic as to recommend pacifism. It preferred an economy of force. “Military equipment” was not regarded as the singularly most important aspect of power. Political will and the condition of a kingdom’s subjects ranked higher than force such that the people’s sticks could overcome the warrior’s armour. Moreover, this same tradition contemplated the importance of the prince of a great kingdom accommodating the prince of a small kingdom. The hierarchical realities of material inequality were moderated in a moral sense of reciprocity that was expected between persons and kingdoms that were in reality manifestly unequal. There is much in the Confucian way of thinking that anticipates the modern views of Deng Xiaoping. Revolutionary history had confirmed the importance of the will of the Chinese people and the power of the masses against superior material odds. Deng assigned importance to the use of technology and science in his emphasis, “military modernization,” but his strategy included the deterrence inherent in “millet plus rifles” and “digging tunnels deep and storing grain everywhere and never seeking hegemony.” Traditionally, the “hegemon” exclusively focused on weapons rather than the subsistence of the people, and the tendency to “bully” others was regarded as ultimately self-defeating. The adjective for “bully” 霸道的 in Chinese includes the character for “hegemon” 霸. Contemporary foreign policy statements often refer to “bullies” and “bullying.” Traditionally, “hegemony” as 霸谐, meaning to force an actor to do something against their own interests, was distinguished from “harmony” 和谐. Deng insisted that China was no country’s “vassal” 附庸 and no other country should assume that it could damage at will China’s interests.109 “Bullying” and “hegemony” were synonymous as Deng claimed: “China will never seek hegemony, nor will China bully others [中国永远不会称霸永远不会欺负别人] but will always side with the Third World.”110 As diplomacy and foreign policy, Deng eulogized “acting in good faith” as a key component of Chinese civilization and the use of study to practically reinforce the synthesis of means and ends in politics and in the society of states. Deng repeatedly insisted on honesty and modesty as China engaged the world looking “for friends everywhere.” Deng, like Zhou and Mao, assigned unusual significance to small states in establishing China’s position in the world. Writing in the Italian context of early sixteenth century, Machiavelli would have choked on such moralizing humbug about sincerity, benevolence, modesty and honesty. Personally, he refused to invest in the possibilities of human justice.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  31 Casting off any illusions, he advised Cesare Borgia that if a prince has to choose between being “loved” or “feared,” then by all means choose to be feared. Machiavelli was not likely aware of the Confucian moral continuum linking man, the state and the cosmos. In his view, the prevailing nature of man was evil. There was no benevolence to be cultivated. A benighted emphasis on justice at the core of governance would bring ruin down on both the prince and the people. Modern Chinese Marxism-Leninism built on the Western narrative on imperialism and colonialism. Imperialism was dialectically perceived as at once a “paper tiger” and a “real tiger” that has “claws” and “fangs.”111 Imperialism had insulted the basic Chinese notion of reciprocity. Chinese foreign policy did not assume that because China had suffered that China should then proceed to victimize others. Such a prospect was regarded as both immoral and self-defeating. Superpower status was neither a realistic option nor a desirable moral goal. In Deng’s mind, neither superpower status nor hegemony offered anything that could be regarded as public goods. China’s modern “independent foreign policy” morally focused on the need to resist “hegemonism” 霸权主义. The traditional way of the hegemon, namely, forcefully to push others around with moral indifference, was overlaid with the Leninist discussion of imperialism as the “highest stage of capitalism.” “Opposition to hegemonism” did not, however, imply a quick resort to costly force. China’s resources were extraordinarily weak and could not realistically sustain major overseas adventures. The principle of “non-interference” in the internal affairs of states was anchored in a reading of China’s weak material conditions. Deng argued that China instead should seek “friends everywhere.” Even when China became a powerful developed economy, China would eventually shed its “developing” status, but it would insist on remaining in spirit with the developing Third World. Deng claimed that China’s “. . . vote belongs firmly to the Third World. . . .”112 The contrast between Deng’s unity of theory and praxis and Western “realism” as it “objectively” explains domestic and international politics is sharp. Given Machiavelli’s view of the evil nature of man, princes and their states could not place their trust in good faith. Machiavelli warned Princes against pursuing “dreams” that lead to ruin.113 In his classicus locus, The Prince, Machiavelli warned of the consequences of believing in ideals rather than dealing forthrightly with realities. Machiavelli’s Prince did not have to be good. He only needed to feign goodness: And the manner in which we live, and that in which we ought to live are things so wide asunder, that he who quits the one to betake himself to the other is more likely to destroy than to save himself; since anyone who would act up to a perfect standard of goodness in everything, must be ruined among so many who are not good. It is essential, therefore, for a Prince who desires to maintain his position to have learned how to be other hand good, and use or not to use his goodness as necessity requires.114

32  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Machiavelli also wrote on the virtues of the republican form of government, but he is most remembered for his logic reducing morality to a feigned disposition that is no more than the product of power. Feigned “goodness” becomes an excusable tactic when the Prince uses it to gain popular compliance with his rule on the basis of deceptive protestations of “goodness.” Perhaps there is some parallel between this assumption and that of more contemporary realist critics who warn that Chinese expressions in favour of world peace represent a deliberate and massive strategy of deception to distract outside powers from focusing on China’s new wealth and how this wealth will automatically grow China’s military power. History no doubt could provide unending examples of lying in politics; however, lies and feigned goodness were formally abominated in the Confucian tradition that sought harmony through the honest recognition and the transcendence of differences. The recent Chinese foreign policy emphasis on “harmony with differences” 和而不同 recalls Confucius’ saying: “A gentleman gets along with others, but does not necessarily agree with them; a base man agrees with others but does not coexist with them harmoniously.”115 In other words, honesty is a sign of respect for one’s interlocutor, whereas the calculated expression of common interest is regarded as opportunistic deception. As discussed at length in Chapter Two, the 1972 Shanghai Communique reflected in its drafting a belief in the advantages of honest acknowledgement of basic differences. Diplomatic nicety for fear of giving offence was regarded as unhelpful in such a context of tremendous change. As discussed in Chapter Three, Henry Kissinger was brought around to Zhou Enlai’s argument that the candid identification of differences is in itself a step forward in state-to-state relations. Such identification will allow for the concentration of diplomacy in areas of concern where there is greater potential for mutual benefit through cooperation. And as discussed in Chapter Four, in his May 1989 meeting with Gorbachev, Deng insisted on identifying China’s differences with the Soviet Union before allowing them to pass into history.

Honesty and deception in international relations Mao relished “strategically despising his enemies.” Deng was firm but less bombastic. While Chinese strategic thinking does not rule out deception, especially if it promotes peace, it is uncomfortable with assumptions that states are more or less obliged to lie in the face of power politics. This suited neither Chinese culture nor Chinese nationalism. Moreover, the dialectics explicit in the Party approach to “seeking the truth from the facts” that have been used to legitimate Deng’s “reform and open door” policies require honesty with respect to the positive and negative dimensions of reality so that China can better engage the world. Referring to Mao’s explanation of “seeking the truth from the facts,” Deng claimed that the “. . . three honests” 三老, namely “the honest person, honesty in words and honesty in deeds, are identical with seeking the truth from the facts 做老实人, 说老实话, 于老实事就是事实求是.”116

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  33 Deng Xiaoping claimed honesty as a trait of Chinese civilization that has been passed on in the conduct of China’s modern foreign policy. On signing the Sino-British Joint Declaration concerning Hong Kong, Deng claimed that the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party “always live up to their international agreements.” He insisted: “Acting in good faith is a Chinese tradition, not something invented by our generation. It is an essential quality of our magnificent old country. Ours is a great and proud nation. A great nation should preserve its dignity. . . .117 Otto Von Bismarck, Prussia’s “Iron Chancellor,” is often cited as a “realist” who like Machiavelli subordinated morality to power. According to one of the more recent biographers of Henry Kissinger, Kissinger believed that Bismarck’s “. . . realism in foreign policy . . . is fraught with perils, not least the alienation of the public and the slippage of the statesman into regarding power as an end in itself.”118 Indeed, Bismarck was more than willing to lie for his country and would have subscribed to Sir Henry Wotton’s (1568–1639) adage, “The ambassador is an honest man sent abroad to lie and intrigue for the good of his country.” Bismarck ridiculed European politicians who “did not know that lies were part of political business.”119 The Chinese tradition does not suggest that lying does not happen, but it insists that it cannot serve as the basis of society and the state. In the Chinese imperial society, lying was prevalent especially among overeager matchmakers and monks begging for alms, but once it spread widely among officials, it was ruinous to society and portended the end of dynasties. One lie was enough to kill off human reputation; hence; the adage, “say just one untrue thing, and everything you say will be taken as lies” 一言不实, 百事皆虚. Moreover, in Bismarck’s view, superior force was the only realistic basis on which to ensure the survival of the nation-state. Bismarck disparaged protestations of pacta sunt servanda (treaties must be kept). Above everything else, Bismarck endorsed “Staats-Raison” (raison d’etat). Moreover, he caustically confided to the Austrian ambassador to Russia: “Austria and Russia are states which are too great to be bound by the text of a treaty. They can be guided only by their interests and their convenience.”120 Perhaps Deng and Bismarck could agree on the limitations of “empty talk” and the fluidity of international relations, but according to Bismarck, the great powers were justified in granting themselves absolution for their own lies that placed their convenience and interests above their signed treaty commitments. In today’s context then, great powers are entitled to enter reservations at the world court. Bismarck would have entered a great many such reservations. He synthesized realpolitik and interessen politik (the politics of power and the politics of material interests). Diplomacy works only if it is backed by credible force. Conferencing is a waste of time. Bismarck once showed his disdain for the Concert of Europe with crude allegory: “. . . six old maids up on an island and the burning question of the day is, Who should have the one man? I fear it would be decided by conference.”121

34  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Perhaps this is indicative of the arrogant impatience of great power, but are there limits to lying as political artifice? Is all strategy inherently deceptive? Hitler frankly answered this question the day before the invasion of Poland when he told his generals on 22 August 1939: “I shall give a propagandist reason for starting the war – never mind whether it is plausible or not. The victor will not be asked afterward whether he told the truth or not. In starting and waging a war it is not right that matters, but victory.” Regardless of whether strategy is always “deception,” Chinese political culture would have enormous difficulty accepting Hitler’s view. Ironically, China’s critics, however, have gone so far as to suggest that China, like the Nazi and Japanese regimes in the 1930s, has become “territorially expansionist” in the East China Sea and that all three regimes have used “Hitler’s theory of the Big Lie.”122 The doyen of post-World War II American “realism,” Hans J. Morgenthau, endorsed “interest defined as power.” He claimed that statesmen think and act in terms of interest defined as power. His study of comparative foreign policy self-confidently claimed social scientific objectivity through rational observation. Morgenthau drew on Machiavelli to claim that politics could be observed everywhere in the same way: “The concept of interest defined as power imposes intellectual discipline upon the observer, infuses rational order into the subject matter of politics, and thus makes the theoretical understanding of politics possible.”123 Morgenthau may have used social science to sanitize power as reality, but Chinese analysis has tended to revise power to promote social justice as part of an alternative reality. Morgenthau cautioned that the “realist” theory of international politics must guard against “two popular fallacies: the concern with motives and the concern with ideological preferences.”124 Hence, ideology was a regrettable analytical distraction. Certainly, this was consistent with the American Cold War understanding of the limitations of ideology as absolute truth, particularly when it served as the basis of charisma in politics. Morgenthau’s “political science” proposed to sanitize power. His personal rationality refused to include “motive” in the explanation of foreign policy: “History shows no exact and necessary correlation between the quality of motives and the quality of foreign policy.”125 In claiming the preferred mantle of Western social scientific objectivity, Morgenthau avowed: “Political realism refuses to identify the moral aspirations of a particular nation with the moral laws that govern the universe.”126 Morgenthau worked to reveal the opportune ideological assumptions that propped up universal propositions, but his own notion of realism, itself, appears as a unidimensional expression of a particular universalism. His analysis does not anticipate more than one form of realism, nor does it anticipate the modern Chinese synthesis of realism with idealism. Based on an alternative “objective” reading of politics, Chinese foreign policy has protested: “China will never seek hegemony.” To practice “hegemonism” was regarded as inconsistent with China’s “national interest.” Deng insisted that once China became prosperous and strong, China will still consider itself with the “Third World.” If Deng was a “realist” in the “classical European tradition,”

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  35 why did he refuse to become part of a Sino-American-Soviet “triangle”? In his view, “triangular diplomacy,” “equidistant diplomacy” and “card-playing” were all unacceptable. Deng told Brazilian President Joao Baptista de Oliveira Figueiredo: “China’s foreign policy is independent and truly non-aligned. . . . [China] will not play the United States card or the Soviet Union card. Nor will it allow others to play the China card.”127 Chinese leaders never mentioned Richelieu’s admonition to practice diplomacy ceaselessly, especially those parts were there was little interest, but Chinese policy has readily recognized differences between states while still pursuing international cooperation and “seeking friends everywhere.” The 1980 US State Department Dictionary of International Relations defined the “China card” as: “A phrase that refers to ‘a policy concept which can be broadly defined as one of strengthening United States-People’s Republic of China relations as a means of influencing Soviet policy and the development of United States-Soviet relations.” Deng loved to play bridge, but he would not play cards with the US in a game of triangular diplomacy. Indeed, in Deng’s way of thinking, there was no triangle in reality! Deng claimed: “Frankly the China angle is not strong enough.” China, he claimed, was at one and the same time a “major” and a “minor country.”128 Why refuse to participate in alliances? Why not “play cards”? Why disclaim international leadership of the Third World? Why not take hold of the leadership of the international socialist movement? In the supposedly anarchic world of state relations, why claim the moral high ground and cast opponents as the source of immorality in international politics? The assumptions of “realism” in their focus on power and the importance of great powers at the expense of equal sovereignty as reinforced by international law have been explored more fully in contemporary Chinese discussion of the differences between “old” and “new security.” Deeper inquiry into the sources and assumptions of Deng’s particular “pragmatism” requires a complex explanation that deliberately references his understanding of Chinese history, culture and ideology. Deng was a leading participant in possibly the greatest revolutionary event of the modern era. He had more than his fair share of dark political opportunism. Many times, he had witnessed the truth along with his comrades-in-arms butchered in cold-blooded Party politics. Cultural Revolutionary exaggerations of “truth” ruthlessly destroyed a whole generation of Party leaders. Many of these colleagues had sacrificed everything in the Party’s cause only to be labelled, white-hatted, and spat on as “traitors” and “capitalist roaders.” Deng did not sink into permanent despair! His nationalism was a perennial source for optimism. Machiavelli only lost his job once. Deng fell much farther on three occasions, yet he still got back up to profess his commitment to his ideals. Deng ideologically highlighted searching for the “truth” as the basis for all policy, including foreign policy formation. He rooted the method for identifying reality and crafting relevant policy response to reality in Chinese Marxist-Leninist ideology, itself. Deng interpreted the events of modern Chinese history through the prism of this ideology, which he regarded as objectively “scientific.” Unlike

36  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Morgenthau, he was not going to drop “motivation” nor ideology in his “objective” understanding of political reality. His analysis required a dialectical understanding of national strength and weakness. The latter needed to be acknowledged in order to come up with appropriate policies supporting the goals of Chinese nationalism and “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”

Idealism and realism and the relevance of recent Party history Deng ideologically agreed with Mao on how to understand contemporary reality. In a 1957 talk with party secretaries, Mao drew their attention to Deng’s exemplary commitment to dialectics: “In a word, we must act in accordance with dialectics. So said Comrade Teng Hsiao-ping [ Deng Xiaoping]. In my opinion, the whole Party should study dialectics and advocate acting in accordance with dialectics.”129 This view had received unlikely support from one of the fiercest critics of Mao and Deng’s regime. During the early 1950s re-organization of the Guomindang, Chiang Kai-shek himself had urged that his Party members to study rather than dismiss out of hand Marxist dialectics. Chiang confided to his diary: “Our attitude of disclaiming the dialectic was the reason why we were defeated.”130 Deng was impressive yet very careful in the way he handled the post-Stalin question of personality cult and collective leadership. In November 1957, responding to Khrushchev’s probing about leadership talent in the CCP, Mao singled out Deng, saying: “This man is principled, fierce in spirit and one of our most talented leaders inside our Party 这个人即有 灵活性, 是我们党内难得的 一个领导人才.”131 Also, Mao appreciated Deng’s strong support in waging the struggle against the Anti-Rightists. He was confident that Deng, unlike some of the leaders of the CPSU, did know the difference between objective “dialectics” and subjective “metaphysics.” Chinese history has become increasingly important to the contemporary development of Chinese foreign policy. Mao and Deng were actually quite close in their respective understandings of how to understand Chinese reality. They selectively viewed history as important to the contemporary process of learning,132 but history was revealed through their “scientific” definition of contradictions. Western analysis has often attempted to describe the inner content of Chinese foreign policy in the harsh light of psychological behaviour, and the Chinese dislike of foreign criticism of their “behaviouralism” may well be justified. Professor Chih-yu Shih’s “normative-cognitive perspective” on China’s foreign policy has looked at Chinese history and culture with little reference to Chinese Communist Party dialectics. He drew a controversial psychological assumption suggesting that Chinese emphasis on China’s moral understanding of world affairs was compensation for weakness, as “limited capability compels [China] to depend on symbolic gestures to demonstrate its friendship and its Third World status.”133 One could argue that the moral rhetoric of Chinese political culture has attracted Western psychological exaggerations about Chinese irrationality. Alternatively, one could argue that it was the healthy and realistic understanding

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  37 of China’s relatively weak international position and the responsive capacity for making friends in the Third World that helped China overcome the singular reality of Cold War containment. Both Mao and Deng required a truthful construction of China’s actual material conditions. While Mao liked to curse his enemies, both he and Deng disavowed “theatrical pretensions.” Professor Shi, in his study of the relation between morality and Chinese diplomacy, argued that Chinese foreign policy was largely “. . . a drama because it does not automatically respond to reality but to stimuli that meet or fail the role expectation. Recognizing reality is not a source of foreign policy motivation; that motivation comes from a meaningful script.”134 Deng might well ask, What and whose script are we talking about, or is this just more “empty talk”? During the growth of China’s economic power since 1978, it is worth pointing out that, if anything, contemporary moral reference to the peaceful integrity of China’s traditional culture has grown more coherent and insistent. Western realism deliberately evolved out of an understanding of European history. Western realism, however, has often chosen to view Chinese history as largely a matter of strategic deception rather than as part of legitimate explanation of policy. The analysis herein, especially in the context of the last chapter, assesses the enhanced relation between China’s moral tradition and the ideological focus on Mao Zedong Thought and Deng Xiaoping theory in the explanation of the fundamental assumptions of contemporary Chinese foreign policy.135 Deng’s concept of “independent foreign policy” 独立外交政策 was enshrined for perpetuity in the preface of the 1982 state constitution, and in the early to mid-1980s, it was related to the core understanding of “peace and development” featured in “Deng Xiaoping Theory” as it relates to foreign policy. When considering Deng’s role in China’s modernization, there is a significant relation between his political leadership for economic reform and the open door and his responsibility for the regime’s ideological theories. Policy formation on modernization was constantly placed within ideology.136 On Deng’s death, “Deng Xiaoping Theory” was canonized and rolled into the ever-unfolding banner of ideological synthesis now called “Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Theory of Three Represents and ‘Scientific Development’.” This theory continuously celebrates modern Chinese nationalism and centres on the history of revolution as it reflected a struggle to discern changing Chinese reality and to achieve a practical way of achieving the ideological ends of “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Deng brought China’s foreign policy into line with the realities of the postMao world not by rejecting ideology per se, but by dialectically finding reality within ideology – ideology that self-consciously united theory and praxis through “seeking the truth from the facts.” The latter “truth” was a matter of national aspiration, and its identification of the inner contradictions of reality was the subject of continuous experiment and investigation. “Seeking the truth from the facts” 实事求是 was a mantra repeated over and over again as Deng consolidated his new post-Cultural Revolutionary leadership on the creative basis of “liberating the mind.” “Seeking the truth from the facts”

38  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” is a key ideological construct that has often been treated as Deng’s own personal credo, but Deng ceded the phrase to Mao. Deng claimed that these four characters representing the “quintessence of Mao Zedong Thought” were a written motto that Mao gave to the Central Party School in the early 1940s study campaigns of Yan’an.137 It was Deng, however, who during the post-1978 reforms established the concept as “the essence of Mao Zedong Thought.” “Seeking the truth from the facts” was a key early 1940s Yan’an ideological construct that was so painfully forgotten in the rush to extremism in the later Great Leap Forward (1958–60) and Cultural Revolution (1966–76) periods, but after the Cultural Revolution, the concept acquired renewed ideological primacy. It was to underwrite new policies of “economic reform and the open door” based on an “objective” reading of reality. Mao distinguished between “the unity of theory and praxis” and “bourgeois pragmatism” [实用主义] and had once protested: “No, we are not insane. We are pragmatists [实际主义者]; we are Marxists seeking the truth from the facts.”138 Deng pointed out that “Mao Zedong Thought” was predicated on a dialectically disciplined understanding of reality’s “internal relations,” or contradictions. In an interview with Oriana Fallaci, he argued that Mao Zedong Thought was in fact the collective thinking of leaders such as Mao, Zhou Enlai, Liu Shaoqi and Zhu De.139 Like his mentor, Zhou Enlai, Deng published his own Selected Works, but Deng achieved special attention within the pantheon of Party ideological leadership when his “theory” was integrated with Mao Zedong Thought. He exercised direct editorial control of the 1982–1992 third volume of his selected works as if it was his last will and testament. The edifice of his reforms came to rest on the foundations of “Deng Xiaoping Theory,” which explored changing reality through dialectics. His “second generational” leadership of economic reform and market transformation served as a post-Cultural Revolutionary guidance that achieved renewed Party consensus on the importance of the Party’s historical approach to dialectics. From within the “unity of foreign and domestic policy,” Deng moved towards national economic development within a fast-changing world order on the dialectical basis of “the liberation of the mind” and his own “pragmatic” experimental approach. The latter resulted in Deng’s articulation of “China’s independent foreign policy” that claimed to hold on to principle while practicing flexibility. Deng hoped to maintain “fine traditions” 优良传统 and workstyle 工作作风 based on the ideological essence of “seeking the truth from the facts” as he created a new set of foreign policy propositions. Deng acknowledged in his remarks to a 22 October 1984 meeting of the Party’s Central Advisory Commission: In my recent talks with foreigners, I never failed to assure them that our current policies would not change, that they could rely on their continuity. Still, they were not completely convinced. This is a serious problem of which I am well aware.140 Deng made two basic points. In the first place, China would continue as a socialist country. Contrary to all the Western speculation, he had not turned his

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  39 back on ideology to embrace market capitalism. He aimed to make the market serve socialism. He had not suddenly sprouted the horns of Machiavelli. His dialectics depended on praxis to reveal the “truth.” Secondly, China’s door would remain open after his own death. Deng was very concerned about changing China’s “image.” Deng may have been premature in his claim that he had already made a significant change in China’s image as the Tiananmen Square incident raised considerable doubts in the West about China’s stability and long-term commitment to reform. Deng was vexed with uninformed Western misgivings as to what would happen in China once he, himself, was gone. Jittery foreigners, according to Deng, were much too sensitive especially when the regime focused on constraining the negative consequences of bourgeois liberalization while opening the door; hence, “. . . whenever [the jittery foreigners] hear the leaves rustling in the wind . . . they wonder if the policy is changing.”141 However, Deng did worry lest Party reform policy on letting one hundred schools of thought contend would be misappropriated to defend a “bourgeois policy of laissez-faire.”142 Notwithstanding Deng’s prolific and laboured explanations to visiting foreigners, there was still plenty of confusion in the West as to whether China was moving towards socialism or capitalism. Deng, himself, referred to speculation about the surname of the special economic zone as “Mr. Capitalism” or “Mr. Socialism.” He acknowledged that ideological and political considerations resulted in the terminology “special economic” as distinct from “special political zones.”143 Related analysis turns on a key point of interpretation. Western “pragmatism’s” rejection of isms was confronting. Deng’s “pragmatism,” if it can be called as such, originated in Mao’s ideological “unity of theory and praxis” 理论 和实际, and this unity aspires to the achievement of ultimate ends on the basis of an informed reading of China’s changing reality. Deng loathed the ultra-leftist ideological extremism of the Cultural Revolution. He conceded Mao’s political mistakes in the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, but he kept Mao’s ideology as the basis for his new program for modernization. Ideology was still necessary to Party legitimacy and national unity. Deng refused to go down the same road as Khrushchev’s complete repudiation of Stalin. Deng told Czech President Gustav Husak, who was curious as to why Deng still believed in Chairman Mao after the Cultural Revolution: “When we summarize the historical experience of our Party, we should not count [Mao] out, because to negate the contributions of Mao Zedong would be to negate the importance of the greater part of Chinese revolutionary history.”144 Deng had personally witnessed and claimed to have learned from Khrushchev’s de-Stalinization. After the Chinese Communist Party had undergone unspeakable trauma during the Cultural Revolution, continued subscription to Mao Zedong Thought helped to reinvigorate Party pride in its national revolutionary achievement. Essentially, Deng returned to the 1956 Party line of its First Session of the Eighth Party Congress to justify relevant reforms. This ideological line provided a constant framework within which late 1978 reform policy of the famous Third Session of the Eleventh Central Committee was evaluated and developed.

40  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” On reviewing the 1981 key draft resolution on Party history that had offered the definitive Party explanation of what went wrong in the Cultural Revolution, Deng requested a more forceful wording: The main thing is to concentrate on the aspects in which [Mao] was correct, because that conforms with historical reality. Shouldn’t the concluding section include a passage about our determination to go on developing Mao Zedong Thought? We should also criticize the “two whatevers.” Comrade Mao Zedong’s mistakes consisted in violations of his own correct ideas.145 Deng grounded the new Party line focusing on the “four modernizations” in Mao Zedong Thought. Claiming that some tigers had to be “spanked,” he attacked the vulgar “fragmentation” 割裂 of Mao’s Thought. The Gang of Four and Lin Biao did not have a “comprehensive understanding” of Mao Zedong Thought, especially as they ignored “seeking the truth from the facts” and they had referred only to snippets of, or the “three constantly read articles” of this thought. Their closed-minded strategy ignored Mao’s instruction to “make foreign things serve China” 洋为中用.146 Deng defended the change in Party line that dropped “class struggle as the key link” to focus on the “four modernizations,” and he directed cadre attention to the study of specific writings and speeches in Mao Zedong Thought such as “On Policy,” “On Contradiction,” “On the Ten Major Relations,” “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People” and Mao’s January 1962 “7000 cadre” speech. Deng cited these specific writings time and time again. Mao’s 1956 “On the Ten Major Relations” became his programmatic statement for reform and the open door. Deng used the core writings of Mao Zedong Thought to explain China’s place in the world and to explain the world’s relevance to China. If China had “stood up,” China would still seek a wide set of economic relations with other states. Certainly, it provided a justification for Deng’s “socialism with Chinese characteristics” under what he regarded as legitimate Party rule. As China moved into deeper and deeper patterns of reform, one of the most pressing issues was how to maintain Chinese values and the Party system vis-à-vis the inevitable spread of bourgeois liberalism during modernization that accepted the importance of foreign trade and technological advance as well as the necessity of new patterns of ownership and competition in human relations and the structures of the economy and society.

Deng’s “pragmatism” and the Hong Kong question In September 1983, Deng Xiaoping had explained to British Prime Minister Edward Heath that they had to come up with a solution to the Hong Kong Question; otherwise, Deng “would become Li Hongchang” (1823–1901), the hapless viceroy forced to sign over elements of sovereignty and territory to the Japanese in the 1895 Treaty of Shimonoseki. Deng was determined but flexible. His notion of

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  41 “one country, two systems” 一个国家两种制度 has become in Chinese hagiography one of the most significant examples of “seeking the truth from the facts.” Originally, this notion had been conceived in relation to Taiwan, but Deng later put forward the notion as the basis for returning Hong Kong and Macao to the mainland.147 Former Foreign Minister Huang Hua pointed out that the “one country, two systems” reflected Chinese tradition focusing on “peace with differences.”148 Once Chinese sovereignty was assured, China would guarantee differences of social, cultural and political systems of mainland China and Hong Kong. Deng’s “pragmatic” response to the realities of the Hong Kong question demonstrated both his ideological agility and political determination. While concerned that the British might create disturbances in the last years of colonial rule,149 Deng identified the facts and then claimed that the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence offered an alternative to “bloc politics” 集团政治, “spheres of influence”势力范围 and “the big family” 大家庭, an allusion to Soviet patriarchy over the socialist commonwealth.150 In a rare moment of immodesty, Deng tentatively suggested to American strategic studies experts that his formula, “one country, two systems,” might be used not only in Macao and Taiwan but elsewhere in the world as a means of solving knotty territorial issues. This formula, however, is particular to Chinese dialectics and appears to have gained little influence outside China. While analysis often suggests the emphasis on sovereignty in Chinese analysis, even this notion seems subject to flexible interpretation of changing realities. Deng’s approach built upon Zhou Enlai’s Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, which attempted to reduce the resort to force to settle territorial claims and alternatively to focus on opportunities for economic cooperation between sovereign states based on the operational principle of “seek common ground while reserving differences 求同存异.”151 Deng was categorically unwilling to accept unequal treaty affirmation of the permanent ceding of Hong Kong Island to Great Britain. He was prepared to send in the PLA to assert China’s sovereignty over Hong Kong. Deng, on the other hand, went ahead and “reserved” Hong Kong’s different social system for fifty years. Deng believed that such a compromise was more than any other state in the modern history of international relations would have contemplated. Deng thought that he could reserve even the most fundamental differences of social systems not only in Hong Kong, but also in Macao, Taiwan, and even in relation to the Koreas based on the practical diplomacy as distinct from 你不吃掉我, 我也不吃掉你 – “You take a bite out of me, I take a bit out of you.”152 While Party historiography has celebrated Deng’s “one country, two systems” concept as a dialectical masterpiece, Western observers were often quick to assume that Deng’s “pragmatism” portended the end of ideology and the death of socialism. Britain’s Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, in her first meeting with Deng Xiaoping, was not happy with his “obdurate” emphasis on China’s sovereignty, but she believed that he was a “realist.” Even so, she was not pleased that

42  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” the Chinese side failed to appreciate the British “moral duty to protect the free way of life of the people of Hong Kong.” In this first encounter, the “Iron Lady” 铁娘子 patronized Deng, chiding him that the Chinese lacked “understanding of the legal and political conditions of capitalism.” Thatcher focused on the legality of what the Chinese side believed were “unequal treaties” that British imperialism had imposed by force “under the castle wall.” Such “bullying” was unacceptable. Mao and Zhou, while expressing interest in new agreements based on genuine reciprocity and mutual benefit, had refused to accept the legality of such treaties in 1949. Deng followed in the 1949 footsteps of Mao and Zhou, who refused to accept “unequal treaties.” He indicated that any Chinese government that failed to resume sovereignty over Hong Kong would have to quit “the political arena.” China was not prepared to accept “power politics” 强权政治 or “coercive diplomacy” 强力外交. Thatcher told a Hong Kong press conference: “If one party to a treaty or a contract says, ‘I cannot agree to it. I am going to break it,’ you cannot really have a great deal of confidence that any new treaty they make will be honored.”153 Thatcher’s Grotian-like lecture invoked the tradition of “treaties must be kept” (pacta sunt servanda). Deng was not at all impressed. Thatcher’s argument was nothing but a self-serving whitewashing of British imperialism in Hong Kong, and he especially disliked suggestion that the Chinese may not be true to their word. The further suggestion that the British were more capable of running administration than the Chinese people was viewed as insulting colonial paternalism. Deng did not miss the opportunity to use such insult to his advantage when he informed a Hong Kong delegation in June 1984: “Chinese are no less intelligent than foreigners and are by no means less talented. It is not true that only foreigners can be good administrators.”154 Deng reprised for Thatcher Chinese thinking at the time of the fashioning of the Sino-British Declaration in December 1984. He argued that “one-country, two systems” was based on “seeking the truth from the facts.” Dialectical analysis suggested that there were two possible ways to settle the issue: one, negotiations; the other, force. He preferred negotiations, but did not rule out force. Furthermore, he was emphatic that a related agreement would have to be concluded within two years. As for “some people” who worried whether China would abide by the agreement, he insisted that China would “keep its promise” and that the 50-year guarantee for Hong Kong’s social system was “in consideration of the realities in China and our need for development.” What is more, Deng argued that change would be unlikely as China kept developing “because then China will have more economic exchanges with other countries and all countries will be more mutually dependent and inseparable.”155 Deng differed from Thatcher as to what is, or is not “realistic.” In a 16 April 1987 meeting with the Committee for Drafting the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Deng said that while he thought Governor Sir David Wilson was “realistic, he was not impressed with Sir David’s successor,

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  43 Chris Patten, who disingenuously rushed to put in place as much democracy and human rights before the 1997 handover. Deng clarified before the Committee for Drafting the Basic Law that for a century and a half the Western system of government had not been copied in Hong Kong and that Britain could not then turn around in a great rush and introduce the parliamentary system and the separation of powers in the last years of colonial administration.156 Deng clearly repudiated any idea of a “general ballot” in Hong Kong that would exclude the central government from playing a role in Hong Kong’s future: Don’t ever think that everything would be all right if Hong Kong’s affairs were administered by Hong Kong people while the Central Government had nothing to do with the matter. That simply wouldn’t work – it’s not a realistic idea.157 Notwithstanding her rousing victory in the Falkland Islands, Thatcher was at a serious disadvantage. China was not Argentina, and Thatcher was really not the pole star! The Falklands War had been too costly and exhausting. The idea of going to war with China was out of the question. In this case, the “lady was for turning.” She was reduced to flattery and reasoning. Thatcher congratulated Deng for “unlocking” the Hong Kong situation with his formula, “one country two systems” 一个国家两种制度. Earlier on she could not see how the Chinese Communists would be able to manage capitalism in Hong Kong. In her later autobiographical treatment of China’s subsequent development, however, she could not resist having the last word and indulged in some “capitalist” triumphalism with respect to Deng’s vaunted mantra of “seeking the truth from the facts”: It has become clear that Chinese society is whatever the Chinese government does; and what it has been doing amounts to a thorough-going embrace of capitalism. In economic policy, at least, Mr. Deng has indeed sought the truth from the facts.158 Thatcher believed that Deng, in “seeking the truth from the facts,” had pragmatically turned his back on socialism to embrace capitalism. Indeed, some senior Party members, themselves, were worried whether reform would indeed destroy socialism. In a speech to the Central Advisory Commission – a body Deng created so that retiring veterans could render important political advice during reform – Deng spoke directly to panic stricken comrades who “can’t stand” the “sudden appearance of capitalism”: [Some of our comrades] worry that the country might go capitalist. I’m afraid some our own veteran comrades do harbour such misgivings. Since they have been devoted to socialism and communism all their lives, they are horrified by the sudden appearance of capitalism. They can’t stand it. But it will have no effect on socialism. Of course some negative elements will come in. . . . But it will not be difficult for us to overcome them; we’ll find ways of doing so.159

44  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” A great many “flies” had already passed through Deng’s “open door,” and such “ways” were not easily identified and implemented, as demonstrated in Deng’s subsequent dismissals of Party secretaries general Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang for having failed to deal with the problem. On the Hong Kong Question, Deng was extraordinarily optimistic. He reserved profound systemic differences, claiming dialectics would “liberate the mind.” Under his leadership, socialism became a perpetual work in progress as it evolved to meet changing national conditions and practical international realities, and Chinese nationalism remained embedded in Chinese praxis.

Spreading “bourgeois liberalism” through China’s “open door” Deng wanted the open door, and he wanted Chinese socialism. As early as January 1980, he attacked as sheer distortion claims that “. . . the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee adopted a ‘loosening up’ policy, whereas the four cardinal principles represent a ‘tightening up policy.’”160 Frustrated with ignorant foreign observations that cast him as a closet capitalist, he kept insisting that he wanted to bring together economic reform and the open door on the basis of independence and self-reliance and that this was for the purposes of Chinese socialism. His policies were to be guaranteed in the “four cardinal principles” as summed up in “coercive diplomacy” 强力外交.161 Deng championed the open door at the same time as he emphasized China’s struggle against “bourgeois liberalism.” He claimed that in 1983 he had put this struggle at the top of his personal leadership agenda. Later in 1986, in the context of the dismissal of Party Secretary General Hu Yaobang, Deng insisted: “With regard to the question of opposing bourgeois liberalization, I am the one who has talked about it most often and most insistently.”162 Deng pressed for the open door, but he invoked a famous metaphor of Sun Yatsen making it clear that China would not be “bullied” by foreigners: “The reason the imperialists were able to bully us in the past was precisely that we were a heap of loose sand.”163 Foreigners had criticized his Party’s factionalism. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao had stated that there were two factions in the Party, which had different attitudes towards mass movements and class struggle.164 Deng, on the eve of the 1989 Tiananmen troubles, however, put it quite differently to two leading members of the Central Committee: Strictly speaking, no factions of any sort have every taken shape in our party. While in Jiangxi in the 1930s, I was regarded as a member of the Mao faction, but it was not true. There simply was no Mao faction. . . . I have never tried to form a clique.165 Such strict speaking does not seem like a credible “seeking the truth from the facts.” The Cultural Revolution consumed the whole Party leadership in palpable, and often bloody, factionalism. Deng himself was largely responsible for Party building in the aftermath of such factionalism. However, in post-1977 discussion

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  45 with foreigners, Deng was keen to project an image of unity and stability. He, therefore, insisted that he himself was not the head of either a “reform faction” or a “conservative faction.” Deng told US Secretary of State George Schultz” on 3 March 1987 that he indeed was personally a “reformer,” but then again he was also a “conservative,” especially as he upheld the “four cardinal principles” that ideologically required adherence to socialism, Party leadership, “democratic dictatorship” and Mao Zedong Thought. Indeed, a core synthesis in Deng Xiaoping Thought required the correlation of “independence and self-reliance” and “reform and the open door” with these “four cardinal principles.”166 Deng had a very different idea from Morgenthau as to what constitutes “scientific” analysis. Optimistically, Deng believed that dialectics could scientifically produce objective results based on a credible reading of changing realities. Deng personally claimed to live by “seeking the truth from the facts.”167 Deng repeated the same message to the Third World leader President Hussain Muhammad Ershad of Bangladesh: “To put it more accurately, I belong to the faction that believes in seeking truth from the facts, the faction that pursues the policies of reform and opening to the outside world and that upholds leadership by the Party and follows the socialist road.”168 Deng downplayed Party factionalism even though the Cultural Revolution had spawned extraordinary factionalism that lasted well into the years of reform. However, his analysis of domestic affairs and international relations was still remarkably perceptive in its acceptance of China’s material weakness. His “realism” drew on Marxist dialectics and the re-prioritized notion of Chinese praxis, on the practical experience of pre-1949 politics as well as from key aspects of China’s political and cultural traditions. Western “realist” historiography and related foreign policy analysis is often disappointingly incomplete, if not off balance, in its interpretation of Deng’s career in international relations. Furthermore, Deng’s outline of an alternative conception of international relations has often gone on almost unnoticed in Western analysis. Perhaps this reflects the hold that Western balance of power realism has had on the Western study of Chinese foreign policy.

Learning with modesty and disclaiming world leadership Deng made it abundantly clear. Chinese domination of the world was both impractical and morally unacceptable. Such aspiration contradicted the thrust of modern Chinese revolutionary history. He strongly believed in China’s independence, but he did not make unwarranted claims to world leadership. Moreover, external resources and external help, while useful, were not in themselves sufficient to meet the needs of China’s development, which was the great task 大局 of the Party. Deng’s policy dialectic rejected both “blind Westernization” and autarchy while synthesizing the “open door” with “self-reliance” 自力更生开放政策. Deng’s dialectic wanted the benefits of participating in an international division of trade and investment. On the other hand, national economic success was largely but not exclusively a matter of indigenous effort.

46  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Deng placed domestic and foreign policy within a dialectical unity highlighting national economic development. Western “realism” in its pursuit of power analysis seldom takes the informed observer through Deng’s self-consciously prioritized synthesis of domestic and foreign policy. Deng kicked off the reform era lauding the 1940s Yan’an principles that were well explained in Mao’s 1956 “Ten Major Relationships.” Deng had written to Chairman Mao in 13 July 1956 supporting this key document and its circulation for Party study. He reiterated his support in 1956, 1957 and as late as 12 and 27 December 1965. During a special meeting of the Central Committee on 8 June 1975, he also supported the completion of the editing of the fifth volume of Mao’s selected works, which after Mao’s death would include the very same key understanding of China’s development as explained in 1956.169 The Party leadership vetting of the 1977 Volume 5 of Mao’s Selected Works ultimately served Deng’s policy purposes, as the volume’s contents featured Mao’s ideological views on praxis and “seeking the truth from the facts.” Deng appropriated Mao’s ideology to gain political initiative against the interregnum of Hua Guofeng and against anti-capitalist ideologues in the Party who saw the injustice of modernization as a contradiction with socialism. Deng’s reasoning was both sophisticated and intriguing. He insisted that in order to deal with the realities of China’s economic development, China’s leaders, and the Party at all levels of leadership, would have to learn with deliberate modesty the complexities of domestic and international realities. Mao was famous or infamous in the West for his ferocious style. Mao was a tiger! He “strategically despised” his enemies. He was not keen on “big professors” who read a lot of books, self-indulged in “confused personal relationships” and exhibited “complicated psychology,” but could not solve China’s problems.170 Mao once claimed: “The weakness of philosophy is that it hasn’t produced practical philosophy, only bookish philosophy.”171 No wonder “Doctor” Kissinger avoided talking philosophy with the Chinese leaders. Just after the key Lushan Party meeting, Mao, in September 1959, engaged in a rare, but obviously limited self-criticism. Apparently, the Chairman had not studied enough. Mao admitted to “not liking himself,” but Mao called on the Party to create “an environment of study”: “There are many things that I have not studied. . . . But, comrades, I study with determination and I will go on studying until I die.”172 Mao, the former primary school teacher and fierce nationalist, stood up to the “big professors.” Of the three flattering designations, great commander, great leader and great teacher, he preferred to be known as “The Great Teacher.” This “self-criticism” was not a sterling moment of personal modesty, and his studying failed to anticipate national economic disaster and the monumental loss of human life in the Great Leap Forward. Mao’s own authority stood in the way of Party learning. “Learning” required modesty, not obsequiousness. Mao had broadcast on 1 October 1949 in Tiananmen Square: “China had stood up!” That was the essence of “self-reliance” 自力更生 that has served as a key concept in explaining China’s relation to the outside world. Literally, “self-reliance” means to self-stand by

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  47 “turning over the body,” “self-standing and changing one’s life.”173 This was the way to respond to imperialism and bullies in international relations. As Deng later explained, “socialism with Chinese characteristics” could only be achieved on the basis of “maintaining independence and keeping the initiative in one’s own hands” and “self-reliance.” Elements of China’s long tradition of moral understanding perhaps explain the insistence that China would always take a “principled stand.” Insistence on distinguishing “right from wrong,” often explicit in Chinese foreign policy statements, concerns the need to oppose hegemonism, imperialism and socialist imperialism. Seizing the high moral ground was often accompanied by stating that China will “not be bullied.” Indeed, this reflects the essential insight of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence – China expected reciprocity, to be treated as an equal. Mao made one of his most famous pronouncements on the question of distinguishing “right” from “wrong” in the ninth of his “Ten Great Relations.” This dialectical treatment deliberately challenged Stalin’s “style of work” to warn against “dogmatists” who do “not allow people to correct their mistakes” and “bar people from the revolution.” The latter are like the “foreign devils” that are satirized in the The True Story of Ah Q: Lu Hsun writes mainly about a peasant who is backward and politically unawakened. He devotes a whole chapter, “Barred from the Revolution,” to describing how a bogus foreign devil bars Ah Q from the revolution. Actually, all Ah Q understands by revolution is helping himself to a few things just like some others. But even this kind of revolution is denied him by the bogus foreign devil. It seems to me that in this respect some people are quite like that bogus foreign devils. They barred from the revolution those who had committed errors . . . and went so far as to kill a number of people who were guilty of only making mistakes.174 This oration focuses on how easy it is to make mistakes. Mao goes on to the tenth of his “ten major relations” highlighting international relations. Mao emphasized the importance of knowing “right” from “wrong,” but he reminded the comrades that socialism is not perfect, and “Our policy is to learn from the strong points of all nations and all countries” 我们的方针是, 一切民族、 一切国家的长处都要.175 “All” countries are important and not just the Soviet Union, particularly as some not-so-discerning comrades had picked up the latter’s “shortcomings and weaknesses.”176 Deng Xiaoping dismissed ideological extremes, but he saw ideology as necessary to politics and the appropriate creation and implementation of related policy. He successfully launched his reforms and his “realist” foreign policy on the ideological basis of Mao Zedong Thought. This gave Deng’s policies a remarkable flexibility as well as a long-term legitimacy and coherence that has withstood “the test of time,” as China has moved further and further away from the original revolution into “reform as revolution” 改革是革命 involving the creation of a “socialist market” and, as discussed in Chapter Five, the increasing but also qualified participation in the “worldwide technological revolution” 世界技术革命.

48  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”

Deng’s apprehended mortality and legacy The 1997 Western obituaries readily acknowledged that Deng had contributed to China’s extraordinary economic success, but also expressed deep concern over whither “China without Deng.” In his last years, Deng had anticipated his own death. Many times, he explained to “foreign friends” that this own presence was irrelevant to the future application of “correct principles,” as the latter had bedrock support throughout the Party. Speaking in “symbolic” terms, Deng claimed that the policies of economic reform and open door were so correct that they would survive one hundred years after his death. The universal revulsion towards the Cultural Revolution and the related demand for modernization may have given Deng such confidence, but recent times suggest that the Cultural Revolution has become more abstract in its impact and has become a subject for hazy reminiscence. Deng progressively retired from his various positions in the face of widespread Party advice not to do so.177 Concerned about political stability and policy continuity, he wanted to establish a precedent for a smooth leadership transition. Again there was the issue of modesty. Deng may have had Mao in mind when he cautioned against the cadres putting their trust in old age: “Old people have strengths but also great weaknesses – they tend to be stubborn, for example – and they should be aware of that. The older they get . . . , the more careful not to make mistakes in their later years.”178 Once he did die on 19 February 1997, Deng’s instincts were confirmed. In the minds of Western observers, a gigantic question mark loomed over East Asia. They were worried about the future of economic reform and the open door, especially in light of the passing of the generation of Party Long Marchers. There was widespread speculation about a leadership vacuum and possible reversal of Deng’s policies, China’s fragmentation and the snuffing out of China’s brilliant new economy in the extremes of Chinese politics. Time’s obituary carried a youthful picture of Deng on its cover, but Johanna McGeary reported with some ambivalence: When death came to Deng Xiaoping last week, at 92, he was nearly blind, deaf, virtually invisible and the honorary chairman of only the China Bridge Association. Yet even in his long political twilight, he still cast a shadow over the nation, at once reassuring and restricting the Chinese as they march uncertainly toward the twenty-first century.179 Western eulogies, while heavily reserved about Deng’s 1989 role in Tiananmen Square, generally acknowledged the important contribution that he had made to China’s modernization. Deng’s insistence on placing domestic and foreign policy within a policy unity did not receive as much Western attention, yet Deng had worked hard to create domestic consensus in favour of reform breakthrough that included less reserved emphasis on foreign technology and investment. This he did in the face of conservative criticism fearing the rise of capitalism in China and

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  49 the desecration of the national principle of “self-reliance.” In light of persisting Cold War imagery of China as a Communist state that had undergone the convulsions of the Cultural Revolution, Deng worried about the vagaries of foreign psychological hyperbole. He worked to create a new image for China as a country that was stable and reliable. Deng sought to convince foreign leaders that China’s door would remain open for business and that China was not a “threat.” Deng’s foreign policy was especially sophisticated in its understanding of the importance of learning to support development on the basis of the “open door” in its synthesis with “self-reliance.” Deng had no time for perverse bourgeois liberalism, but he believed that learning required a widely construed historical and international basis. China’s former Foreign Minister, Huang Hua, wrote about the exciting attributes of Deng’s foreign policy and claimed: He called on our people to learn from and use for reference all the splendid achievements of mankind. According to my understanding, this would involve assimilating the cream of ancient Chinese philosophy, the scientific socialist theory of Marxism-Leninism, and all the achievements of world civilizations created through the bourgeois revolutions and the proletarian revolutions.180 Beijing Review’s analysis of Deng’s thoughts as “the fountain of China’s diplomatic policy” later eulogized Deng’s “independent foreign policy” as the enduring basis for the development of a range of new foreign policies: It is the target of China’s foreign policy to maintain world peace and carry out cooperation with all countries under the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, to serve [China’s] efforts to build a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way at home. Based on Deng Xiaoping’s diplomatic thought, China has put forward and implemented a series of new foreign policies, establishing an image of a peace-loving, principled and responsible big country. It has played an important role in dealing with the Asian financial crisis, nuclear [arms] race in South Asia, Kosovo crisis, post 9/11 anti-terror campaign, Afghan war, Iraq war and the Korean nuclear crisis, which has shown to the world a new diplomatic style featuring sincerity, responsibility, frankness as well as pragmatism, flexibility and openness.181 At the time of Deng’s death, there was some Western criticism of his foreign policy. Despite Deng’s consolidation of the “open door policy” and his leadership of normalization with traditional enemies such as Japan, the US and the Soviet Union, seasoned observers such as David Goodman and Gerald Segal claimed that Deng had a “poor sense of strategy or understanding of international affairs.” By 1987, Deng thought that China’s image had changed, but Segal and Goodman argued that Deng was driven by “a sense of past humiliation.” Again, this looks like insufficiently qualified psychological generalization. As late as 1997, even Samuel Kim emphasized that Chinese policy was essentially ambivalent due to an unresolved problem of identity:

50  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” The PRC’s quest for an appropriate niche in a changing international order can be seen as an ongoing struggle to enhance physical and psychological well-being, in the course of which the Self attempts to secure an identity as a global power that others do not bestow, while others attempt to bestow an identity as a regional power that the Self does not appropriate.182 Chinese psychological inhibition, or behavioural maladjustment, was more recently described in Professor William Callahan’s treatment of China as a “pessoptimist nation” and Chinese foreign policy as a troubled combination of both a “superiority complex” and “inferiority complex.”183 The “euphoria of achieving the dream of a great modern China” is apparently commingled in the Chinese mind with a keen “sense of humiliation” that produces instability. On the other hand, the Chinese response to “hegemony” and “bullying” might be seen as rationally predicated on a well-informed, if not “pragmatic,” understanding of international politics. At any rate, the Chinese presumably caught in their behavioural dilemma are not given any points for their dialectical understanding of complex reality. Deng’s foreign policy, however, was hugely successful in breaking away from the limitations of containment and supporting domestic economic reform that included a new role for foreign investment and technology. Goodman and Segal’s obituary asserted to the contrary: “. . . unlike Zhou Enlai, Deng exhibited little subtlety in handling the outside world and even less understanding of the nature of international affairs in the late twentieth century.” While Deng had “cast off ideology,” his “nasty” self was expressed in his “naked nationalism.” His “rough and unsatisfied nationalism was unable to fathom the ‘post-modern’ world of limited sovereignty of states and increasing interdependence.”184 What could one expect of a diminutive leader who “cackled” and spit into a spittoon in front of his foreign guests? Apparently, Deng was too attached to the old state system to really appreciate the compelling implications of economic globalization. Professor Ezra Vogel has more recently provided a much more positive and compelling account, claiming that under Deng, “. . . China truly joined the world community, becoming an active part of international organizations and of the global system of trade, finance, and relations among citizens of all walks of life.”185 Moreover, Vogel was also impressed with Deng’s adaptation to globalization: “Deng advanced China’s globalization far more boldly and thoroughly than did leaders of other large countries like India, Russia, and Brazil.”186 Chinese PRC scholarship not unexpectedly presents a very positive picture. Notwithstanding Morgenthau’s objections to ideology and motivation, a fair and comprehensive analysis should still review both sides of the question. Chinese commentary claims that Deng built upon the experience of Mao and Zhou, but he is also said to have made a major contribution to China’s foreign policy adaptation to changing post-Cold War international conditions. His theory provided a consistent and compelling basis in relation to the changing conditions regarding war and peace, expanding multilateralism, multi-polarity and responding appropriately to the rising pattern of Third World nationalism

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  51 and development. What is more, even though Deng may not have read Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane’s neoliberal theories on the compelling nature of complex interdependence and the need to challenge realism, he did see the growing importance of interdependence, and his theory and foreign policy attempted to reap the advantages of “world technological revolution” while at the same time preserving China’s “independence and self-reliance.”187 Li Zhongjie, for example, started off a Peking University Conference on “The Study of Deng Xiaoping’s International Strategic Thinking” by claiming: Deng Xiaoping’s international strategic thought includes a rich content. It moves in three general directions. First, there are his predictions, analyses and observations as to the general trend of international events. Of these the most important is his thinking concerning the two big contemporary world issues, namely that of peace and development. . . . Secondly, there are his fundamental proposals for solving the world’s problems. The most important of these is to establish new economic and political orders placing them on the foundation of the five principles of peaceful coexistence. . . . Thirdly, there is his peaceful foreign policy for the new period of independence and keeping the initiative in our own hands.188 At the same Peking University conference, Li’s colleague, Li Yihu, claimed that Deng had made a threefold contribution to “international strategic thinking” 国际 战略思想. In the first place Deng had correctly centred his diplomacy and thinking within the domestic parameters of building the economy. Secondly, he elaborated on the correlations of development with regional and international prospects for peace. Thirdly, he had established the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as the basis for a new political and economic international order.189 As for how strong was Deng’s interest in foreign policy, Professor Ezra Vogel has suggested that whereas Deng tended to defer to the experts on science and technology, he took a hands-on approach to national security and the relations with other countries. Deng was his own “master strategist” in these areas. Vogel wrote that in these areas Deng seldom yielded to others, as he relied on the strength of his own expertise: “Deng spent more time finding out what he needed to know and to devise the strategies himself.”190 Distinguished Georgetown China expert David Shambaugh made the same point, arguing that while not as despotic as Mao, Deng was able to put his “personal imprint upon the making of Chinese foreign policy.191 Not one to “rest on his oars,” there was the pressing question of how China should move forward. For Deng, this was a question of creating a deliberate learning process to facilitate China’s new place in the world. Deng eulogized “modesty” as the key to learning. His learning dialectic started with the acceptance of China’s relatively weak position in the world. “Empty talk” could not provide meaningful solutions. Praxis was to be assessed on the basis of a modest learning dialectic. In discussion with Gorbachev on his visit to Beijing in 1989, Deng observed that the two sides should “do more practical things and indulge in less empty talk.”192

52  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Building on Zhou Enlai’s approach to Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, Deng opposed persisting notions of containment and alliance politics. He used Mao’s dialectics for solving problems and to justify revision to some of Mao’s own international relations theories. His revision to Mao’s theory on general war as well as the theory on the “three worlds” resulted in a dialectical reassessment of the possibilities of war and peace, and this revision supported China’s “independent foreign policy” based on the domestic and international dialectics of peace and development. Mao’s original theory stressed the proliferation of contradictions and placed these within four categories, namely, contradictions between the developing countries and imperialism, the class contradictions within capitalist and revisionist countries, inter-imperialist country contradictions and the contradictions between socialist countries and imperialism/ socialist imperialism.193 Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” requires appropriate definition and related nuanced analysis that is fully informed as to the relevant aspects of Deng’s Chinese Marxist-Leninist thinking. His thinking is not in antithesis to ideology, but rather it is part of an ideology requiring a realistic relation between means and ends. Deng’s problem-solving dialectics eschews absolutes and requires learning with modesty. Foreign policy is the continuation of domestic priorities of national economic development. China’s relative weakness requires a low-posture foreign policy that looks for external opportunities to support development, but independently avoids extravagant superpower commitments. Hegemony was neither a moral nor a realistic option. Deng’s foreign policy honestly understood China’s stage of development. It rejected both autarchy and dependencia, preferring instead the synthesis of the “open door” with “self-reliance.” It also rejected the export of revolution in favour of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Furthermore, it challenged the international and regional balance of power system that was predicated on treaties of alliance that fundamentally characterized the Cold War experience. While focusing on “independence and self-reliance,” Deng’s “independent foreign policy” contributed greatly to the reduction of Cold War power politics. Drawing on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, Deng proceeded with Sino-American and Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian normalizations, all the while rejecting “triangular diplomacy” and the “playing of cards.” And once he secured a normalization process with the US, he then laid the groundwork to support SinoSoviet and Sino-Russian normalizations. Deng Xiaoping focused on the realistic achievement of his ideals. He was not a “pragmatist” in the conventional sense of dealing with the realities of power without deference to the ideals canonized in ideology. Deng created all policy, including foreign policy, within an ideological matrix of “seeking the truth from the facts.” His dialectical reading of China in the world required a low-posture approach that recognized China’s comparatively weak national power and international influence. Within this reading, Deng declined to support the export of revolution and embraced the single world economy.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  53 The analytical problem with “pragmatism” as a foreign policy construct is threefold. First, to answer Kissinger’s original question, “it is not enough” especially when the question is put to the Chinese themselves. Chinese ideals motivate Chinese policy. Ideology stipulates the difference between “right” and “wrong” as a matter of “firm principle”; however, the dialectics embedded in Mao Zedong Thought have required the flexible adaptation to changing realities in the achievement of ideals. Second, Western “pragmatism,” in its rejection of ideology and isms, differs from Deng’s “unity of theory and praxis.” Third, the origins of Deng’s particular blend of idealism and realism requires careful and comprehensive examination in relation to both China’s deep and immediate past and its impact on Deng’s view of the world.

The structure of this book Chapter 1: Judging Deng Xiaoping’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Deng Xiaoping has had many Chinese and Western biographers, but these biographies and the wider literature have not paid sufficient attention to Deng’s fascinating role in fashioning modern Chinese foreign policy.194 With particular reference to the different Chinese and Western approaches to the study of China’s international relations, this Chapter discusses the available interpretations of Deng’s “pragmatic” foreign policy and explores the difference between Western and Chinese “realism” as it concerns the development of Deng’s foreign policy content. The latter is placed within the relevant parameters of both recent Party and deep imperial history. A balanced and careful reading of Deng’s foreign policy has been difficult in light of Cold War exaggeration and “realist” bias; however, it can be argued that Deng’s foreign policy has proven to be especially lasting and appropriate to the needs of reform-based national economic development; and it has displayed a logical coherence that is rarely found in the context of the emergence of a new world power. Any judgment regarding the origins and implications of Deng’s “pragmatism” needs a comprehensive analysis – one that includes ideology within the matrix of Chinese culture, history, personality and politics. This book’s analysis treats Deng’s foreign policy within this matrix of background factors focusing on past diplomatic and political experience, leadership personality, as well as on Party thinking, Mao Zedong Thought and policy formation so as to feature new emphasis on economic reform and the open door and the practical correlations of peace and development in the international relations of China. Chapter 2: The origins and implications of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” The roots of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” 独立自主外交政策 go back through several decades of national discourse and self-conscious practical experience.

54  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Moreover, Party discourse has increasingly entwined these “modern” roots with the ancient roots of Chinese civilization. Chapter Two chronicles CCP foreign policy history to establish the modern conceptual and practical antecedents of Deng’s most important foreign policy concepts and actions, especially as these focus attention on “independent foreign policy” and the relation between “peace and development.” The blend of idealism and realism in relevant Chinese foreign policy debates over time is discussed with extended chronological reference to the substantial policy elements of post-1949 conceptual continuity and discontinuity so as to facilitate the overall conclusions in the final chapter as to the ongoing relevance of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” to the foreign policy of today’s China. Chapter 3: Deng and the United States: “normalization” without closure As a process, Sino-US normalization was and is still regrettably incomplete. In the past, Henry Kissinger and others have commented on how it is practically impossible to conduct diplomacy with a country that is deeply committed to ideology or a singular true faith. Deng’s foreign policy, however, rejected the export of revolution and reserved ideology in defining the relations between states on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. This required “making friends everywhere.” The record on the American side leaves less room for optimism insofar as it suggests a closeddoor approach to learning in international relations. US recognition of the USSR was withheld for seventeen years, 1917 through 1933. The Vietnamese case took twenty years and the Cuban case, forty-seven years. The process of Sino-US normalization started in 1970 and began to mature with the exchange of ambassadors in 1979; that is thirty years after the proclamation of the People’s Republic of China. Each ideological objection to the make-up of Communist regimes appears as a prominent factor, and one wonders what happened to “classical European diplomacy” and Richelieu’s commitment “to negotiate ceaselessly, either openly or secretly, and in all places, even in those from which no present fruits are reaped and still more in those for which no future prospects as yet seem likely.” It fell to Deng Xiaoping to advance the original normalization process started by Mao and Zhou. After several ups and downs, even Deng, the “optimist,” conceded that he would not see unification with Taiwan in his lifetime. His “pragmatic” approach was predicated on “seeking the truth from the facts.” In foreign policy, this included constant reference to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” It was this “pragmatism” that underlay the Chinese approach to the drafting of the 1972 Shanghai Communique. Once he was in full control of the Party agenda, Deng modified Mao’s foreign policy, all the while stressing that he was applying the key principle of Mao Zedong Thought, namely, “seek the truth from the facts.” Deng revised the original understanding of Mao’s First

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  55 World, and Sino-US normalization was placed inside a more complex reading of international relations. However, the early emphasis on achieving “parallel” geopolitical understandings with the US fell by the wayside as the two sides grappled with the Taiwan Question. Chinese and American pragmatisms converged to produce three communiques in 1972, 1979 and 1982, but these failed to sustain a mutually satisfactory approach reinforcing genuine trust and cooperation based on reciprocity and equality. This chapter reviews the stages of “normalization” with special reference to Deng’s management of Sino-American relations. “Normalization” was never properly completed, but Deng achieved his number one foreign policy goal, which was to achieve peace for two decades so as to facilitate domestic economic development Chapter 4: Ideology and the Five Principles in Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian normalizations Mao Zedong, exercising his constant propensity for dialectical observation, once said: “The relationship between two countries is also a ‘unity of opposites.’ China and the Soviet Union are both socialist countries. Are there differences between them? Yes, there are.”195 The ideological dispute between China and the Soviet Union was ferocious, but as Deng suggested when he finally met Gorbachev in Beijing in 1989, such disputes tended to mask the real underlying problem, namely, state-to-state inequality. The modern history of Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian relations reflects a great deal of self-conscious reference to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. These principles, especially as they are designed to promote progressive cooperation while “reserving differences,” were at issue, but failed in a spectacular manner during the polemics of the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1980s, these same principles were resurrected in the context of protracted negotiations over “normalization.” In May 1989, Deng and Gorbachev agreed on an eightcharacter approach, letting go of the past, and opening up the future 结束过去, 开辟未来. The formal reversion to the five principles was later sustained even through extraordinary transition that saw the collapse of the Soviet empire and the emergence of the new Russian state. How well did Deng Xiaoping handle Sino-Soviet/Sino-Russian differences? As a “son of China,” Deng was tough but flexible. China and the world survived the apocalyptic implosion of the Soviet Union. The Five Principles were not only applied in China’s relations with the new states in the former Soviet space, but these same principles became the basis of new Sino-Russian relations as well as the basis for the governing principles of the Shanghai Cooperative Organization. Deng’s handling of the “three obstacles” to normal Sino-Soviet relations deserves to go down in diplomatic history as one of the most interesting chapters of proactive peaceful initiative on the part of two great powers in tension during unprecedented upheavals in their respective domestic politics in a time of major structural change at the international level.

56  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” Chapter 5: Deng’s “independent foreign policy” and “independent globalization” China is the first developing country to become a world power. As such, China has had to respond to the opportunities and liabilities associated with economic globalization. This chapter takes up the particular question raised by scholars such as Gerald Segal, David Goodman and Michael Yahuda at the time of Deng’s death. Segal and Goodman had expressed reservations at Deng’s death as to his apparent attachment to “an old world of states” and his lack of acumen in responding to globalization. Well-known China expert, Michael Yahuda commented: “Even in the area where the Chinese may be said to have fulfilled some of the requirements for the ‘learning’ of interdependence in officially approved institutional settings, doubts remain as to how much has been ‘learned.’”196 Another well-known China expert, David Lampton, put the issue in slightly different terms with respect to the enduring nature of China’s “narrow national interest and practice of realpolitik”: . . . it is easy to assume that globalization will slowly erode Beijing’s dedication to its narrow national interest and practice of realpolitik. Although there is plenty of evidence of increasing Chinese cooperation and conformity with international norms, there is little evidence that considerations of national interest and realpolitik figure any less prominently in Chinese thinking than they always have.197 More recently, Professor Vogel contends that Deng greatly advanced Chinese participation in the global system: During Deng’s era, to adjust to its new global role, China went through retching internal changes that Chinese leaders called “jeigui,” or linking tracks, drawing on the term used in the 1930s for the linking together of Chinese railways of different gauges. In the 1980s Chinese used the term to describe the adjustments that China was making to take part in international organizations and in global systems of all kinds.”198 This Chapter argues that Deng Xiaoping established a rational response to globalization, which was designed to seize the opportunities for foreign investment and technology transfer while controlling for those political aspects of globalization that undercut state sovereignty. Chinese analysis has not presumed that the rise of globalization correlates with the decline of states in the international system. While “globalization” has been described as inevitable, it has been seen as manageable by sovereign states. Chinese viewpoint did not subscribe to notions such as James Rosenau’s “post-international politics” 后国际政治. China’s policy built on the existing logic of “self-reliance and the open door” to

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  57 acquire for the sovereign state the benefits of globalization while controlling as much as possible for its liabilities. This “independent foreign policy” approach is described in this chapter as “independent globalization.” Chapter 6: Deng Xiaoping and China’s contemporary foreign policy This chapter details which Dengist foreign policy contributions have lasted through time, considers the reasons for their persistence and shows how and why the original formulations have been extended to meet new circumstances. Deng’s dialectical proclivities and his unity of domestic and foreign policy had filliped unprecedented economic development. Deng Xiaoping established the related policy framework by which China would engage the world. He established the underlying basis of China’s response to globalization on the basis of “self-reliance and independence.” Succeeding leadership generations could hardly ignore this success and were inclined to build upon such success rather than striking out in entirely new directions. Many of the foreign policy concepts advanced by Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jiping are predicated on Deng Xiaoping theory and practice, including concepts such as “new security,” “diversity of civilizations,” “democratization of international relations,” and “harmony with differences.” Deng expected that by 2020 China would achieve the goal of a “moderately prosperous society” 小康社会. By his calculation, China would still need up until mid-century to become a moderately developed country. Several key questions follow from this. Will changing domestic and international conditions negate the necessity of a “low-posture” foreign policy? Will China become “cocky” as it achieves new status as the world’s largest economy? Will it become necessary to revise Deng’s core concept of “peace and development” as China’s consumer society expands and urbanization pushes further into China’s Third World hinterland? As Deng’s memory fades, will the leaders still maintain his theory? Under such circumstances, will a Chinese “Monroe Doctrine” become necessary?

Notes 1 Lee Kuan Yew, One Man’s View of the World. Singapore: Straits Times Press, 2013, p. 31. 2 Lee, One Man’s View of the World, pp. 319, 327. 3 Deng Xiaoping, “China Will Never Allow Other Countries to Interfere in its Internal Affairs,” 11 July 1990, talk with former Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau, Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, vol. iii, (1982–92) (henceforth SWDXPIII), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1994, p. 346. 4 Ni Siyi & Meng Na, “Deng’s Legacy still Influences the World,” Daily Report, 22 August 2004, Xinhua, Beijing, http://toolkit.dialog.com/intramet’cgi/present?STYLE +73931801&PRESENT=DB=985,A, accessed 19 April 2007. 5 Henry Kissinger, On China, New York: The Penguin Press, 2011, p. 266: Hengli Jixinge, Lun Zhongguo, (On China), Beijing: Zhongxin chubanshe, 2012, p. 263. “Pragmatism,” translated as 实用主义 is used to indicate “pragmatism” in the Chinese translation of Kissinger’s book, and it is generally used in the Chinese scholarship when American “pragmatism” is intended. Deng’s “pragmatism,” however, relates to

58  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” the Chinese Communist Party’s ideological emphasis on the unity of theory and praxis 理论与实际. “Praxis” here is integrated with theory about ideological goals. 实际 is interchangeable with 实践. When Mao said, “No we are not insane, we are pragmatists,” “pragmatist” was translated as 实际主义者. Different wording was used for the different contents of Chinese and Western “pragmatism.” 6 Zhou Yijun, Zhongxin sikao Jixingen, (A Kissinger Restored), Beijing: Shishi chubanshe, 2015. Zhou, on pp. 6–7, suggests that Kissinger’s “realism” (现实主义) was rational in its “determination of interests” (利益判断) and that it distinguished between core values (道) and technique (术). 7 Gong Honglie & Gao Jinhu, Jixinge: Meiguode “waijiaomo shushi” (Kissinger: America’s “master foreign policy tactician”), Beijing: Peking University Press, 2014, p. 29. Gong and Gao took this statement from Kissinger’s The White House Years. 8 Graham Evans & Jeffrey Newnham, The Dictionary of World Politics, New York & London: Simon & Schuster, p. 339. 9 According to Chinese biographers, such as Deng Rong and Gao Yi. See Gao Li, for example, Lishi xuanzele Deng Xiaoping (Deng Xiaoping: Chosen by History), Wuhan: Wuhan chubanshe, 2012, pp. 2–3. 10 Huang Hua, Huang Hua Memoirs, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2008, p. 488. 11 Li Hongfeng, Zhanlue Deng Xiaoping (Deng Xiaoping, the strategist), Beijing: Xin Hua chubanshe, 2014, p. 188. 12 Hu Jintao, “Zai Deng Xiaoping tongzhi tanzhang yibai zhounian jinin dahuishangde jianghua,” (Speech at commemorative meeting celebrating the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of Comrade Deng Xiaoping), (22 August 2004), Hu Jintao, Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. 2, (Hu Jintao’s selected works), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2016, p. 204. 13 Stuart Schram, Mao Tse-tung, Middlesex, 1967, p. 51. 14 This is based on his self-observation. Deng Xiaoping, “Excerpts from Talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhia and Shanghai,” (18 January–21 February 1992), SWDXPIII, p. 370. 15 “China’s “Paramount Leader Deng Xiaoping Dead,” Associated Press, 19 February 1997, Section 5: “Selected Deng Sayings,” p. 2. 16 See discussion in Stuart Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, London: Penguin Books Ltd., p. 19. 17 Mao Zedong, “Talk on Question of Philosophy,” Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 229. 18 “Deng Xiaoping’s Children Tell Rarely Known Stories about their Father,” Beijing Renmin ribao (People’s daily), in English, 23 August 2004. Apparently, this item was not carried in the paper’s Chinese edition. 19 Deng, “Excerpts from Talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” p. 370. 20 For the standard Party view on this, see Li Hongfeng, Zhanluejia Deng Xiaoping, pp. 188–9. 21 Deng was, in retrospect, apologetic for his portrait appearing among the seven portraits that “as a sign of respect” were widely displayed throughout China in 1956. Deng Xiaoping, “We Should Take a Long-Range View of Developing Sino-Japanese Relations,” (25 March 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 64. 22 Deng Xiaoping, “Adhere to the Party Line and Improve Methods of Work,” (29 February 1980), SWDXPII, p. 268. 23 Cited in “The Second Revolution,” Time, 23 September 1985, p. 35. 24 Ross Terrill, A Biography: Mao, New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1980, p. 407. Even so, while Deng lost office, Mao still let Deng keep his Party membership, thus leaving the door open to Deng’s rehabilitation and return to power.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  59 25 Deng Xiaoping, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” (2 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 175. 26 Ruan Ming, Deng Xiaoping: Chronicle of an Empire, trans. and ed. by Nancy Lin, Peter Rand and Lawrence Sullivan, with foreword by Andrew Nathan, Boulder: Westview press, 1992, p. 8. 27 As cited in Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011, p. 507. 28 According to Terrill, when Kissinger met Zhou he wondered why this “nasty little man” quoted Mao so often and appeared unresponsive to Kissinger’s solicitous enquiries after Zhou Enlai’s failing health. Terrill, A Biography: Mao, p. 396. 29 Kissinger, On China, p. 324. 30 The only real “nastiness” here may lie in Pye’s gratuitous cultural determinism. According to Pye, Deng “. . . does not bother to capture his audience’s imagination and does not bother to communicate any emotion” and this is why Kissinger is said to have concluded that he was a “nasty little man.” Lucien Pye, “Deng Xiaoping and China’s Political Culture,” in David Shambaugh, ed., Deng Xiaoping: Portrait of a Chinese Statesman, Oxford: Clarendon Paperbacks, 1995, p. 9. 31 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, pp. 4–5. 32 Alexander Haig, Caveat: Realism, Reagan, and Foreign Policy, New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1984, p. 194. 33 Richard Nixon, The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1978, p. 577. 34 Ye Zicheng, Xin Zhongguo waijiao sixiang: cong Mao Zedong dao Deng Xiaoping (New China’s foreign relations thought: from Mao Zedong to Deng Xiaoping), Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2001, p. 76. 35 Samuel Kim, ed., China and the World: Chinese Foreign Relations in the Post-Cold War Era, 3rd edit., Boulder: Westview Press, 1994, p. 7. 36 Pye adds that it is especially curious that even when “pragmatism” prevails, Western scholars “feel it necessary to treat Chinese propaganda seriously.” Lucien Pye, “Chinese Politics in the Late Deng Era,” The China Quarterly, no. 142, June 1995, pp. 578–9. 37 Deng Xiaoping, “The Present Situation and the Task before Us,” (12 January 1980), Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, vol. II, (hereinafter SWDWPII), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984, p. 252. 38 Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks at the Sixth Plenary Session of the Party’s Twelfth Central Committee,” (28 September 1986) SWDXPIII, p. 183. 39 Lee, One Man’s View, p. 324. 40 This likely resulted in Deng’s promotion to General Secretary of the CCPCC. See Richard Evans, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China, rev. ed., London: Penguin, 1993, p. 125. 41 Evans, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China, p. 132. 42 In 1953, in a rare moment of modesty, Mao noted that this ruling was adopted to observe the proper relationship between pupil and teacher. See Mao Tse-tung, “Combat Bourgeois Ideas in the Party,” Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works of Mao Tsetung, (hereafter cited as SWMTTV), Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 111. 43 See Teng Hsiao-ping, “Report on the Revision of the Constitution of the Communist Party of China,” 16 September 1956, Central Committee, Communist Party of China, Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, vol. 1, Documents, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1956, p. 183. 44 Teng, “Report on the Revision of the Constitution of the Communist Party of China,” p. 200. 45 David Goodman, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution: A Political Biography, London & New York: Routledge, 1994, pp. 46, 52. Professor Vogel summed up these

60  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” key relationships: Deng had worked closely with Zhou since their time in France half a century earlier when Zhou had supervised his work. But Deng had bonded with Mao in the Jiangxi Soviet in the early 1930s and risen over the years because he was Mao’s man, not because he was Zhou’s man.” Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, p. 73. 46 Deng Xiaoping. “Answers to the Italian Journalist Oriana Fallaci,” (21 & 23 August 1980), SWDXPII, p. 329. 47 Deng Xiaoping, “Uphold the Four Cardinal Principles,” (30 March 1979), SWDXPII, p. 180. 48 Deng Hsiao-ping, Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiao-ping, at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1974, p. 21. 49 Deng Xiaoping, “Keeping to Socialism and the Policy of Peace,” (4 April 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 161. 50 William Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts: The Top-Secret Talks with Beijing and Moscow, New York: The New Press, 1998, p. 267. 51 National People’s Congress of China, The Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, (4 December 1982), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, pp. 7–8. 52 Huang, Memoirs, p. 288. 53 Huang, Memoirs, p. 295. 54 Paul R. Viotti & Mark V. Kauppi, International Relations Theory: Realism, Pluralism, Globalism, New York: Macmillan, 1987, p. 34. 55 Henry Kissinger, Years of Renewal, London & New York; Simon & Schuster, 1999, p. 1076. More recently, Kissinger has suggested that US foreign policy must be concerned with both means and objectives. Regarding the “many gradations” in both the American and Chinese camps, he concluded: “The best outcome in the American debate would be to combine the two approaches: for the idealists to recognize that principles need to be implemented over time and hence must be occasionally adjusted to circumstance; and for the ‘realists’ to accept that values have their own reality must be built into operational policies.” Kissinger, On China, p. 454. 56 Han Nianlong, “Five Principles Guide China’s Diplomacy,” Beijing Review, no. 31, 30 July 1981, 1984, p. 18. For related analysis, see R.C. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s Independent Foreign Policy’,” International Journal, xli, winter 1985–86, pp. 102, 125. 57 Gerald Segal, “China and the Great Power Triangle,” The China Quarterly, no. 85, September 1980, p. 490. For Chinese reference to Segal and the “China Threat,” see Qian Qichen, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, New York: Harper Collins, 2005, p. 244. 58 Deng discussed this with PM Nakasone, “We Should Take a Longer-Range View in Developing Sino-Japanese Relations,” (25 March 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 63. 59 Mark Mancall, China at the Center: Three Hundred Years of Foreign Policy, New York: Free Press, 1984, p. 438. 60 Lee, One Man’s View, p 33. 61 Deng Xiaoping, “We Must Adhere to Socialism and Prevent Peaceful Evolution towards Capitalism,” (23 November 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 333. Deng Xiaoping himself edited and fastidiously reviewed all of the articles in the third volume of his own selected works. Chinese analysis has claimed that the notion of “peaceful evolution” originated in the foreign policy of US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles. 62 Ye, Xin Zhongguo waijiao sixiang: cong Mao Zedong dao Deng Xiaoping, pp. 74–5. 63 This is according to the memory of former foreign minister Huang Hua (1976–82), who spent five years with the Chinese UN mission. See Huang, Memoirs, pp. 252–4. 64 Chuang Meng, “Deng Puts Forward New 12-Character Guiding Principle for Internal and Foreign Policies,” Ching Pao, no. 172, 5 November 1991, pp. 84–86, FBISCHI-91-215, 6 November 1991, p. 28.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  61 65 Gong Li, Deng Xiaoping yu Meiguo, (Deng Xiaoping and America), Beijing: Zhonggongdangshi chubanshe, 2004, pp. 6–7. 66 See, for example, “Deng Xiaoping’s 24-Character Strategy” www.global security.org/ military/world/china/24-character.htm. 67 Kissinger, On China, pp. 508–510. 68 Hu Jintao, “Guoji xingshi he waishi gongzuo,” (International conditions and our foreign affairs work), (21 August 2006), Hu Jintao wenxuan, (Hu Jintao’s selected works), vol. ii, Beijing: Remin chubanshe, 2016, p. 516. 69 Hu Jintao, “Tongdeng guonei guoji liangge daju, tigao waijiao gongzuo nengli shuiping) (Taking all factors into consideration regarding the internal and international dimensions of the two great tasks, raising the policy levels and capabilities of our diplomatic work), 17 July 2009), Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. iii, p. 236. 70 Deng Xiaoping “Seize the Opportunity to Develop the Economy,” (24 December 1990) SWDXPIII, p. 350. 71 Huan Xiang’s “Zhongyi ben xuyan,” (Interpreting a book preface to Zheng lun Zhongguode guojia guanxi lilun (Debates on the theory of China’s international relations) Shijie zhishi, (World knowledge), no. 8, 1988, p. 12. 72 Margaret Macmillan, Seize the Hour: When Nixon Met Mao, London: John Murray, pp. 229–30. Macmillan herself describes Kissinger and Zhou Enlai as “twin Machiavellis” on the back cover. 73 Zao Yingwang, Zhongguo waijiao diyi ren (The first person in China’s diplomacy), Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 2006, p. 50. 74 Henry Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, Boston and Toronto: Little, Brown and Com., 1982, p. 50. 75 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 67. 76 “Marx to Engels in Ryde,” 25 September 1857, in Karl Marx and Frederick Engels: Selected Works, Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1969, p. 530. 77 Wang Jisi, “Idealism, realism: The Weave of US China Policy,” Beijing Review, no. 3, 16–22 January 1989, p. 16. If Kissinger was a “realist” like Kennan, Kennan thought the Chinese in their ideological extremism were “absolutely permeated with hatred towards [Americans]. . . . See John Lewis Gaddis, George F. Kennan: An American Life, New York: Penguin Books, 2011, p. 583. 78 Fallaci’s interview with Kissinger is in her edited book, Interview with History. She did not mince her words: “I see power as an inhuman and hateful phenomenon.” See Oriana Fallaci, ed, Interview with History, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1976, p. 12. 79 As cited in Fallaci, ed., Interview with History and analysed in Niall Ferguson, Kissinger 1923–1968: The Idealist, New York: Penguin Press, 2015, p. 27. 80 At the conclusion of Years of Renewal, Kissinger provides “A Personal Note” on his background and this speculation. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 1078. 81 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 67. 82 Harvard History Professor Niall Ferguson also notes that Hans Morgenthau thought that on the contrary Kissinger was like Odysseus, “many-sided.” See Ferguson, “The Meaning of Kissinger: A Realist Reconsidered,” Foreign Affairs, vol. 94, no. 5, Sept./Oct. 2015, p. 134. Indeed Kissinger’s “realism” is not unalloyed. In On China, Kissinger raised his own qualification that “values,” if not “ideology,” had some necessary virtue in international affairs. He reasoned that “ideology” could drive “two sides towards confrontation,” but he also thought: “Some congruence of values is generally needed to supply an element of restraint.” Again, it seems order as a value is the key value with which others must converge. 83 See Chapter Four, Lawrence Freedman, Strategy: A History, Oxford & New York; Oxford University Press, 2013. 84 Freedman, Strategy: A History, p. 3. Freedman does note that his book is largely predicated on Western thinking. 85 Kissinger, On China, p. 29.

62  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” 86 Kissinger, On China, p. 514. 87 Mao Tse-tung, “On Protracted War,” May 1938, Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. ii, p. 152. 88 Machiavelli gave the example of the French king’s useless attempt to allay war by ceding Romagna to Alexander the Kingdom of Naples to Spain, See the related discussion of war in Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince and the Discourses, New York: Random House, 1940, p. 14. 89 Lord Gore-Booth, ed., Satow’s Guide to Diplomatic Practice, London & New York: Longman, 1977, p. 5. 90 Richelieu, Armand Jean du Plessis, trans. by H.B. Hill, The Political Testament of Cardinal Richelieu, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, pp. 94–5. 91 Henry Kissinger, World Restored, p. 2. 92 R.C. Keith, “The Contemporary Relevance of Zhou Enlai’s Diplomacy of Peaceful Coexistence,” Third International Symposium on Zhou Enlai Studies, Nankai University, at fn 15. 93 Mark Mancall, China at the Center: 300 Years of Foreign Policy, New York: The Free Press, 1984, pp. 11–12. 94 The distinction between the two “ways” was of keen interest to Asian leaders such as Nehru and U Nu. See Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, New York and London: St. Martin’s and Macmillan, 1989, p. 77. 95 R.H. Mathews, Mathews’ Chinese-English Dictionary, rev. American edition, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1960, p. 670. 96 Zihai, (Sea of words), Taibei: Zhonghua shuju faxingsuo, 1948, p. 1457. 97 Phil Williams, Donald Goldstein and Jay Shafritz, eds., Classic Readings of International Relations, Belmont, Cal.,: Wadsworth Publishing, 1994, editor’s comment on p. 178, and related text on p. 185. 98 For these citations and related analysis, see John K. Fairbank, ed., On the Chinese World Order, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968, p. 25. 99 “Mengzi,” (“The Works of Mencius”), Chen Wei, ed., Sishu (Four books), (Chinese/ English), Macao: Juwendang shuwen, 1962. 100 Kenneth Waltz, Man, the State and War: A Theoretical Analysis, New York: Columbia University Press, 1959, passim. 101 Chapter VII of “Lun Yu”, (Confucian Analects), Chen Wei, ed., Sishu (Four books, (Chinese/English), p. 112. 102 “Mengzi” (“The Works of Mencius”), Sishu (Four books, (Chinese/English), Macao: Juwendang shuwen, 1962, p. 16–7. 103 This Xunzi reference and its implications are discussed in R.C. Keith, “New History Inside Hu Jintao’s Foreign Policy: ‘Harmony’ versus ‘Hegemony,’” Joseph Y.S. Cheng, ed., China – A New Stage of Development for an Emerging Superpower, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong Press, 2012, p. 246. 104 “The Works of Mencius,” Chapter IV, Sishu (Four Books), p. 551. 105 “Zhongyong” (The Doctrine of the Golden Mean), Chen Wei, ed., Sishu (Four books, (Chinese/English), p. 42. 106 “Zhongyong,” Chen Wei, ed., p. 49. 107 “Confucian Analects,” Four Books, pp. 46–7. 108 “Confucian Analects”, Four Books, p. 18. 109 Deng Xiaoping, “Opening Speech at the 12th National Congress of the CPC,” (1 September 1982), SWDXPIII, pp. 14–5. 110 Deng Xiaoping, “We Must Safeguard World Peace and Ensure Domestic Development,” (29 May 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 66. 111 Mao Tse-tung, “US Imperialism Is a Paper Tiger,” Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. v, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 310. 112 Deng Xiaoping, Fundamental Issues of Socialism, Beijing: Foreign Language Press, 16 October 1984, p. 83.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  63 113 Miles Unger, Machiavelli: A Biography, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011, pp. 215, 224 114 Extract from John Vasquez, ed., The Prince in Classics of International Relations, 3rd edit., Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1996, p. 16. 115 Keith, “New History inside Hu Jintao’s Foreign Policy: ‘Harmony’ vs. ‘Hegemony,’” p. 244. 116 Deng Xiaoping, “Mao Zedong Thought Must Be Correctly Understood as an Integral Whole,” (21 July 1977), SWDXPII, p. 58. Deng Xiaoping, “Wanchengde zhunquede lijiao Mao Zedong sixiang,” (Completely and precisely understand Mao Zedong thought), (21 July 1977), Deng Xiaoping Wenxuan (Selected works of Deng Xiaoping) (SWDXPII), vol. ii, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1994, p. 45. 117 Deng Xiaoping, “Maintain Stability and Prosperity in Hong Kong,” 3 October 1984, Deng Xiaoping on the Question of Hong Kong, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1993, p. 16. 118 Niall Ferguson, Kissinger: 1923–1968: The Idealist, New York: Penguin Press, 2015, p. 32. 119 Eyck’s characterization, Erich Eyck, Bismarck and the German Empire, London: Unwin University Books, 1968. 120 Eyck, Bismarck and the German Empire, p. 65. 121 W.N. Medicott, Bismarck, Gladstone and the Concert of Europe, New York: Greenwood Publishers, 1969, pp. 11, 318. 122 Bruce Jacobs, “China’s Expansion Echoes History,” The Australian, 20 February 2003. 123 Hans J. Morgenthau, Six Principles of Political Realism, in Phil Williams, Donald Goldstein and Jay Sharfritz, eds., Classic Readings and Contemporary Debates in International Relations, 3rd edit., Australia, United States: Thomson Wadsworth, 2006, p. 59. 124 Morgenthau, Six Principles of Political Realism, p. 59. 125 Morgenthau, Six Principles of Political Realism, p. 59. 126 Deng Xiaoping, “Safeguard World Peace and Ensure Domestic Development,” (29 May 1984), Build Socialism with Chinese Characteristics. Beijing; Foreign Languages Press, 1985, p. 29, p. 61. 127 Deng, “Safeguard World Peace and Ensure Domestic Development.” p. 29. 128 Deng Xiaoping, Fundamental Issues in Present-Day China, p. 98, cited in fn 32, R.C. Keith, “The Asia-Pacific Area and the “New International Political Order,” China Report vol. 25, no. 4, 1989, p. 350. 129 Mao Zedong, “Talk at a Conference of Party Secretaries,” (27 January 1957), in Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. v, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 382, Ron Keith’s italics. As cited and analysed in Ronald C. Keith, “Plumbing the Relevance of ‘Independence and Self-Reliance’ in Chinese Foreign Policy,” Chan Lai-Ha, Gerald Chan, Kwan Fung, eds., China at 60: Global-Local Interactions, Singapore: World Scientific, p. 2011, p. 59. In the same January speech, Mao approvingly cites (Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. v, p. 375.) the way Deng handled a problem student during a visit to Tsinghua University. In another speech on 9 October 1957, “Be Activists in Promoting the Revolution,” Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. v, p. 490, Mao spoke favourably about Deng’s comments on the importance of agriculture. 130 Chiang’s diary as analysed and cited in Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo: Chiang Kaishek and the Struggle for Modern China, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press for the Harvard University Press, 2009, p. 442. 131 Cited and discussed in Tao Jingguo, Gongheguo waijiao fengyun zhongde Deng Xiaoping, (The Charisma of Deng Xiaoping as Republic Diplomat, sic.), Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe, 2004, p. 7. For the interview itself, see Oriana Fallaci, Oriana Fallaci: Interview with History, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1976, p. 39.

64  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” 132 Suisheng Zhao, “Rethinking the Chinese World Order: The Imperial Cycle and the Rise of China,” Journal of Contemporary China, vol. 24, no. 96, pp. 961–82. On p. 961, Professor Zhao argues that the imperial past has been selectively used by China’s leaders and that this past relates to both civilization and power. 133 Chih-yu Shih, China’s Just World: The Morality of Chinese Foreign Policy, Boulder & London: Lynne Reinner Publishers, 1993 p. 7. 134 Shih, China’s Just World: The Morality of Chinese Foreign Policy, pp. 8–9. 135 The Deng Xiaoping lilun cidian gives some sense of the extravagant breadth of this theory. Deng’s formal thinking 思想 stretches across any number of overlapping categories such as “philosophical thought,” “economic thought,” “political thought,” “scientific and technological thought,” “thought on education,” “cultural thought,” “arts and literature thought,” “nationalities thought,” “thought on military affairs,” “diplomatic thought,” “united front thought” and “party-building thought.” See Xu Yuanpei, ed., Deng Xiaoping lilun cidian, (Dictonary of Deng Xiaoping’s theory), Shanghai: Dishu chubanshe, 2011. 136 On only a few occasions would I disagree with Ezra Vogel’s excellent biography of Deng. The analysis herein disagrees with Vogel’s argument: “Throughout his career, Deng was responsible for implementation rather than theory.” Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and China’s Transformation, p. 7. Deng’s concept of leadership and politics required that he provide ideological direction. His policies were usually discussed within a centrally controlled ideological framework that oversaw the distribution of related Party documents throughout the Party system. 137 Deng Xiaoping, “Hold High the Banner of Mao Zedong Thought and Adhere to the Principle of Seeking the Truth from the Facts,” (16 September 1978), SWDXPIII, 75–82, p. 141. 138 Mao’s First Speech, 2nd Session, Eighth Party Congress, 8 May 1958, Miscellany of Mao Tse-tung Thought (1949–1968), Arlington: Joint Publications Research Service, Vol. 1, p. 95, as discussed in Anthony Parel & Ronald C. Keith, eds., Ronald C. Keith, “Mao Zedong and his Political Thought,” Comparative Political Philosophy, Lanham: Lexington Books, 2003, p. 103. 139 Deng Xiaoping, “Da Yidali jizhe Aolinkeai Falaqiwen,” (Replies to the questions of the Italian Journalist Oriana Fallaci), (21 & 23 August 1980), SWDXPII, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1994, p. 352. 140 Deng Xiaoping “Speech at the Third Session of CPC Advisory Commission,” (22 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 91 141 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at a Meeting with Members of the Committee for Drafting the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region,” (16 April 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 216. 142 Deng Xiaoping, “The Party’s Urgent Tasks on the Organizational and Ideological Fronts,” (8 July 1983) SWDXPIII, p. 57. 143 Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Speed Up Reform,” (12 June 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 236. 144 Deng Xiaoping, “We Review the Past to Open up a new Path to the Future,” (5 September 1988), DXPSWIII, p. 266. 145 Deng cleverly placed “seeking the truth from the facts” in opposition to Hua Guofeng’s “two whatevers” [两个凡是], namely, “. . . we will resolutely follow whatever policy decisions Chairman Mao made and unswervingly follow whatever instructions Chairman Mao gave.” Deng Xiaoping, “On Drafts of the Resolution on Party History,” SWDXPIII, p. 283. Reference the specific talk of 27 June 1980. 146 Deng Xiaoping, “Things Must Be Put in Order in All Fields,” (27 September and 4 October 1975), DXPSWII, p. 49. 147 Deng acknowledges Ye Jianying’s contribution to this notion. See Deng Xiaoping, “China Will always Keep its Promises,” (19 December 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 107–8. 148 Huang, Memoirs, p. 295.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  65 149 Deng Xiaoping, “Our Basic Position on Hong Kong,” (24 September 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 25. Deng put the case directly to Thatcher: “What I am concerned about is how to make a smooth transition over the next fifteen years. I am concerned that there may be major disturbances in this period, man-made disturbances. These could be created not just be foreigners, but also by Chinese – but chiefly by Britons.” 150 Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s ‘Independent Foreign Policy,’” p. 123. 151 Deng Xiaoping, “A New Approach to Stabilizing the World Situation,” (22 February 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 59. 152 Xu Yuanpei, ed., Deng Xiaoping lilun xuexi cidian, (Dictionary of Deng Xiaoping theoretical studies), Beijing: Dengjian tuwu chubanshe, 2004, p. 751. 153 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, p. 497 154 Deng Xiaoping, “One Country, Two Systems,” 22–23 June 1984, Deng Xiaoping on the Question of Hong Kong, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1993, p. 10. 155 Deng, “China Will Always Keep its Promise,” pp. 43–4. 156 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at a Meeting with the Members of the Committee for Drafting the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region,” 16 April 1987, Deng Xiaoping on the Question of Hong Kong, p. 55. 157 Deng, “Speech at a meeting with the members of the committee for Drafting the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region,” p. 219. 158 Margaret Thatcher, Margaret Thatcher: The Downing Street Years, London: Harper Press, 2011, pp. 261, 494. 159 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at the Third Session of the CPC Advisory Commission,” (22 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 97. 160 Deng Xiaoping, “The Present Situation and the Tasks before US,” (16 January 1980), SWDXPIII, p. 241. 161 This formulation was highlighted at the Thirteenth Party Congress. It brought together the central task of the age with two sets of operational principles, the open door and economic reform as one fundamental point and the four cardinal principles as the other. For discussion, see Ronald C. Keith, “The Asia-Pacific Area and the ‘New International Political Order’: The View from Beijing,” China Report, vol. 25, no. 4, 1989, pp. 357–58. 162 Deng, Fundamental Issues in Present-Day China, p. 154. 163 Deng, Fundamental Issues in Present-Day China , p. 165. 1 64 Mao Tse-tung, “Speech at the Closing Session of the Eleventh Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee, 13 August 1966, Stuart R. Schram, ed., Mao Tsetung Unrehearsed: Talks and Letters: 1956–71, London: Penguin Books Ltd., 1974, p. 263. 165 Deng Xiaoping, “We Must Form a Promising Collective Leadership that Will Carry out Reform,” (31 May 1989)), DXPSWIII, p. 292. Although Deng had claimed that he was not part of a “Mao faction” per se, Jiang’s eulogy reminded Deng’s mourners that he had been removed from all of his positions by the “left” for supporting Mao in the Central Revolutionary Base Area. Jiang Zemin, “Eulogy for Comrade Deng Xiaoping,” (25 February 1997), Jiang Zemin, Jiang Zemin wenxuan, vol. 1, (Selected works of Jiang Zemin, vol. 1), (henceforth cited as SWJZMI), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2010, p. 622. 166 Jiang Yiguo and Li Jungou, Deng Xiaoping gaige kaifang sixiang yanjiu, (Studies on Deng Xiaoping thought on reform and the open door), Beijing: Guofang daxue chubanshe, p. 115. 167 Deng Xiaoping, “China Can Only Take the Socialist Road,” (3 March 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 209. 168 Deng Xiaoping, “Two Basic Elements in China’s Policies,” (4 July 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 245. 169 Sun Dongsheng, ed., Deng Xiaoping shouji gushi, (The Deng Xiaoping story in his own handwriting), Zhongqing: Chongqing chubanshe, 2014, pp. 138–43.

66  Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism” 170 As discussed in A. Parel & R. Keith, Comparative Philosophy under the Upas Tree, p. 99. 171 “Talks on the Question of Philosophy,” 18 August 1964, Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 229. 172 “Speech at the Enlarged Session of the Military Affairs Committee and the External Affairs Committee,” Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 154. 173 See explanation of this terminology and its implications in Ronald C. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s Independent Foreign Policy,” International Journal, vol. xli, no. 1 Winter 1985–6, p. 98. 174 Mao Tsetung,” On the Ten Major Relationships,” (25 April 1956), SWMTTV, pp. 301–2. 175 Mao,” On the Ten Major Relationships,” p. 303. 176 Mao,” On the Ten Major Relationships,” p. 303. 177 Deng told Mike Wallace: “. . . I am trying to persuade people to let me retire at the Party’s Thirteenth National Congress next year. But so far, all I have heard is dissenting voices on all sides.” Deng, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” p. 177. At the Thirteenth Congress, Deng did manage to remove himself from the Party Central Committee; however, he acceded to strong demand to act as chairman of the Party’s Military Affairs Committee, an extraordinarily important post. 178 Deng Xiaoping, “Talks in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” (18 January – 21 February 1992), SWDXPIII p. 369. 179 Time, Special Report, 3 March 1997, p. 36. 180 Huang, Memoirs, p. 288. 181 Pei Yuanying, “Deng Xiaoping’s Thoughts on the Current World, World Order, Security and Civilization: Fountain of China’s Diplomatic Policy,” Beijing Review, 12 August 2004, p. 29. Pei was China’s former ambassador to Poland. 182 See Samuel S. Kim, “Mainland China in a Changing Asia-Pacific Regional Order,” Issues and Studies, vol. 230, no. 10, October 1994, p. 5 as discussed in the introduction to Ronald C. Keith, China as Rising World Power and its Response to “Globalization,” London & New York: Routledge, 2005, p. 3. 183 William A. Callahan, The Pessoptimist Nation, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2010, pp. 9 and 13. 184 David S.G. Goodman and Gerald Segal, “China Without Deng,” (Part 5 of 6), CNDGlobal, No. GL97-033, 27 February 1997. This interpretation seems a lot more harsh than the one offered in David Goodman’s own political biography of Deng: “Deng’s portrayal as a statesman on the international stage was justified, particularly by comparison with his predecessors, even if somewhat exaggerated in a global perspective.” Goodman, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution: A Political Biography, p. 120. 185 Vogel, Deng, p. 696. 186 Vogel, Deng, p. 698. 187 Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane, Power and Interdependence: World Politics in Transition; Robert Keohane and Joseph Ney, Transnational Relations and World Politics, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972. 188 Li Zhongjie, “Deng Xiaoping guoji zhanlue yanjiu,” (The study of Deng Xiaoping’s international strategic thinking), in Zhao Zunsheng and Wang Dong, eds., Deng Xiaoping yu dangdai Zhongguo he shijie (Deng Xiaoping, contemporary China and the World), Beijing: Peking University Press, 2004, pp. 659–60. 189 Li Yihu, “Deng Xiaoping guoji zhanluede lishi gongxian,” (Deng Xiaoping’s historic contribution to international strategy), Zhao Cunsheng & Wang Dong, eds., Deng Xiaoping yu dangdai Zhongguo he shijie, pp. 703–4. 190 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, pp. 379–380 and 423–4. 191 Certainly, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping have been at pains to endorse Deng’s foreign policy. Shambaugh, ed., Deng Xiaoping: Portrait of a Statesman, p. 143. 192 Deng Xiaoping, “Let Us Put the Past Behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” (16 May 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 287.

Judging Deng’s foreign policy “pragmatism”  67 1 93 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 197. 194 These Chinese and Western biographers include, for example, Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China,; Richard Evans, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China; Ruan Ming, Deng Xiaoping: The Chronicles of Empire, translated and edited by Nancy Liu et  al., Boulder: Westview Press, 1992; David Goodman, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution: A Political Biography; Gao Yi, Lishi xuanzele Deng Xiaoping (Deng Xiaoping: Chosen by History); Deng Rong (Maomao), Deng Xiaoping: Wode fuqin, (My father) Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 3 vols, 2010. 195 Mao Tsetung, “Speech at the Second Session of the Eighth Central Committee,” SWMTTV, p. 339. 196 Michael Yahuda, “How Much Has China Learned About Interdependence,” in David Goodman and Gerald Segal, eds., China Rising: Nationalism and Interdependence, London & New York: Routledge, 1997, p. 16. 197 David Lampton, The Making of Chinese Foreign and Security Policy in the Era of Reform, 1978–2000, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001, p. 25. 198 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping, p. 697. Vogel points out that within the three decades since 1978, China’s trade with the world had expanded one hundredfold.

2 The roots and implications of Deng’s “independent foreign policy”

Contemporary Chinese historiography lauds the continuing relevance of Deng’s formulation, “independent foreign policy” 独立自主外交政策, as policy appropriate to China’s changing place in a changing world and to China’s goal of national economic development under Deng’s strategy of “peace and development” 和平和发展. The Peking University’s Centre for the Study of Deng Xiaoping theory has highlighted three related key points in Deng’s theory of international strategic thinking, namely, his focus on twenty years of peace to further domestic economic development, the raising of “peace and development” as an important theme in international relations, and supporting the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as the basis of a new political and economic world order.1 Even today, Party General Secretary Xi Jinping still instructs the Party to “firmly grasp the independent foreign policy of peace, never departing from the road of peace and development 就要坚持独立自主的和平外交 政策坚定不移和平发展道路.”2 This chapter reviews the analytical chronology of Deng’s foreign policy thinking that resulted in the specific connotations of “independent foreign policy.” How did Deng personally interpret the history of modern China and how did his interpretation inform China’s foreign policy over time? What were the respective roles of history, culture and ideology in the formation of such policy? Several selected key facets of Deng’s foreign policy contribution will be covered in the following chapters, but this chapter briefly reviews Deng’s foreign policy thinking and then moves chronologically to trace and assess how this thinking informed Deng’s foreign policy practice from 1949 to Deng’s death in 1997. Deng, in discussion with the Rong family delegation in June 1986, explained this policy, which he claimed that “we shall follow forever”: We adhere to independent foreign policy of peace and do not join any bloc. We are prepared to maintain contacts and make friends with everyone. We are against any country that practices hegemonism. We are against any country that commits aggression against others. We are fair in our words and deeds.3

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  69 “Independent foreign policy” has specifically eschewed spheres of influence, alliances, “playing cards,” “power politics,” hegemonism and “playing the tyrant.” It combined lessons in “self-reliance and independence” with those elements of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence stressing non-interference and nonaggression, with a tradition of fairness in seeking relations with as many states as possible on the basis of equality and reciprocity. The origins of this policy were not suddenly pulled out of the thin air at the much-touted Third Session of the Eleventh Central Committee meeting in December 1978, which set in motion Deng’s reform program. There are significant historical antecedents that Deng drew upon to develop his particular formulation of “independent foreign policy.” In Mao’s thought, “the past is to serve the present” 以古为今. Of course, it is selectively defined within a self-conscious ideological matrix, but the CCP’s view of “history” is, nonetheless, important in the explanation of the origins and implications of Deng’s decision-making and policy thinking. In particular, Deng often used dialectical materialism specifically to explain the past, present and future. Even after witnessing the ideological extremes of the Cultural Revolution, Deng stressed the importance of encouraging “people to study, principally to study Marxist philosophy, with the emphasis on Comrade Mao Zedong’s philosophical works.”4 On this basis, Deng claimed that had it not been for the success of his policies of reform and the open door, China would have collapsed in 1989: Had it not been for the achievements of the reform and open policy, we could have weathered June 4th. And if we had failed that test, there would have been chaos and civil war. The “cultural revolution” was civil war. Why was it that our country could remain stable after the June 4th Incident? It was precisely because we had carried out reform and the open policy, which have promoted economic growth and raised living standards.5 The Western history of Chinese foreign policy has paid indifferent attention to Deng’s ideological assessments of domestic and international reality. Notwithstanding Cold War reservations about ideology, this aspect should be included in the explanation of the development of China’s foreign policy under Deng. Chinese historiography labours to explain Deng’s foreign policy in light of correlation of “Deng Xiaoping Theory” with Mao Zedong Thought. Rather than discarding such explanation, it is reviewed and assessed as part of the overall discussion throughout this book’s chapters. Deng self-consciously drew on his political experience and on an existing ideological base that had informed past foreign policy debates. It is important to note that Mao’s “seeking the truth from the facts” as a “way of thinking” was not new. It had been in gestation at least since the late 1930s and was restored at the Third Session of the Eleventh Central Committee in rejection of the Cultural Revolution. The new policies of economic reform and open door were specifically

70  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” legitimized and sanctified on the basis of Mao’s “restored” thinking so as to create new policies such as those of “economic reform and the open door” that would deal more efficiently with changing realities. Furthermore, Chinese scholarship has considered the enduring nature of Deng’s foreign policy legacy. “Independent foreign policy” has been represented as sufficiently flexible to deal with the substantive changes in international relations that occurred after Deng’s passing. Ye Zicheng’s Peking University study on the subject lauds the underlying continuity of China’s foreign policy in the following way: Their foreign policy thinking had to reflect China’s standing as a weak country and as a middle-small country whose foreign policy thinking must respond to its developing status as a country that is impoverished and backward. New China in a new century and beyond for yet another 1000 years is one of the great nations of the world that will stand in need of policy as it passes through development. The Chinese people are going to need new foreign policy thinking and wisdom to deal with all this change. Still we can say that Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping’s foreign policy thought and wisdom will provide the foundation for solving our foreign policy problems.6 Thus, it is argued that new foreign policy problems can be continuously solved within Deng’s ideological matrix of “seeking the truth from the facts.” Only a few Western analysts such as Melvin Gurtov and Byong-Moo Hwang have emphasized that “dialectics” as the “study of contradictions” is crucial to the “method of analysis” that informs Chinese foreign policy thinking.7

Dialectics in Deng’s “Chinese foreign policy thought” The core dialectic of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” was “peace and development” 和平和发展. Deng articulated this concept on the basis of an existing ideological understanding of modern Chinese political experience that stretched back at least to the 1940s. Dialectics is a critical part of Party ideology, and it has served as the general basis of Deng’s reforms and the specific basis of his foreign policy “pragmatism.” It engenders in such policy an uncommon flexibility that disagrees with Cold War assumption that where there is ideology, there is the axiomatic negation of diplomacy and reason in the relations between states. In the early to mid-1950s, Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai started to set out the dialectical ABC’s that culminated with Deng’s 1980s “independent foreign policy.” Deng drew on the dialectics underlying the famous Yan’an instruction in Mao Zedong Thought, “seek the truth from the facts” 实事求是 . As Deng explained in April 1985 to Vice-President Ali Hassan Mwinyi of the United Republic of Tanzania, the last twenty years of experience in China had taught the importance of “dialectical materialism” and “. . . as Comrade Mao Zedong put it, in everything we must seek truth from the facts – in other words, we must proceed from reality.”8

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  71 “Seeking the truth from the facts” was an ideological formulation and also an attitude requiring constant personal study and learning from the contradictions that develop out of ever changing reality. Mao disliked comrades who put on airs and indulged in “bombastic twaddle” in their reports, substituting listings of A, B,C, D and 1, 2, 3, 4 for the creative thinking that is at the heart of such “scientific” learning. Mao had made serious accusations against the effect of Confucianism on Chinese society, but he agreed with Confucius that to pretend to know when you do not know leads to disaster. Politics, therefore, needed scientifically honest study and investigation based on dialectics. Mao even quoted the opening sentence of the Confucian Analects: “How pleasant it is to learn and constantly to review what one has learned.”9 To see the world for what it really is, Mao professed a “dialectical world outlook” that was inherently informed by “the universality of contradiction.” Dialectics were the antidote for the unrestrained idealism, subjectivism and metaphysics that so often informed politics. Dialectics offered extraordinary intellectual flexibility, seemingly allowing Mao to hold two apparently competing ideas in his head at once. According to Deng, the locus classicus for this essence was Mao’s famous 1941 metaphor treating Marxism-Leninism as the “arrow” that would be used to hit the “target” of the Chinese revolution. Deng’s analysis was summarized in the front page of 2 November 1981 Renmin ribao. Deng instructed Party members to pay close attention to the following explanation by Mao: “‘Facts’ are things that exist objectively, ‘truth’ means their internal relations [referring to the clash and unity of opposites] . . . and ‘to seek’ means to study.”10 Mao had lectured on such seeking to Party cadres at the Anti-Japanese Military and Political College of Yan’an (Yenan) in the late 1930s. Mao claimed that there were naive intimations of such an outlook in both China and Europe. Pan Gu, an historian of the former Han dynasty had, for example, coined the aphorism, “Things that oppose each other also complement one another 相反相成.”11 This assumption was reflected in later Daoist discussion of the interactions of yin and yang in the dynastic history of Chinese philosophy. According to Mao, superior modern dialectical analysis takes into account both the “clash” and “unity of opposites.” Mao later openly criticized Stalin for his weak recognition of the “unity of opposites.” Metaphysics and dialectics commingled in Stalin’s mind. Stalin stubbornly fixated on “one aspect” rather than two. Stalin’s subjective idealism then produced contradictions resulting in the mishandling of the complexity of Soviet and Eastern European society and politics. Full-blown dialectics had emerged with Hegel in the early nineteenth century, and Mao believed that Marx and Engels borrowed from Hegel so as to exorcise the metaphysical elements of “idealism” from an enhanced discussion of historical materialism.12 Lenin elaborated on the key notion of “dialectics” as it was transferred to China in the 1920s through the 1940s. In the following commentary, Mao specifically referred to Lenin’s definition of “dialectics” as relevant to China:

72  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” Dialectics is the teaching that shows how opposites can be and how they happen to be . . . identical – under what conditions they are identical, transforming themselves into one another – why the human mind should take these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, transforming themselves into one another.13 Mao approved of Lenin’s prioritization of praxis in relation to theory. In Mao’s view, dialectics controls for the idealism that so easily gets “bogged down” in abstractions rather than capturing the underlying reality of things. And in the “scientific” pursuit of knowledge through the dialectical examination of contradiction, it was necessary to adopt an attitude of honesty and modesty and to eschew black and white thinking.14 For Mao, the only satisfactory study or learning comes from an appreciation of how the things within the flux of material reality reflect both the clash and unity of opposites. When Mao lectured to his cadres at the Anti-Japanese University in the late 1930s, he highlighted the failures of the Deborin school of Soviet philosophers. This School had too exclusively focused on the differences between the kulaks and the peasants in the Soviet Union. It had also ignored the contradictions of the Third Estate within France before the Revolution.15 Mao opined that “no contradictory aspect can exist in isolation. Without its opposite aspect, each loses the condition for its existence. . . . Without life, there would no death; without death, there would be no life.”16 Commenting on the development of the Party, Mao stressed the discovery of dialectics in Yan’an. Previously, the Party had often fallen into the trap of “subjectivism” and “paid dearly for it.” Mao claimed: The problem was not straightened out until the rectification movement in Yenan, which laid stress on investigation and study and a realistic approach. The universal truth of Marxism must be integrated with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution, or else we will get nowhere.17 Furthermore, given the complexity of interconnected contradictory things, Mao required a modest style of analysis that honestly takes note of liabilities as well as opportunities. Mao demanded analysis of social reality that studied “all its sides, all connections and ‘mediations’ so as to avoid the ‘one-sidedness’ that is fostered by ‘dogmatism.’”18 Notwithstanding his own rather lucid philosophical commentary on the dangers of one-sidedness, Mao certainly had a dark side. In his last years, this side fathered wild and unqualified absolutes that resulted in Deng’s second and third dismissals from Party leadership in 1966 and 1976. On the verge of nationwide military victory in 1949, Zhou Enlai urged everyone to study Chairman Mao’s dialectics. On 7 May 1949, Zhou told the First National Youth Congress about Chairman Mao’s “dedication to study”: “He studies day in, day out and never feels satisfied. . . . As for Chairman Mao’s attitude towards study, his own motto is ‘seek truth from facts.’ He is most honest, unequivocal about what is right and what is wrong. He is strongly opposed to

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  73 conceit and impetuosity.”19 Although Mao became famous for his cursing, he also “ploughed the ink slab” in the preparation of his selected works. Armed with their dialectics forged in an extraordinary revolutionary experience and deliberately based on a self-professed sense of modesty and honesty, Mao and Zhou took New China’s first steps out into the world.

Establishing first principles in China’s foreign policy According to the account of Peking University Professors Ye Zicheng and Li Hongjie, the origins of Mao’s understanding as to the importance of China’s “independence” related to four experiences. First, Mao concluded that the Allied Army that invaded and sacked Beijing in 1900 was a lesson calling for independence. Second, the costly mistakes of applying Comintern instructions in China had seriously damaged the CCP. Third, after 1949, Soviet “internationalism” reinforced the lesson of “independence” so as to determine the course of China’s own affairs. Fourth, the problems in dealing with China’s relations with the US and the USSR had re-affirmed the necessity of Chinese “independence.”20 Was this “independence” narrow-minded and unreasonably inward looking? In a talk with China’s new diplomats specifically on the tasks of New China’s new foreign policy, Premier Zhou started by reminding them that in the spring of 1949, Mao Zedong had instructed that China’s key foreign policy was to “build a new kitchen” 另起炉灶 and to prepare for receiving new guests.21 Deferring to Mao yet again, Zhou emphasized “equality,” “mutual benefit” and “respect for the territory of sovereign states” as the basis for New China’s foreign relations; however, the diplomatic personnel of those states that had established embassies under the former Guomindang regime were treated as ordinary foreign residents.22 Military victory had been won, but the new government of New China still had to struggle to assert its independence. Recognition for the new regime was coveted, but it was not to be encouraged at the expense of China’s own interests and independent sovereign integrity. The immediate past reflected massive aggravated interference in China’s internal affairs, not only in the creation of the treaty ports, but in the foreign attempts to control China’s economy and in the US’s not-so-neutral involvement with Chiang Kai-shek during the civil war. Indeed, the CCP had achieved a very great victory against enormous material odds. Mao’s heavily accented “China has stood up!” 中国起来 crackled over the loud speakers in Tiananmen Square on 1 October 1949. There was indeed a collective “turning over of the body” as implied in “self-reliance” 自 力更生! However, this did not mean that China, having recently been the victim of great powers, would now seek to become a great power itself. A great victory had been won, but the new People’s Republic of China hardly had any resources to reintegrate the national economy. Furthermore, the revolution’s great victory would be demeaned, should China, the victim, turn around to become China, the victimizer. Initially, policy at the foundation of the new state modestly focused on a very poor and undeveloped national economy that was extremely fragmented and was

74  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” increasingly concerned with the survival of a new state caught up in the spread of the Cold War into Asia. New China did not receive ready recognition. It faced a “closed door” and there was little opportunity for international trade to support China’s development. New China had to deal with a “diplomacy of exclusion” 越 顶外 or 强制外交. The struggle for national economic recovery on the basis of independence was difficult in the extremely antagonistic context of US containment and exclusion from the UN. Reciprocity and equality was expected in victory, but none were on offer. China’s leaders did not, however, overreact to containment. They honed a dialectically calibrated policy response to the extraordinary Cold War difficulties of containment that steadily drew down alliance commitments in favour of diplomacy based on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. In April 1949, Zhou Enlai assembled New China’s fledgling diplomatic corps. He firmly explained that China wanted relations and cooperation with as many states as possible, but would not accept past “unequal treaties.” While China would no longer be “bullied” by the great powers, Zhou dwelled on the importance of caution. He advised that it is politically better to let your opponents “strike first” and that we “must mean what we say,” while keeping in mind that “it is better to say not too much.” Indeed, not saying much was appropriate to China’s traditions of modesty and honesty. Moreover, New China was not yet a viable political and economic reality. A new national diplomacy had yet to be created. This was sound and realistic advice for China’s freshman diplomats.

Mao, Zhou and Deng on “independence and self-reliance” As early as April 1949, Premier Zhou Enlai provided one of the most influential statements on the necessity of “independence and self-reliance” – this was the statement to which Deng would return when he initiated the reform and open door policies in late 1978: . . . we uphold China’s national independence and the principle of independence and self-reliance. . . . No country may interfere in China’s internal affairs . . . If foreign aid holds benefits for China, of course we want it, but we cannot be dependent upon it. We should not be dependent even on the Soviet Union. . . . One of the main causes for Chiang Kai-shek’s defeat is that he relied on foreign aid for everything.23 Help when extended on the basis of equality and reciprocity was welcome, but there was no illusion to the effect that any such help could serve as the main force in China’s development. In 30 June 1949, Chairman Mao added that he believed that victory would not have been achieved without international help in uniting all of the revolutionary forces in China, but he cautioned against the sentiment, “We need help from the British and US governments.” He suspected that if such help were offered, it was for the sake of money and not for the sake of “helping the Chinese people.”24

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  75 In his later explanation of “independence,” Deng deferred to the continuing relevance of Mao’s dialectical approach to China and the world: . . . our experience shows that China cannot rebuild itself behind closed doors and that it cannot develop in isolation from the rest of the world. It goes without saying that a large country like China cannot depend on others for its development; it must depend mainly on itself, on its own efforts. Nevertheless, while holding to self-reliance, we should open our country to the outside world to obtain such aid as foreign investment capital and investment.25 At the onset of the Cold War, the Communist military victory had come a lot sooner than expected, and Mao and Zhou were under no illusions as to the extreme weakness of China’s economy after so many years of war. They did not have the benefit of a functioning national economy. The economy had been practically burnt to the ground while the Soviets walked away with much of the heavy industrial equipment left by the Japanese in China’s only concentration of heavy industry in the Northeast. China’s revolution was symbolically important, but China’s new government had very little influence in world affairs. China’s developmental problem was so huge that it was not possible to accept that outside powers could fix these problems even if the Chinese wanted them to do so. The Cold War hyperbole of China’s looming threat to world peace was a serious distortion of Chinese reality and thinking. The Soviet Union recognized the People’s Republic of China the day after its founding, but Stalin was originally suspicious of Mao’s credentials and wondered out loud whether China “would follow the road of Yugoslavia.” Mao, nevertheless, hoped to steal a “piece of meat from the mouth of the tiger,” but in January 1950 he had to extend his stay in Moscow and argue with Stalin for two months before he could get him to sign a treaty of friendship celebrating everlasting fraternity between socialist parties. Stalin offered Mao less financial aid than what he had previously offered to Chiang Kai-shek. Zheng Weizhi, director of the Foreign Ministry’s Institute of International Affairs, later reflected on Zhou Enlai’s original speech to argue that even when China “leaned” to the Soviet Union in the early 1950s, this was a reserved position informed by the leadership’s protested sense of “self-reliance.”26 Zhou Enlai had focused on the inclusion of the notion of “equality and mutual benefit” in the treaty’s wording. The final treaty draft went beyond Soviet undertakings in the East European context to include a special statement of principles governing relations that anticipated major aspects of Zhou Enlai’s later articulation of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence: The High Contracting Parties undertake in the spirit of friendship and cooperation and in conformity with the principles of equality, mutual interest, and also mutual respect for the state sovereignty and territorial integrity and noninterference in internal affairs of the other Party to develop and consolidate economic and cultural ties between the Soviet Union and China. . . .

76  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” One might well ask why it was necessary for the two fraternal socialist states to insist on the principle of non-interference? When the first volume of the Selected Works of Zhou Enlai appeared in 1982 during Deng’s campaign to stress “China’s independent foreign policy,” it was Zhou’s April 1949 statement that was featured in Deng’s explanation of the beginnings of China’s “independent foreign policy.” One of the most influential first readings of New China’s foundational foreign policy appeared in seven articles on this subject in Chapter VII of the 1949 “Common Program.” The latter had its origins in united front politics and served as a provisional constitution until the formal declaration of a state constitution in 1954. The Common Program celebrated foreign policy “based on the principle of protection of the independence, freedom, integrity of the territory and sovereignty of the country, upholding lasting international peace and friendly cooperation between the peoples of all countries and opposing the imperialist policy of aggression.”27 Again, despite the advance of the Cold War in Asia, reference was made to “friendly cooperation between the peoples of all countries.” The Common Program further specified the importance of seeking friendly relations with all states that have severed relations with the Guomindang and on Article 56’s basis of “equality” and “mutual benefit” between states that, even if they differ in their material circumstances, are equal in their sovereignty.28 Zhou and Mao had gone to Moscow seeking aid that was not freely given. They patiently waited for Stalin to make up his mind. In the end, Beijing signed a thirtyyear treaty of alliance and friendship with Moscow, but at the same time China’s foreign policy emphasized China’s “self-reliance.” The ideological sanction for China’s new foreign policy can be traced to Mao’s 25 December 1940 “On Policy.” Mao and Zhou had used “dual tactics” within the “united front,” whereas Chiang Kai-shek relied heavily on military force and failed to understand the complexity of the changing political alignments that characterize reality. Chiang did not have the CCP’s advantage of a dialectical analysis. According to Mao, while the CCP had learned the lesson of “self-reliance,” Chiang had relied “entirely on foreign help”: Our tactics are guided by one and the same principle: to make use of contradictions, win over the many, oppose the few, and crush our enemies one by one. Our foreign policy differs from that of the Kuomintang. The Kuomintang appears to treat all countries other than Japan alike, but in fact it is pro-British and pro-American. Chiang’s unrealistic and simplistic foreign policy was excoriated for its inability to treat the complexity of differences that inform the unity and clash of opposites in international reality: On our part we must draw distinctions, first, between the Soviet Union and the capitalist countries, second, between the United States and Britain on the one hand and Germany on the other, third, between the people of Britain

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  77 and the United States and their imperialist governments, and fourth, between the policy of Britain and the United States during their Far Eastern Munich period and their policy today. . . . our basic line is to use all possible foreign help, subject to the principle of independent prosecution of the war and reliance on our own efforts, and not as the Kuomingtang does, to abandon this principle by relying entirely on foreign help. . . .29 This viewpoint already revealed a strong preference for an open-ended foreign policy strategy favouring “independence and self-reliance,” and the post-1950 history of the friendship treaty with the Soviet Union painfully confirmed the uncertainties of unfair alliances. Deng Xiaoping’s later development of a “good neighbourly policy” that contemporaneously sought “friends everywhere” while opposing both American and Soviet “hegemonism” derives from the approach to self-reliance that informed the pre-1949 Party history of united front politics. Zhou, himself, was the past master at “reserving” differences while flexibly focusing on the opportunities for cooperation in a fast-changing political context. In the early 1950s, he urged his country’s diplomats to work assiduously on extending China’s relations beyond those with the “fraternal” socialist states of the USSR and Eastern Europe. The united front substance of Chinese foreign policy became a deliberate matter of handling “differences” in such a way as to expand China’s circle of “friends.” Over time Chinese foreign policy would reflect a greater interest in widening its circles of “friends,” as opposed to consolidating treaty commitments with “allies.” US containment to ostracize China was extremely restrictive. Zhou Enlai would likely have appreciated Richelieu’s advice to “negotiate ceaselessly” everywhere. Zhou told assembled Chinese diplomats to practice united front tactics bringing together “progressives” with “middle-of-the-road forces” so as to expand China’s options in international relations: The capitalist countries by no means form a monolithic bloc, and you should make distinctions among them. . . . We should be flexible in our diplomatic work, relying on the progressives, uniting with the middle-of-the road forces and splitting the diehards. In this way we will open up new prospects for diplomatic work. It is wrong to think that the world is divided into conflicting camps and that there is nothing we can do to improve it.30 New China was profoundly disappointed in its international aspirations. Although there was an interesting capacity to “make distinctions” as well as a bold new rhetoric insisting on the equality of sovereign states, there was reluctance to take bold initiatives in international affairs. New China was shut out of the UN, and “contained.” The free world was insulated against the virus of Chinese Communism. The opportunity for new trade and investment was severely circumscribed. China’s new leaders were unable to complete the task of liberation, as Chiang Kai-shek consolidated a new regime right on their doorstep in Taiwan. In effect, it seemed as though Taiwan had

78  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” been occupied by the US. Taiwan had become an “unsinkable” American aircraft carrier in the fight for freedom. The possibilities for the pursuit of a balanced diversified range of new trading relationships were lost in the descent into war on the Korean peninsula. Containment required a less-qualified “self-reliance” such as “taking domestic sales as primary and foreign sales as supplementary” 以内消 为中外为辅.31 During the mid-1950s, American containment sought to pre-empt the spread of communism. Containment denigrated China’s equality, but the response of Chinese foreign policy and diplomacy – if greatly offended – was surprisingly measured over the long run. Why? Differences could be tolerated – even dialectically celebrated – without necessarily incurring the heavy costs of alliance commitments. Even though China was denied entry to the UN, Chinese policy played for time in the expectation of future entry into the UN. Although China had been rebuffed, Chinese foreign policy continuously identified with UN principles of collective security based upon sovereign state equality and collective responsibility. Such principles were congenial to such a large but weak developing country. Chinese policy then differentiated between the apparently unjustified American politics inside the UN and the need to support the UN objectives that it favoured. In the fast-changing context of decolonization, Chinese policy preferred to converge politically with non-alignment, refused to think of creating an alternative Asian network of alliances in the Pacific and continued to garner the support of non-aligned states in the UN General Assembly. Drawing strength in China’s numbers, China’s leaders believed that the Americans in their attempt to contain China had “lifted a rock only to drop it on their own feet.” In a 28 November 1950 statement to the UN Security Council, the Chinese delegation had pointed out: . . . without the participation of the lawful delegates of the PRC representing 475 million people, the United Nations cannot in practice be worthy of its name. Without the participation of the lawful delegates of the People’s Republic of China, the Chinese people have no reason to recognize any resolutions or decisions of the United Nations.32 Later in 1958, Mao explained his position on the UN’s China seats and the prospect of Sino-US diplomatic relations: We are in no hurry to take our seat in the United Nations, just as we are in no hurry to establish diplomatic relations with the United States. We adopt this policy to deprive the United States of as much political capital as possible and put it in the wrong and in an isolated position. You bar us from the United Nations and don’t want to establish diplomatic relations with us; all right, but the longer you stall, the more you will be in the wrong. . . . One day the United States will have to establish diplomatic relations with us.33

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  79 Once again Mao displayed his penchant for calculated dialectical equanimity in the face of adversity. When considering the contemporary Western criticism of the “China Threat,” this history is quite informative. How did China deal with the hostile environment of the Cold War? To be sure, the Chinese volunteers fought in Korea, but how many times did the PLA actually cross the boundaries of other states? Why didn’t the Chinese stay in North Korea? Why did the PLA withdraw so quickly after defeating India’s border forces in 1962? Having been barred from the UN, Chinese foreign policy did not support regional parallels to NATO versus the Warsaw Pact and the Council for Mutual Assistance versus the Common Market. There was more than enough reason for white-hot anger in Beijing. China’s new state and its revolutionary history had been denied recognition and legitimacy. China was denied equality in the post-war relations of states. China’s fragmented national economy was denied access to trade and technology. And while the Chinese were struggling to establish a new nation-state, the Americans placed the Seventh Fleet in the Taiwan Strait. Even as MacArthur’s armies moved closer and closer to China’s borders, Chinese foreign policy was still reluctant to expand real alliance commitments against identified enemies and threats. Except for a period during the Cultural Revolution, China’s government persisted in pursuing friendly relations with an ever-widening range of different states to gain recognition that would lead to an effective challenge for the China seats at the UN. In this accentuated Cold War context of containment, neither Chinese nationalism nor Chinese socialism resulted in a deliberate challenge to the UN as international collective organization, and over time China enunciated foreign policy principles that explicitly rejected war and alliances as the means by which to check US-led containment. The 1950 friendship alliance with the Soviet Union certainly implied that the PRC was looking for some security against Cold War hostility and for economic support to help create a new base of heavy industry in China. Mao was in effect the supplicant in Moscow. He wanted and needed a treaty of collective defense more than did Stalin. “Leaning to one side” 一边倒 (i.e,. leaning to the Soviet Union), however, was precisely a matter of “leaning.” The latter was not an exclusive relationship. “Learning” from the great variety of states and societies in the international system regardless of their ideologies and systems was not to be circumscribed by such “leaning.” Zhou Enlai in 30 April 1952 chided China’s diplomats, warning them against “conceited” or “narrow nationalism.” Zhou and Mao agreed that “every nation has its good qualities which we should respect and learn from.” Zhou reiterated that “. . . capitalist countries by no means form a monolithic bloc and we should make distinctions among them.” Zhou hoped that China would gain “the initiative only widening the circle of China’s friends while dealing with enemies by defensively ‘striking last.’” “Leaning” excluded reliance on even such an apparently stout socialist ally as the Soviet Union. China still had the option of cultivating people-to-people

80  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” relations with supposedly hostile capitalist countries. In the process of selfreliance economic development, China could even learn “the strong points of these countries.” The logic of “keeping the initiative in our hands” so as to pursue China’s interests reflects an interesting perspective on the relations between states and the structures of world politics. Such advice would stand Deng Xiaoping in good stead as he later dealt with the Western reaction to the Tiananmen Square event of 1989. The great wall of US containment was not impenetrable. It could be diplomatically breached with foreign policy that focused on new Asian state sovereignty, the rejection of alliances and the export of revolution in a politically favourable context of decolonization. And contrary to the assumptions of Western realism, Premier Zhou Enlai believed that, although China was weak in terms of its national power, economy and international influence, it could still make political gains by attaining the moral high ground. In today’s terms, China did not have the advantage of hard power, but soft power was cheap and readily available in the traumatic context of decolonization. While Zhou stressed the belligerent nature of US policy, there was no suggestion of creating an “Asian alliance” in response to containment. Chinese foreign policy instead sought to achieve a new influence by politically aligning China with the cause of new state independence and sovereignty. Zhou resorted to a form of reverse onus. He told his diplomats to make their foreign counterparts bear the moral responsibility for conflict: “. . . we are the ones who advocate to resolve all international disputes through peaceful consultation and negotiation, and the other side is the one who insists on the use of force or hostility in resolving conflicts.”34 The key point of historical reference in the fashioning of New China’s foreign policy and the origins of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” came with the establishment of friendly relations between China and India as these two countries sought to avoid confrontation over the PLA’s “liberation” of Tibet. Sino-Indian diplomacy managed the very contentious issues of religion and territory. This accommodation was to have a momentous significance for China’s diplomatic offensive in the Third World and for China’s ultimately successful struggle against US containment. The formation of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence The basic principles of China’s modern foreign policy were established in the original development of relations between two of Asia’s greatest states. China and India agreed on the need to avoid rigidly exclusive bipolar Cold War alliances so as to preserve their independent options in the relations between new and old states on the basis of reciprocity between equally recognized sovereignties. The idea of equal sovereignty was originally a liberal notion embedded in Europe’s Westphalian experience, but this Sino-Indian initiative turned the notion around to criticize Western great power attitudes and associated bipolar East-West alliance building.

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  81 The first joint enunciation of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, 和平 共处五项原则 (Panchsheel in India) emerged in a conflicted context of religious and ideological difference that otherwise had tremendous potential for misunderstanding and suspicion. The five principles were bilaterally enshrined for posterity in the 29 April 1954 Sino-Indian Agreement on Tibet. The agreement was to show how best to deal with differences in international affairs. These five principles in fact became the core of modern Chinese foreign policy, and the lessons learned in this regard clearly revealed the disappointing opportunities of alliance politics, especially as featured in the failure of the 14 February 1950 Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship. In fact, over the long run, it was these five principles that ultimately underwrote the collapse of containment, the future Sino-American, Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian normalizations and Deng’s successful response to post-Tiananmen Square Group of Seven sanctions. Wang Junyan, in his discussion of the origins of the five principles on the Chinese side, has argued that these principles drew upon China’s history and culture and that they represented a progression in thinking from Engels to Lenin through Mao and Zhou.35 The Five Principles had a more immediate reference point in three of the first foreign policy principles set out in the 1949 Common Program. These were especially appropriate to the new states of Asia that were confronting the problems of decolonization and the rigid and often unwanted extension of the Cold War alliance politics into sensitive new national contexts. These principles were especially compelling in the context of decolonization in Asia and the fashioning there of new states. New China’s foreign policy principle relatedly emphasized the new state’s enjoyment of precious state sovereignty and new opportunities for development through cooperation rather than constraining alliance politics. The principles of equality and mutual respect challenged the hierarchical power politics of nonregional great powers. The extension of East-West conflict into Asia was cast as a burden on the sovereignty of the new Asian states. Principles relating to non-interference and non-aggression call for new state subscription to “peaceful coexistence” between states with different value systems and constitutional orders as well as different approaches to economic development. Nehru believed in British parliamentary democracy. With Gandhi, he had sought social justice through non-violence. He readily agreed with Zhou on the importance of recognizing new state sovereignty and the need for national selfidentification in the traumatic context of decolonization.36 Both sides took a moral approach to the history of colonialism. Nehru hoped that the Panchsheel would serve as the basis of a constitutional world order and would foster a condition of peaceful coexistence that would facilitate a “self-consciously morally rational outlook that accepted differences of religion and ideology.” “Truth” would be expedited in the Panchsheel. The emphasis on equality responded to a central fact of human existence. Truth could not be “confined to one country or one people.” He also believed that China, because of its rich ancient Asian civilization, would eventually right itself with respect to the initial extremes associated with MarxistLeninist revolutionary violence.37

82  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” Mao and Zhou were agreed on the need for China to go out into the world especially in light of Zhou Enlai’s successful united front tactics at the 1954 Geneva Conference in favour of a truce in Indochina. The cracks in the US’s great wall of containment were exposed first at Geneva and then at Bandung in 1955. Some of America’s staunchest allies in Europe engaged with Zhou Enlai at the Conference. Hitherto, Mao’s call to “sweep the house first and then invite the guests in” had been cautiously applied to limit Chinese diplomacy. The huge Chinese diplomatic success in Geneva, however, had an important impact on the subsequent direction of China’s foreign policy. At an enlarged Politbureau meeting of 7 July 1954, Mao highlighted qualitative changes in international affairs that were resulting in New China’s “high reputation” at the international level. Mao noted Soviet encouragement to participate more in international affairs. He agreed with Zhou that “the door can no longer and should not be closed and, moreover, [we] should walk out.” Marking the success of China’s initiatives bringing together Britain’s Anthony Eden and India’s Nehru based on peaceful coexistence, Mao called for an expansion of diplomatic work so as to “develop a working relationship with all the countries that are willing to establish relations with us. . . .”38 On October 12th that same year, the Chinese and Soviets signed a joint declaration that noted Chinese leadership on the Indo-China settlement at Geneva and the “utterly groundless” US policy to prevent the PRC from occupying its seats at the UN. The Declaration proclaimed the interest of the two governments in participating in “all international actions designed to promote peace” and to “consult with each other with a view to concerting their actions in safeguarding the security of the two countries. . . .39 As discussed at the 1955 Bandung Conference on Non-Alignment, the five principles came with public reassurances that “revolution cannot be exported.” This was not necessarily that big of a concession for Mao to make. It suited his own view of modern Chinese history based on “independence and self-reliance.” Revolution imposed from the outside was predicated in unsustainable hegemony. Instead of exporting revolution, China would “honestly” deal with the “differences” in international relations by applying the newly touted operational principle, “seeking common ground while reserving differences” 求同存异. Zhou successfully highlighted this principle against Western propaganda concerning the “bamboo curtain” and China’s alleged aspirations to regional power. Zhou challenged Cold War thinking predicated on the extremes of ideology. Instead, he focused on the common suffering associated with colonialism and the struggle to create new sovereign states. He informed the delegates at the Bandung Conference: The Chinese delegation has come here to seek common ground and not [to] discuss differences. The basis for seeking common ground is that the overwhelming majority of nations and peoples of Asia and Africa have all suffered in modern times. . . . We should seek common ground in the course of freeing ourselves from the sufferings and disasters caused by colonialism, and then it will be much easier for us to have mutual understanding, respect for each other, mutual sympathy and support for each other. . . .40

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  83 Focusing on common interest in development was just right in the Bandung context of new state sovereignty in Asia and Africa. Zhou’s five principles expressly dropped the “export of revolution,” and at the end of the Conference, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were successfully rolled into a joint declaration of ten principles. Professor Michael Yahuda has written on the significance of the Chinese rejection of the “export of revolution” as key to the Chinese rejection of “the principles of classic great-power diplomacy by which the great settled the affairs of the small.”41 Of key importance is the Chinese approach to different social and constitutional systems of states. Commitment to change elsewhere was often limited to political posturing and the supply of material resources. Except for Korea, the PLA did not move across national borders. Lee Kuan Yew has discussed this generally in an explicit comparison of American and Chinese approaches: The Chinese have the wiser foreign policy approach. They do not believe it is their business to change the system. They deal with a system as it is and get whatever advantages they can out of it, without entangling themselves. The problem with the Americans is that they go in believing they have the power to change the system. Time and time again they have been proven wrong.42 There is lot of controversy in this. Lee wanted to see a continuing US presence in the Asia-Pacific, but he believed that the Americans had failed to understand their limitations in changing other countries’ cultures and religions. The Chinese, on the other hand, came to realize that they had to reject the “export of revolution” and to embrace the principle of non-interference. Normally, realists found it difficult to believe that the Chinese were sincere in their rejection of the “export of revolution.” Indeed, John Foster Dulles rejected Zhou Enlai’s diplomatic initiative at Geneva and proceeded to establish a network of alliances so as to encircle the Communists whom he likened to “Godless terrorists.” The reassurance against the export of revolution substantively drew from the logic of Mao’s principle of “self-reliance.” Mao believed that genuine revolution could only happen on the basis of “self-reliance.” Mao’s ideological focus on praxis assigned huge significance to domestic forces reacting to distinctive national conditions. On the other hand, while a country or people would have to stand on their own to achieve development, this did not mean that they would dismiss the international division of labour and practice an autarchy that ignored the economic, social and cultural achievements in the outside world. History and the Chinese people were on his side, Mao told those who criticized him as a latter-day Emperor Qin Shihuang who burned the books and buried the scholars. Hardly the soul of modesty, Mao insisted that learning required modesty. Bombarding the enemy with verbal cannons was one thing – it was a cheap way of putting the enemy off his game without necessarily making any costly military commitments. “Learning,” however, was a serious matter of “scientific” observation that would support China’s modernization.

84  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” “Modesty” and “honesty” in Chinese foreign policy Mao kept propaganda and “scientific analysis” in play at one and the same time and referred to this “hotheadedness” and cool-headedness.” The most famous example of this was his 1958 characterization of the US as a “paper tiger” in propaganda terms, while taking full account of the US as a “real tiger that devours people.” Mao lectured: . . . Communists invariably put optimism and contempt for difficulties first. And only then do they take full account of things, of every piece of work, of scientific research, analyse each contradictory aspect of things, dig into them and come to understand the laws of motion of nature and society.43 Internally, Mao warned Party members not to be conceited and dwell on the superiority of socialism. Almost as if drawing on centuries of Chinese culture that celebrated the importance of learning, despite the inconvenience and closedmindedness of containment, Mao contended that much could be learned from the outside world that would meaningfully support China’s development. Based on the theme of dialectical learning that was emphasized in the 1940s Yan’an programmes of rectification, Mao – fervent nationalist that he was – insisted that Chinese Communist cadres would have to learn from everyone and not put on airs of superiority. The warning was likely good advice, as no doubt some cadres and colleagues’ hearts were bursting with nationalist pride, first for having defeated Chiang Kai-shek in 1949, and second for fighting the world’s most powerful military power to a standstill in Korea. Deng Xiaoping himself could not agree more. In his explanation of the 6 February Party resolution, “conceit” and “complacency” were identified as “the archenemy of unity.” Deng believed that a modest attitude would best serve China’s future. He was no more inclined than Mao to spare overly conceited comrades. Modesty was closely tied to discipline and unity. He verballed “a number of Party cadres”: After the victory of the revolution, a number of Party cadres had apparently developed extremely dangerous conceit and complacency. They had let the achievements in their work to go to their heads, forgetting about the modest attitude and the spirit of criticism that all Communists should possess.”44 The 1949 Common Program recitation of seven foreign policy articles was not repeated in the formal state constitution adopted on 20 September 1954. The new constitution’s preface referred to China’s “indestructible friendship” with the USSR, but also converged with the underlying logic of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to confirm the importance of widening the circles of China’s diplomacy: “China’s policy of establishing and extending diplomatic relations with all countries on the principles of equality, mutual benefit, and mutual respect for each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, which has already yielded success, will continue to be carried out.”45 Mao himself had approached a British

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  85 delegation in late August noting his hope that the US would adopt the policy of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.46 In his review of China’s new constitution, Mao claimed that China’s new socialist constitution was superior to the bourgeois constitutions of France, Britain and the US, but then warned the comrades not to be “cocky”: What can we make at present? . . . we can’t make a single motor car, plane, tank or tractor. So, we mustn’t brag and be cocky. Of course, I don’t mean that we become cocky when we turn out our first car, more cocky when we make ten cars. And still more cocky when make more and more cars. That won’t do. Even after fifty years when our country is in good shape, we should remain as modest as we are now. If by then we become conceited and look down on others, it would be bad. We mustn’t be conceited even in a hundred years from now.47 Again, Deng seconded Mao. “Modesty” required a realistic understanding of China’s lack of international power and its very weak national economy. It also came with the notion of non-interference. It required basic thinking about China’s comparative national power, its place in the world and how China’s strategy of development would proceed in light of very modest industrial achievements at home and the meagre opportunities for trade abroad. He believed that modesty could pay big dividends in securing the right environment for future development. It was precisely this calm modesty that later sustained Deng and his foreign policy in the context of the international backlash against the Tiananmen Square crisis of 1989 and the subsequent collapse of the Eastern European and Soviet Communist Parties. On 24 September 1989, Deng faced one of the most serious tests of his foreign policy leadership and lectured his colleagues on the need for modesty in light of a US leadership of the Group of Seven countries to sanction China for the suppression of the students in Tiananmen Square: The more developed we are, the more modest we should be. . . . There is no doubt that the imperialists want socialist countries to change their nature. . . . we should continue to carry on genuine reform and open wider to the outside. . . . China will have tremendous influence. Of course, that will put the developed countries all the more on guard against us. In 1989–90, the Group of Seven’s attempt to impose punishing sanctions on China was regarded as yet another example of “hegemonism.”48 Deng recommended a familiar set of nuanced countermeasures. Chinese foreign policy – knowing full well the West’s predilection for “peaceful evolution” – would still focus on maintaining friendly relations with the Western countries and would respond to their policies with prudence that avoids interference in their affairs.

86  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” Notwithstanding, we should maintain friendly relations with them. We should keep them as friends but also have a clear understanding of what they are doing. We should not criticize or condemn other countries without good reason or go to extremes in our words and deeds. . . . What is going on in other countries is not our business, but we should make one thing perfectly clear: in China socialism will not change.49 Despite the Tiananmen backlash and the sudden resurgence of East-West differences, Deng, like Zhou in the early 1950s, was still hoping to divide his enemies and to make friends wherever possible. Deng, however, was sorely tested by Western “peaceful evolution,” which he found to be really irritating. Deng said: “The West really wants unrest in China.”50 Deng reiterated: “What’s going on in other countries is not our business. . . .” Moreover, China, while “holding its ground,” would still refuse to play the role of a belligerent new world power. Deng was still a Chinese nationalist, and he could not help but observe that in 1990 six of the seven countries out to punish China were part of the Allied Army that originally sacked Peking in 1900, but still he would not be rushed into a precipitous response. His post-Tiananmen strategy re-affirmed “independence and keeping the initiative in our own hands” while “seeking friends everywhere.” Deng was both calm and firm. His policies of economic reform and the open door were to continue regardless of the collapse in the Soviet Union. On 4 September 1989, Deng faced reality and commented: “The problem now is not whether the banner of the Soviet Union will fall – there is bound to be unrest there – but whether the banner of China will. Therefore, the most important thing is that there should be no unrest in China and we should to carry on genuine reform and to open wider to the world.”51 As for handling the situation, Deng had one word, “calm”: “In short, my views about the international situation can be summed up in three sentences: Observe the situation coolly. Hold our ground. Act calmly 冷静观察, 站 稳脚根, 沉着应付.”52 Deng was so insistent on being calm: “We should be calm, calm and again calm, and quietly immerse ourselves in practical work to accomplish something – something for China.”53 Tiananmen Square against the backdrop of increasing Soviet and East European difficulties screamed for a cautious approach rather than an overemotional response. General Secretary Jiang Zemin likened the “principle of observing calmly and responding coolly” to “sit tight in the fishing boat despite the rising wind and waves.”54 “Independence and keeping the initiative in our own hands” was the lesson at the core of the CCP’s revolutionary experience; it presumed that revolutionary justice and development could not be gifted from the outside by any particular state, but that it would have to be generated for the most part by the energies and creativities of the peoples within states. Such logic limited what other states could do even if they were predisposed to “proletarian internationalism,” and this key construct militated against the notion that socialist states need to be guided by a centre of world leadership.

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  87 Once the Sino-Soviet split broke out into the open in 1960, the CCP challenged the correctness of CPSU leadership, but contrary to Cold War propaganda, it did not offer itself as an alternative centre given its own often-stated support for independence and self-reliance. Looking back on the history of proletarian internationalism, Deng, in a talk to senior cadres at the Central Committee in 31 May 1980, later acknowledged that whenever the CCP thought too highly of its own leadership and experience as a general rule: “. . . we must respect the way the parties and peoples of different countries deal with their own affairs. They should be left to find their own paths by themselves and to explore ways to solve their own problems. No party should act like a patriarchal party and issue orders to others.”55 In effect, this was the extension of “independence and self-reliance” into party-to-party relations in reaction to the hierarchical dimensions of one-party patriarchal leadership After 1978, Deng returned to the mid-1950s notion that in the Sino-Soviet ideological dispute China would affirm its principles while applying the operational principle, “seek common ground while reserving differences.” Mao no doubt agreed with Confucius that honesty of opinion is a positive sign of the respect for others. Contradictions have to be identified, but they could be “reserved.” Mao had, for example, confided to local party secretaries on 27 January 1957: When [Khrushchev’s] head gets too swelled, we have to give him a good bawling out. . . . This time in Moscow, Comrade [Zhou Enlai] did not stand on ceremony . . . and consequently they kicked up a row. . . . There will always be contradictions. As long as things are tolerable on the whole, we can seek common ground and reserve differences. . . .”56 Mao’s apparently well-intended emphasis on modesty in dealing openly with the rational evaluation of contradictions seemed at odds with the need to give the Soviets “a good bawling out.” The making of mistakes was sufficiently commonplace that it was necessary to conduct “criticism and self-criticism.” His approach to learning was repeatedly described as “dialectical.” Dialectics recommended “making friends everywhere” while carefully distinguishing the strong and weak points of all countries. However, Mao’s Soviet “friends” were profoundly alienated by Mao’s “honesty.” In 1952–5, Deng served as vice premier of the State Council, and as such he was involved in inner Party discussions on foreign policy. Professor Ezra Vogel notes that Deng in this time had “an opportunity to learn how China’s two greatest leaders and their generation assessed the major issues facing the country.”57 Deng had either the good fortune or misfortune to be in Moscow when Nikita Khrushchev gave the famous “secret speech” denouncing Stalin. Soviet “honesty” about Stalin created problems in Beijing. On his return from Moscow, Deng became the CCPCC general secretary, and he was charged with the unenviable task of sorting out the CCP’s response to Khrushchev’s denunciation of Stalin’s personality cult. Mao, whose own status was directly relevant, was not prepared to “drop Stalin’s sword” and, like Khrushchev, dispose of Stalin in

88  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” one fell swoop. Mao, who was certainly one to bear a grudge, could not openly object to Deng’s reiteration of the Party’s standards of workstyle and collective leadership that he himself had formulated. Such standards were integral to Mao’s own explanation of China’s distinctive revolution. It fell to Deng to deal with the implications of Stalin’s denunciation within the senior ranks of his own Party. Deng was already on record in his opposition to “conceit.” He had lived through inner-Party debates over the issues that arose with the Sino-Soviet dispute as it concerned the definition of a Chinese path to development, and Mao had personally praised Deng for his strong rebuttals to Moscow’s chief polemicist, Mikhail Suslov. Independence and self-reliance came to the fore. The issue of how to see China in relation to the opportunities in the outside world was explicitly reviewed. China’s development might benefit from foreign learning, but China’s development would for the most part have to be carried out by the Chinese people. No state in the world had the resources to develop China’s economy for the Chinese people. Moreover, neither “Chinese exceptionalism” nor “rough nationalism” were considered as an appropriate response to the task of building up China’s national economy. Mao, who keenly studied reality on the basis of “seeking the truth from the facts” while lecturing at Kangda (Anti-Japan University) in the early 1940s, wanted to study all the more. He pushed on the boundaries of China’s learning from the outside world, deliberately moving beyond the limitations of late imperial China when reformers proposed taking “Chinese learning as essence, and Western learning for practical use” 以中学为体 以西学为用. Apparently, the latter attempted to acquire only foreign technology without studying its foreign economic and cultural context. Mao wanted “learning to go deeper,” while at the same time wanting to preserve “Chinese characteristics”: [This learning of the good points of all countries] isn’t the same as taking “Chinese learning as the substance, and Western learning for practical use.” By “learning,” we mean the basic principles, which are applicable everywhere and shouldn’t be differentiated as “Chinese” or “foreign.” The appearance of China, whether in politics, economy or culture should change and not remain old-fashioned. But Chinese characteristics ought to be preserved. . . . We ought to critically assimilate useful elements from the West on our own Chinese foundation.58 Zhou Enlai similarly identified and criticized “parasitic” and “isolationist” views that had characterized inner-Party debates in the spring 1956. Zhou had participated in the difficult Moscow negotiations of 1950. Clearly “fraternity” in socialism was not even skin deep. Zhou and Mao had to endure Stalin’s insensitive remarks on the Chinese “revolution” as a “fake revolution” – as nothing more than a labour movement in the UK. Their hopes were rebuffed in Moscow as they came up sharply against the limits of Soviet help. At any rate, dependence on the

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  89 Soviets was no real option for the leaders who proclaimed that “China had stood up.” And “leaning” had already been qualified by “learning” that required a wider set of international relations. The limits of “leaning” were well understood in Beijing. The Party’s Eighth National Congress in mid-September 1956 confirmed the importance of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and it also recognized “the alliance between China and the Soviet Union” as “the main pillar of peace in the Far East and the world.”59 Premier Zhou Enlai was able to look beyond the immediate developments of the Cold War to observe in 16 September 1956: “. . . [as] the international situation tends and moves towards detente – economic, technological and cultural relations between China and non-socialist countries will expand. . . . the isolation view is wrong.”60 China’s economic development could use the help of “non-socialist countries”! Conceited “isolationists” who displayed their Chinese exceptionalism defied the “scientific” international division of labour and advantages of trade for domestic development. However, those of a more “parasitic” persuasion who hoped to depend on the Soviet Union were also faulted. They had forgotten the CCP’s deep commitment to “independence and self-reliance.” Chen Yi seconded Zhou’s argument at the Eighth National Party Congress on 25 September 1956. Chen highlighted the growing trend to independence in Third World countries that were resisting the blandishments of the great powers to take a stand against joining military blocs. In particular, Chen had been impressed by the “positive role” played by the Colombo countries, India, Burma, Indonesia, Ceylon and Pakistan in supporting a peace agreement at the Geneva Conference.61 Given the extremes of the Cold War containment, the 1956 debates were mature and sophisticated in their understanding of changing world affairs. Moreover, China’s leaders had clearly moved beyond the quick-fix limitations of the late nineteenth century strategy of “Chinese learning as essence and Western learning for use” as the latter denied broad-based learning and only expected the qualified transference of technology – especially military equipment – to China. Mao, in 25 April 1956, dialectically reviewed his ten great relations, or his ten great contradictions, and the last of these dealt definitively with the issue of “learning”: We have put forward the slogan of learning from other countries. I think we have been right. At present, the leaders of some countries [possibly the Soviet Union and specific East European supporters of Soviet leadership] are chary . . . of advancing this slogan. It takes courage to do so because theatrical pretensions have to be discarded. . . . every nation has its strong points. If not, how can it survive? . . . On the other hand, every nation has its weak points. Some believe that socialism is just perfect without a single flaw. How can that be true? . . . Our policy is to learn from the strong points of all nations and all countries, learn all that is genuinely good in the political, economic, scientific and technological fields and in literature and art.62 The idea of Mao discarding “theatrical pretensions” might well sound strange to the Cold War observer. Surely Mao loved the theatre of class

90  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” struggle? He relished the topsy-turvy of contradictions. He was the modern incarnation of the Monkey King, who freely bashed everyone on the head with his magical cudgel. The sovereign equality of states and the leadership of socialist internationalism In his 15 November 1956 speech to the Second Session of the Eighth Central Committee, Mao referred to the disturbances in Poland, Hungary and the BritishFrench “armed aggression against Egypt.” Mao often complained that some comrades had failed to pay attention to dialectics. These comrades, for example, had trouble in understanding that contradictions exist between imperialism and the Third World, but that there are also contradictions between socialist states and between capitalist states. Mao reminded the comrades attending the Second Session of the “dual nature” of things: When people see the word “bad” before the word “thing,” many think that it’s nothing but bad. But we say there is another aspect to it, that the bad thing is at the same time a good thing, and this is what is meant by “failure is the mother of success.” Every failure, every reverse, or every mistake, may lead to good results under given conditions.63 Deng commented on how Mao delighted in turning a bad thing into a good thing. Mao, for example, told his Party in 1957 that he expected the present issues with the US and its rejection of China’s UN claim would ultimately work in China’s favour. Predicting diplomatic relations with the US in eighteen years, Mao explained his view of containment: We are in no hurry to take our seat in the United Nations, just as we are in no hurry to establish diplomatic relations with the United States. We adopt this policy to deprive the United States of as much political capital as possible and put it in the wrong and in an isolated position. . . .64 Mao’s sense of timing, at least in this case, was consistent with his dialectics. He could afford to conserve his energy and wait for two opposites to transform into one another as the US was increasingly burdened with the irrationality of containment; hence, he told the Party: The United States now controls a majority in the United Nations and dominates many parts of the world – this state of affairs is temporary and will be changed. . . . China’s position as a poor country denied its rights . . . will also be changed – the poor country will change into a rich one, the country denied its rights into one enjoying them – a transformation of things into their opposites.65

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  91 While Mao waited to overcome containment, Chinese policy still subscribed to the importance of learning wherever and whenever possible. In the West, however, Mao was more widely known for his chilling doomsday rhetoric. His internal recommendation of “modesty” and his warnings against “cockiness” were not as well known. Mao did not like “big professors.” His notion of “modesty,” however, was key to his metaphor of China as a “blank piece of white paper” on which one could write beautiful characters. Mao reasoned: Being poor and blank is therefore all to our good. Even when one day our country becomes strong and prosperous, we must still adhere to the revolutionary stand, remain modest and prudent, learn from other countries and not allow ourselves to become swollen with conceit.66 Mao’s 25 April 1956 comment on China’s future prosperity and continued modest learning is worth noting in light of Deng’s sponsored circulation of “The Ten Great Relations” and his relevant comments from the early to mid-1980s. In August 1956, Mao further explained how to apply modesty in dialectical understanding of realities. Mao urged Party members in their learning to avoid both dogmatism and conservatism. Despite all of the violent Cold War histrionics, Mao’s “learning dialectic” cut cross the East-West divide. In 26 December 1956, the authoritative Renmin ribao (People’s daily) reviewed related implications of foreign relations. Following the reasoning in Mao’s “Ten Great Relations,” it warned of the immodesty associated with “great-nation chauvinism” and the latter’s potential negative impact on the relations between “small and backward countries” and “big and advanced countries.” Even China, although it had become a recent victim of imperialism, had “to take every precaution” carefully to guard against any internal chauvinist tendencies and to be sensitive to historical conflict involving large and small states that are striving towards development: What we Chinese especially must bear in mind is that China too was a big empire during the Han, Tang, Ming and Ching dynasties. Although it is true that . . . China became the victim of aggression and a semi-colony . . . under changed conditions, great-nation chauvinist tendencies will certainly become a serious danger. . . .67 Herein, there is possibly at work a mix of perspectives. Traditionally it was expected that a great kingdom would protect and even “serve” a small kingdom. Superimposed on this is a Leninist perspective on imperialism and hegemonism. Having been a “victim,” it was morally important for China to identify with the modern principles of the sovereign equality of states and to use the Five Principles to support the small and the big states. Chinese united front strategy of course maximized the opportunities to create a bloc of states that would support China against containment.

92  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” In what is a striking paradox, given the collapse of modest learning during the Great Leap Forward, Mao, at the Second Session of the Eight Party Congress in May 1958, once again claimed that learning was to be achieved on the basis of both modesty and self-confidence. He addressed two massive obstacles to learning. One was internal; the other, external. The weight of tradition, or more specifically “feudalism,” had created an unthinking deference to Confucian sagely authority, hence “We were inferior in the face of Confucius.” Second, the tendency “to belittle ourselves” was aggravated in over one hundred years of “imperialism” that propagated “obedience to foreigners.”68 Mao asserted that the Chinese could learn just as well as the foreigners – a point Deng well remembered when he told Thatcher that Chinese people were quite capable of administering Hong Kong. However, learning had to be achieved on the basis of a modesty that recognized reality. Referring to “dogmatists [who] copy from foreign countries” Mao attacked “excessive modesty” and asked: “Why do they not use their brains in whatever they do?” In 1958, Mao was realistic about the modest role of Soviet help. He stated: “It is very necessary to win Soviet aid, but the most important thing is self-reliance.”69 Having said this, Mao asked his Party: “Who designed and assembled so many factories for us? He answered that it was not the English, Japanese and the Americans. While the comrades were urged to learn from all countries, they were still to pay special attention to the Soviets, as “only they dispatched engineers to design for us, teaching us to be able to make the designs ourselves. . . . ”70 In the extreme fratricide of Party factionalism, overemphasis on science could lead to accusations of “empiricism,” but Mao formally subscribed to learning that builds on modesty. As for how to learn, Mao asserted that “true modesty” required scientific analysis: Modesty without a scientific foundation is not true modesty. True modesty must be compatible with reality. For example, when we tell foreigners that China is still an agricultural nation and its industrial construction is just beginning . . . , it is reality, but the foreigners will find us modest.71 Mao even claimed that China would still learn from the Soviet Union, even as he openly challenged the nature and legitimacy of Soviet socialism. On 30 January 1962, he said: People may ask: Since the Soviet Union is under revisionists, should we learn from them? What we should learn is about good people and good things . . . the good experiences of the Soviet Communist Party. . . . as for the bad . . . we should treat them as teachers by negative example and learn lessons from them.72 Chinese modesty, however, was not intended to encourage bullies, and it did not back down in the face of patronizing external protestations of superiority. Mao dispatched Deng Xiaoping to Moscow to defend what he thought was the correct

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  93 line. Mao knew that Deng, although he was short of stature, could not be bullied. In fact, he relished Deng’s performance. At times, it would appear that modesty was sacrificed to honesty, and it was not always clear which best served diplomacy. As more fully discussed in Chapter Four, the consequences of the open SinoSoviet split were huge for China’s foreign and security policies. The falling out confirmed that alliances – even among fraternal socialist states – were less than meaningful when it came to ensuring China’s independence and self-reliance. Ideologically, the issue of “revisionism” was explosive, as it publicly spotlighted the illegitimacy of Soviet claims to ideological purity as leader of the world communist movement. The experience ultimately served only to re-confirm the Chinese in their belief that each country must find its own way to socialism. Moreover, the necessary acceptance of different paths to socialism required a strategy of “seeking common ground while reserving differences” that ultimately negated the necessity of world leadership on the part of any party. Moreover, the “truth” and “learning” did not require the building of a great impenetrable wall between socialism and capitalism. “Seeking the truth” was not only a matter of learning about technology, but with qualification, it could look at the issue of “essence” or “truth” and it could take in not only the fields of science but also humanities and social sciences. Unlike the nineteenth century imperial “self-strengtheners,” Mao realized that technology as a scientific outcome grows within the context of a particular society and economic cultural development. Mao would subject the “strong points” of other countries to dialectical analysis. As suggested in Chapter Two, the debates of 1956 subsequently informed Deng’s later justification of his policies on economic reform and the open door. China’s leaders gave some thought as to what would happen to China as it become economically more developed, and such thinking lacked any imperial design to facilitate China as a world power. Politically, Mao attempted to distance himself from the extreme rhetoric of “The Great Leap Forward.” China could not advance so quickly. At an expanded central work conference in 30 January 1962, Mao related to Party members some of his conversations with foreign visitors. Edgar Snow had asked Mao in a 1960 meeting what was China’s long-term plan for “socialist construction.” Mao quixotically replied: “I said: ‘I don’t know.’ [Snow] said: ‘You are being prudent.’ I said: It’s not a question of being prudent. It’s just that I really don’t know and we just haven’t any experience.’”73 Mao then informed the Party that the same point came up in his conversation with Field Marshal Montgomery in 1961: “Montgomery said, ‘In another fifty years you will be terrific.’ What he meant was that after fifty years we will become powerful and invade other countries, but not within fifty years.” Mao corrected Montgomery, claiming that it might take more than one hundred years to achieve a strong economy, but that it did not follow that China must, therefore, invade other countries: “We are Marxists-Leninists, our state is a socialist state, not a capitalist state, therefore we wouldn’t invade others in a hundred years, or even ten thousand years.”74 In his later years, Mao focused on the mistakes of his enemies. Old Mao could not help himself in his last years. Dialectical nuance disappeared in his own

94  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” absolute thinking. He forgot his repeated prescriptions for “modesty” and “seeking the truth from the facts.” Looking back on events, Deng himself was not entirely without blame. Deng regretted that the “truth” was ignored in the 1957 Anti-Rightist Campaign when he was Party General Secretary: “. . . I share responsibility for the broadening of the scope of the struggle. . . .”75 Subsequently, the “essence” of Mao Zedong Thought was trashed and the Party headquarters bombarded in the Cultural Revolution. Deng refused to accept arguments that the Party had disappeared in the Cultural Revolution, and believed that the Party itself had to take a share of the blame even though Mao had nearly decimated its national leadership. The belated rearguard attempt in February 1967 by dazed leaders to regain lost political initiative and to remind Mao of his own dialectics underlying “seeking the truth from the facts” was bitterly counter-attacked, and its proponents were damned as a subversive “February Adverse Current.” As Mao’s brilliant red sun blazed across the universe, absolutized class struggle resulted in extraordinary mistakes, wild accusations, unfair persecution and the almost universal failure to distinguish between “right” and “wrong,” not to mention extraordinary confusion in China’s foreign policy. All but one of China’s ambassadors was recalled from their postings to receive political education and to engage in labour. Red Guards tapped a society seething with envy over the least expression of material gains on the part of “capitalist roaders” and reproached China’s diplomats as “privileged stratum” that had failed to spread the thought of Chairman Mao among the peoples of the world. Not only had they “fat salaries,” but they apparently acted as if they were not subject to the norms of Party discipline and “. . . many embassies abroad simply became ‘one doctrine’ halls or ‘family-type gangster inns. ’”76 Ominously, China’s embassies were attacked for defying democratic centralism. Ultra-leftists attacked the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and briefly convulsed the organization and functioning of the Foreign Ministry in April–May 1967. Chinese diplomacy briefly championed the notion of the “diplomat” as a “red diplomatic fighter.” Since the start of 1967, 2000 staff returned to China from their embassies. They were ordered to form “combat groups” to attack “power holders” such as ambassadors for taking the capitalist road.77 Once the Foreign Ministry descended into power seizure, past strictures against “exporting revolution” were dropped, and there was a string of embarrassing diplomatic incidents in Indonesia, Hong Kong, India, Burma, Cambodia, Outer Mongolia, Tunisia and Kenya.78 The “ultra-leftists” went too far when they sacked and burned the British charge d’affaires office in Beijing on 22 August 1967. Mao would not forgive anarchy that blackened China’s international reputation. Moreover, Chinese diplomacy that hitherto had been so successful was haemorrhaging in different parts of the world. Zhou started to return the ambassadors to their posts in the summer of 1969. Incapable of dialectical nuance, Deng’s ultra-left critics’ exceptionalism knew no modesty. In their unidimensional idealism, “self-reliance” meant autarchy. Indeed,

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  95 Deng and others who very modestly advocated for the introduction of foreign aid and technology had been accused of wanting to turn China into a “sweatshop” for foreign imperialism. During the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping was denounced as China’s “number two capitalist roader.” The accusations of the Cultural Revolution still haunted him once he returned to power for the second time in the spring of 1973. He was attacked again in 1975 for “national betrayal” 读国主义 and “”worshipping foreign things and fawning on foreign powers” 崇洋媚外. Staring into the abyss of anarchy and civil war, Mao rediscovered the Party disciplinary requirements of Leninism. He reined in the Cultural Revolutionary process while at the same time setting the stage for negotiated normalization with the United States on the basis of a reiterated commitment to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The brush with extremist revolutionary diplomacy was a truly sorry learning experience for all concerned, including Mao’s starry-eyed Red Guards. Mao turned on them, criticizing their propensity for anarchy. He petulantly complained about their misappropriation of the slogan, “The world is yours!”: “This was said by the chairman in 1920. He can’t altogether remember it himself, and it should not be used in the future.”79 The Red Guards, having served their purpose, were to disband. Deng Xiaoping takes the helm of foreign policy Mao absolved himself and blamed his wife and Lin Biao for creating a “feudal” personality cult in the Cultural Revolution. Deng’s sins as China’s second most powerful capitalist roader were allowed to pass with self-criticism; incredibly, and over the vociferous Jiang Qing’s objections of Jiang Qing, Mao sent Deng Xiaoping off to New York to explain China to the world. Deng’s New York speech had been carefully vetted by Mao, but it was, nevertheless, a triumph for Deng and his ailing mentor, Zhou Enlai. Deng was assigned the responsibility for defining China’s “independence and self-reliance” in New York! In effect and regardless of the fury of Jiang Qing, foreign policy was given to Deng. If anything, the Cultural Revolution had by negative example strengthened the case for relocating the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence at the core of foreign policy. When Vice Premier Deng went to New York, he was not even a member of the Politbureau. Mao himself had pinned the white cat/black cat analogy on Deng during the Cultural Revolution. Still, Mao had very good reasons for sending him. What was the alternative? Jiang Qing and her leftist colleagues had tried to establish the Shanghai Commune at the expense of the Chinese state, and their proteges almost wrecked China’s international reputation in the Cultural Revolution. New York was the first opportunity to explain China’s foreign policy to the world and to regain lost ground. This explanation of course would be expressly situated in Mao’s developing theory of three worlds, which he had been working on since June 1973. Zhou

96  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” Enlai, who was under a cloud, was too ill to travel. Like Zhou, Deng had previously demonstrated his ability to represent Mao’s ideological position in Moscow. Deng was tough and smart. He well understood the Chairman’s dialectics. Deng had negotiated the political sensitivities surrounding the personality cult problem, and Mao had in the past recommended Deng as an outstanding dialectician. The decision to send Deng was made in a politically intense context. Premier Zhou had been fending off indirect criticism that was masked in the innuendo of the Criticize Lin Biao and Confucius Campaign. Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing, was sparring with him over Politbureau procedures. On 26 March 1974, the Politbureau approved Deng’s New York assignment. After Mao had clarified that Deng’s assignment was one hundred percent his own idea, Jiang Qing’s Politbureau supporters stood aside, but Jiang Qing herself stubbornly remained opposed. The next day, an angry Mao criticized her severely and apparently warned against the growing factional activities that included her fox-tailed acolytes, Zhang Qunqiao, Yao Wenyuan and Wang Hongwen.80 China’s debut in New York came in the middle of heated international controversy over the nature of the world order itself. In the UN General Assembly, China sided with the Third World in acrimonious debates over developing countries’ control over their own natural resources and how to fashion new international economic and political orders. Deng arrived and spelled out Mao’s new Three Worlds theory. At the heart of this theory was the possibility of world war between the “two superpowers” who were contesting for hegemony in the threatening context of potential nuclear warfare. This dangerous situation was summed up as “disorder under heaven.” On the other hand, there was new opportunity in the proliferation of contradictions, which Mao handled on his own ideological basis of united front politics. Once again, Chairman Mao revelled in contradiction. He theorized about the inadequate world view summarized in the struggle between “two camps.” He applied his own knowledge of united front politics to study the complex relations between three worlds. Mao wanted to garner all of the opportunities of aligning Second World and Third World interests. In the dialectical context of increasing superpower contention for hegemony, there was a silver lining. US-Soviet antagonism was bringing the developing nations closer together. Mao’s Three Worlds theory looked forward to increasing political alignments between the developing countries in the Third World and those developed countries like Japan, France, the UK, Canada and Australia in the Second World. World politics afforded China related opportunities to align (not to “ally”) with countries in the Third and Second Worlds to restrain the contending Soviets and Americans in the First World. As for superpower “bullying” of the developing countries, although the Soviet Union was the more “hungry” superpower, Deng again referenced dialectics: “The two superpowers have created their own antithesis.”81 Their contention was creating new space for new states that wished to consolidate their independence. Deng’s UN speech also plumbed the depths of Chinese disillusionment with the Soviets:

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  97 Under the name of so-called “economic cooperation” and “international division of labour,” [the Soviet Union] uses high-handed measures to extort super profits in its “family.” . . . The “joint enterprises” it runs in some countries under the signboard of “aid” and “support” are in essence copies of “transnational corporations.” . . . Moreover, it preaches the theory of “limited sovereignty,” alleges that the resources of developing countries are international property. . . . These are out-and-out imperialist fallacies. They are even more undisguised than the so-called “inter-dependence” advertised by the other superpower.82 Mao inserted Deng into the middle of a red hot General Assembly debate over Third World control over natural resources, the oil crisis and the need for a new world order, but what was the basic thrust of Mao’s Three Worlds approach? Would Mao throw oil on the fires of neo-colonization? Mao saw ultimate victory in the growing numbers of the developing states and unlocking their dependence would undercut hegemony. The key to international relations was therefore to support the political and economic independence and “self-reliance” of the developing states. No one model for development was to be imposed on these states; they were to be free to decide on their own model depending upon their own conditions. Deng challenged the “ideas of pessimism and helplessness spread by imperialism in connection with the question of development” as having “ulterior motives.” Deng added that “self-reliance” required each developing country in accordance with its own conditions to make a basic effort at home, but that this effort should not be allowed to descend into “self-seclusion” and the “rejection of foreign aid.” Deng took the opportunity to rebut domestic critics who accused him of “national betrayal” and dishonouring Mao’s principle of “self-reliance.” Deng clarified that “self-reliance” was a matter of dialectics. It encouraged trade while it warned against the sacrifice of national economic and political independence. “Autarchy,” of which his critics stood accused, was a dialectically irrational attachment to natural economy. Now with Mao’s emphatic endorsement, Deng was telling the world that “selfreliance,” like all of China’s policies, was dialectically qualified. He cautioned against the false opposition of “self-reliance” to the “open door.” His advice was to augment the developing country’s prospects for self-help, thereby reducing the opportunities for imperialism on the part of the developed countries. At the same time, he left the door open to enhanced economic and technological relations between states on the basis of equality and mutual benefit, one of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Deng subscribed to widening the circles of international economic cooperation, but he also gave a definitive explanation of the policy connotations of “self-reliance”: By self-reliance we mean that a country should mainly rely on the strength and wisdom of its own people, control its own economic lifelines, make full use of its own resources, strive hard to increase food production and develop

98  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” its national economy step by step and in a planned manner. The policy of independence and self-reliance in no way means that it should be divorced from the actual conditions of a country. . . .83 On the other hand, the dialectical reading of economic realities invoked Zhou Enlai’s1949 statement on “self-reliance;” hence, Deng added the following critical distinction: Self-reliance in no way means “self-seclusion” and rejection of foreign aid. We have always considered it beneficial and necessary for the development of the national economy that countries should carry on economic and technological exchanges on the basis of respect for state sovereignty, equality and mutual benefit, and the exchange of needed goods to make up for each other’s deficiencies.84 Deng had, at least temporarily, outflanked his domestic leftist critics at the UN. On the one hand, while he rejected their tendency to autarchy, he clarified China’s “open door” with reference to “self-reliance” as distinct from “self-seclusion” or autarchy. The open door was not to be swung open wide without due consideration of China’s own conditions and the need for “self-reliance” and mutually beneficial economic cooperation. Moreover, Deng endorsed “collective self-reliance” 集体自力更生 in which developing countries in the South enhanced their economic relations between one another, but China was herself a developing country that had no interest in taking on the dubious commitments of a superpower especially as China had herself suffered greatly under superpower influences in the immediate past. This was at once a position that conveyed the Chinese sense of morality, while it was also a statement that reflected Beijing’s own realistic reading of China’s modest level of influence and capabilities at the time when China first came on the world stage and at a time when there was “great disorder under heaven.” China’s April 1974 position dealt with the problems of “hegemonism” by emphasizing “self-reliance.” This augmented the developing country’s prospects for self-help thereby reducing imperialist opportunism on the part of the developed countries. This position at the same time left the door open to enhanced economic and technological relations between all states regardless of their respective political systems and on the basis of equality and mutual benefit, one of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The issue of Deng’s wavering support for Mao’s principle of self-reliance resurfaced once Deng was dismissed from all of his positions for the second time in April 1976. Mao moved left for the last time and reportedly claimed: “This person does not grasp class struggle; he has never referred to [class struggle as the key link]. Still his theme of ‘white cat, black cat,’ [makes] no distinction between imperialism and Marxism. . . .”85

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  99 However, once Deng established his own leadership position after the death of Mao and eclipsed Mao’s chosen successor, Hua Guofeng, Deng focused on modernization using Mao’s own thought to legitimate the transition from class struggle to reform. Deng used dialectics to craft a new Party consensus on the basis of Mao Zedong Thought. He argued that the core of this thought allowed for adaptation to changing reality. As for China’s position vis-a-vis the opportunities for technological cooperation, investment and trade, he synthesized the notions of “self-reliance” and “open door.” Deng would only open China’s door on China’s own terms and conditions. This would be a matter of gradual adaptation based on experiment in limited areas. The open door and self-reliance were placed in a dialectical synthesis as Deng explained, referring to earlier problems of “closed-door” experience: . . . while Comrade Mao was still living, we thought about expanding economic and technological exchanges with other countries. We wanted to develop economic relations with certain capitalist countries and even to absorb foreign capital and even form joint ventures. But the necessary conditions were not present because at the time an embargo was placed on China [i.e., US containment]. And later the Gang of Four branded any attempt at economic relations with foreign countries as “worshipping things foreign and fawning on foreigners,” or as “national betrayal” and so sealed China off from the outside world. Comrade Mao Zedong’s strategic idea of differentiating the three worlds opened the door for us. We have gone on opposing imperialism, hegemonism, colonialism and racism, working to safeguard world peace, actively developing relations, including economic and cultural exchanges, with other countries on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.86 Mao’s Three Worlds theory “opened the door for us”! Deng used Mao Zedong Thought to explain and legitimate the “open door.” Facing his critics, Deng argued that the open door was correct and necessary even in the face of devious foreign practices: “Yes, foreigners may still deceive us or take advantage of our backwardness. For instance, when we import complete plants, they may edge up the price or pass off inferior goods as high-grade ones.”87 Deng’s “modest” dialectical approach to the acquisition of advanced foreign science and technology became an important part of China’s strategy for accelerated industrial development. Deng outmanoeuvred those who had attacked him for “national betrayal” and “absurd views.” Leftist polemics had attacked Deng’s sponsored 2 September 1975 working draft, titled “Some Problems in Accelerating Industrial Development.” This document built on Mao’s 1956 Tenth Relationship on China and the outside world and Zhou Enlai’s strategy for selectively acquiring foreign technology based on the “four points,” namely, “use, criticize, change and create” 一用二批三变四创. The latter was another policy dialectic designed to ensure against both the dependent mechanical copying of foreign technology

100  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” and experience and isolationist tendencies that ignored the benefits of the international division of labour. “Rote learning” and “fear of innovation” were both negative phenomena. Point Eleven of the 2 September 1975 draft, namely “Adopt Advanced Techniques,” had described the related dialectical synthesis of learning and creation in the following familiar terms: It is necessary to learn humbly from foreign experience and to selectively import advanced technologies from abroad for our purposes. . . . We must stick to the principle of independence and self-reliance and oppose the philosophy of slavishly learning from abroad and crawling slowly behind. But we must not be conceited and close our doors to everything and refuse to learn at all from abroad.88 In contrast, the 1956 dialectical approach embedded in the “four points” supported the acquisition of technology based on an open approach that would selectively try out foreign technology and closely examining its appropriateness to China’s conditions. Having sorted the negative and positive aspects of such technology, it would be reworked or changed so as to create a new and improved technology for China. The Cultural Revolution left, or the “Gang of Four,” however, saw in this protested dialectics a clever sleight of hand that promoted “slavism to foreign things.”89 Their zero-sum “idealism” had allegedly contradicted Mao’s learning dialectic. Deng’s correlation of “self-reliance” and the “open door” expected the materialization of “mutual benefit and equality” as stated in the original Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. It permitted, subject to critical scrutiny, qualitative new technological transfer, but the “open door” was not swung wide open, but rather gradually opened a bit at a time. While Deng was consolidating his power over the Party agenda in relation to Hua Guofeng in 1979–80, there was already some concern that in reality the door had already been improperly opened. Critics in NPC debate asserted the importance of Mao’s principle, “self-reliance is primary, while striving for foreign assistance is supplementary” 自力更生为主 争取外援为辅. Several central ministries, most notably the Ministry of the Metallurgical Industry” had taken the “four points” too far, using foreign loans to finance indiscriminately complete sets of technology without regard to how well such technology would fit into existing Chinese economic structures.90 Deng Xiaoping began to use the term, “independent strategy” 独立自主战 略 in August 1982.91 At the Twelfth National Party Congress on 1 September 1982, Deng marked the “new situation in all fields of socialist modernization” and insisted on “persevering in self-reliance” and giving “unswerving” support for the “open door” policy. Deng wanted to learn from the West as well as from all countries, but he did not expect the leaders of his Party who opened China’s door to absorb uncritically “decadent ideas from abroad” and to foster “bourgeois liberalism.” “Learning” had to proceed in tandem with “resisting hegemonism” and supporting “independence and self-reliance.”

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  101

Deng supports and revises Mao’s foreign policy CBS Correspondent Mike Wallace put the following question to Deng during an interview in 1986: “Mao has been dead for just 10 years. What do you think Mao’s reaction to China today would be. . . . ?” Deng thought that the answer was perfectly obvious: There are differences. However, there are similarities as far as certain principles are concerned. Mao Zedong Thought is still our guiding ideology. We have adopted the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China, which answers your question.”92 Indeed, there were differences and similarities! And the document to which Deng referred was one of the most important political statements to come out of the leadership since 1949. Wallace came to admire Deng, but at that point he snapped: “It doesn’t answer my question.”93 Foreign observers that focused on the different styles of Mao and Deng may not have fully appreciated how Deng significantly appropriated Mao Zedong Thought as the ideological basis for his reform policies. While continuity is an important aspect of the Chinese politics of legitimation, Deng’s own dialectical analysis was quite independent. His constant genuflection to Mao Zedong Thought did not preclude the selective and independent revision to some of Mao’s key ideas in foreign policy in light of changing national and international conditions. Deng reiterated existing policy assumptions that “hegemonism, bloc politics and treaty organizations no longer work.” To paraphrase Deng, the Chinese were not just going to drop the very ideals that they believe in on American say-so. Deng, however, did proceed to revise Mao’s policy with respect to two key areas. First, he modified Mao’s understanding of the prospect for general war, and second, he revisited the substantive nature and scope of international competition as Mao had focused too exclusively on the contention between the US and the USSR. To be sure, both were hegemonies, but China needed to focus on its development. But Mao’s interpretation had emphasized that the USSR was more aggressive. In September 1977, the Remin ribao (Peking daily) editorialized on the importance of Mao’s Three Worlds theory and claimed: “Of the two imperialist powers, the Soviet Union is the more ferocious, the more reckless, the more treacherous, and the most dangerous source of world war.”94 This was naturally the case because the USSR was following “on the heels of the United States.” The Beijing “anti-Soviet hysteria” that regarded the Soviet Union as a ferocious and hungry “socialist imperialist” state attracted a furious rebuttal from Moscow, claiming that it was designed to undermine detente in Europe and to “provocatively disperse the socialist states among all ‘three worlds,’ trying to counterpose them to one another.”95 While normalization stalled over the Taiwan Question as the “biggest obstruction,” Deng’s program for “independent foreign

102  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” policy” initially suggested that the two imperialist powers were equally part of the problem of contention for world hegemony. The reading of the inner contradictions affecting world peace and war needed significant updating. In 1957, for example, Mao had earlier predicted: “It seems that the countries of the Americas, Asia and Africa will have to go on quarrelling with the United States till the very end, till the tiger is destroyed by the wind and rain.”96 Deng had learned the underlying lesson of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The latter had not only rejected the “export of revolution,” but also the casting of international relations exclusively on the basis of social system. His curiosity piqued, Mike Wallace later inquired as to why China’s relations with “capitalist America” were better than China’s relations with the “Soviet Communists.” In reply, Deng was cautious and succinct: “China does not regard social systems as a criterion in its approach to problems.”97 Deng was chaffing at the bit to move away from general war, which stood as an obstacle to his more exclusive focus on peaceful development. Initially, Deng accepted that in the event of a “massive war,” development would not receive such an exclusive priority, but he added that once such a war was over it would still be important to “either pick up where we left off or start over.”98 The early 1980s international situation had improved so much that Deng was able to sidestep the Chairman’s general trend to world war. Deng qualified this trend, insisting that “the situation of a war, like water, does not have a constant form.”99 In the context of increasing Third World development, the superpowers were beginning to lose their foothold. War was likely to exhibit more of a “partial” nature. Deng gave more emphasis to the nuclear dimensions of the relationship between the superpowers. The superpowers had to limit themselves in order to avoid nuclear confrontation at a time when more and more developing states were moving out of the initial phases of decolonization and the structures of development were becoming more complex. In this context of proliferating contradiction within the transitional structures of international relations, there was a golden opportunity for China to focus on its own domestic process of development without having to endure the costs and distractions of a general trend to war. Deng even went farther when he confided to President Hussain Muhammad Ershad of Bangladesh past mistakes: “In the past we were too sure that world war was imminent, and we neglected the development of our productive forces and our economy.”100 Following the dialectical logic of Mao’s 1956 discussion of the ten great relations, Deng regarded “military modernization” as the fourth in importance of the four modernizations. The other three modernizations of agriculture, industry and technology and science were more primary in their support of China’s national economic development. Military modernization would itself, over time, benefit from the creation of “an independent and relatively comprehensive and economic system.” Military modernization was still important, but it was subordinated to modernization of the economy. However, Deng wanted massive demobilization so as to facilitate more modern forces. Once general war had been downgraded, Deng

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  103 did not drop “people’s war.” The latter remained important particularly in the rear areas of the hinterland in the event of significant foreign invasion. His view that a “superior enemy” can be defeated with “inferior equipment” evoked traditional Chinese thinking.101 He nevertheless thought that the PLA was “bloated” and needed a radical reduction in its size so as to facilitate the development of a more modern force rather than perpetuating such a large force so exclusively premised on “rifles and millet.” “Deng Xiaoping Thought” called for “three changes” 三化, synthesizing modernization, professional regularization and enhanced revolutionary élan as the basis for PLA modernization.102 He was all for cutting down the related cost of food and clothing for a force that was outdated. In his speech at the Party’s Military Affairs Committee on 28 December 1977, Deng summed up his reasoning for cutting the military: The international situation is also good. It is possible that we may gain some additional time free of war. Applying Comrade Mao’s strategy of differentiating the three worlds and following his line in foreign affairs, we can contribute our share to the international struggle against hegemonism.103 “Proceeding from actual possibilities” and relying on Mao’s 1956 reasonings, Deng concluded: “Our national defence can be modernized only on the basis of the industrial and agricultural development of the country as a whole.”104 If Deng’s “pragmatism” required the domestic focus on economic modernization, why then did Deng, in the midst of PLA reduction and modernization, invade North Vietnam in 1979? In his mind, Vietnam’s military occupation of Cambodia confirmed the convergence of Vietnamese regional hegemonism and Soviet hegemonism. The possible integration of Cambodia and Laos into Vietnam after Vietnam’s victory over the US was worrying, especially given past dominance of the Vietnamese leadership within the Indochinese Communist Party. Deng’s commitment to “independence,” however, specifically precluded a counter alliance with the US. Deng proceeded in the face of SovietVietnamese agreement to expand military cooperation. His military action in North Vietnam became yet another moral “lesson,” self-consciously similar to the one administered on the Sino-Indian border in 1962. While Moscow dithered, the PLA, in six weeks, took five provincial capitals and came within reach of Hanoi before withdrawing from the country. The PLA, however, suffered tremendous casualties at the hands of Vietnamese veterans who had been at war for a very long time. The Western literature focused on China’s comparatively weak military performance in North Vietnam.105 Deng, on the other hand, claimed: “The victory in our counterattack waged in self-defence on Viet Nam has immensely heightened China’s prestige in the international struggle against hegemony.” China had attacked even in the face of Soviet-Vietnamese collusion. He relatedly claimed that “a lot of diplomatic work” had “secured an excellent international environment for the realization of China’s four modernizations.”106 The “moral lesson”

104  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” in Vietnam had demonstrated China’s resolve, but it cleared away the post-1975 Southeast Asian dilemma and allowed Deng to focus on domestic modernization. Deng’s “pragmatism” preferred peace but did not imply the absence of force in the face of a critical impasse. Weakness in the face of a determined enemy would likely invite intervention or attack. “Independence and self-reliance” allowed for carefully timed deterrence with unilateral force in the event of unacceptable “bullying.” Deng had independently drawn a line in the sand warning both the Soviets and the Vietnamese of the potentially very high costs of interventionism in Southeast Asia. At the time, the prime minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, believed that Deng had succeeded in his strategic objectives with respect to Vietnam and the Soviet Union: The Western press wrote off the Chinese punitive action as a failure. I believe it changed the history of East Asia. The Vietnamese learned that China would attack if they went beyond Cambodia to Thailand. The Soviet Union did not want to be caught in a long drawn-out war in a remote corner of Asia.107 Deng attempted to make an important point backed up by military force that China would not tolerate Vietnamese “bullying” in Southeast Asia, but his longterm regional policy still did not include resort to regional military alliances and continuous occupation by the PLA of territory beyond China’s borders. Perhaps the most important aspect of the sequence of events is how quickly he revised Mao on the question of general war so as to move away from the focus on systemic hegemonism to focus domestically on China’s own priorities of “peace and development.” China’s foray into Vietnam had revealed Moscow’s ambiguity in honouring its commitments to Vietnam. Deng’s intervention also served as a valve that released the pressures associated with Mao’s fears of Soviet encirclement of China. The trend to war was real but limited, whereas China’s commitment to its own domestic development was primary and unending.

The advent of the “independent foreign policy of peace and development” Having made a decisive move against the potential combination of Vietnamese regional hegemony and Soviet hegemony, Deng refocused on the link between world peace and Chinese development. He claimed that the general trend to world war, although still palpable, was in decline. The US had become more defensive in light of its Vietnamese debacle. Now, the Soviets had not intervened massively to support Vietnam. The Soviet-Vietnamese treaty had not trumped China’s independence, and the Soviets emerged looking strategically weaker. Deng began to moderate the conflictual elements of Mao’s Three Worlds theory. Deng rolled the 1950s discussion of “independence and self-reliance” into his new foreign policy theory on “peace and development” at the Twelfth Party Congress of September 1982. Citing Engels, “A nation cannot become free and at the same time continue to oppress other nations,” Deng effectively declared revolution to be an internal matter; thus, he reiterated Zhou Enlai’s Bandung understandings:

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  105 However, revolution cannot be exported but can occur only by the choice of the people of the country concerned. It is on the basis of this understanding that we have always abided by the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. We do not station a single soldier abroad, nor have we occupied a single inch of foreign land. We have never infringed upon the sovereignty of another country, or imposed an unequal relationship upon it. In no circumstances will we seek hegemony.108 Within the unity of domestic and foreign policy, Deng gave priority to China’s development. Deng built upon an existing bias for independence as against great power responsibility and balance of power politics based on treaties of alliance. Deng believed that China’s security lie in its prospect for economic development. To support this development, he crafted policies highlighting both China’s independence and its interest in learning abroad based on the “open door.” China had learned a hard lesson with respect to alliance politics in light of the failures of the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship. Deng deliberately avoided “triangles” through the continued application of the logic of the five principles that had repudiated the “export of revolution” while focusing on “independence and self-reliance.” According to Deng’s hapless protege, CCP General Secretary Hu Yaobang, “peace and development” came with commitments against alliance politics and arms races, and in difficult times China would count on its own people. At a banquet for peace activists, Hu commented on genuine “realism” in such a way as to invoke the Confucian logic that men’s “sticks” could defeat men with “armour”: “We are realists. . . . It is necessary for a country to have its national defence. But measures in this field should be appropriate and defensive in nature. As an ancient Chinese saying aptly put it, ‘Unity of will is an impregnable fortress.’ The security of a country, in the final analysis, rests mainly on the unity of its people.”109 In terms of China’s relations in the state system, an alternative to Cold War alliance politics was announced with “independent foreign policy.” On 18 June 1986, Deng explained the dynamics of this policy as follows: We adhere to an independent foreign policy of peace and do not join any bloc. We are prepared to maintain contacts and make friends with everyone. We are against any country that practices hegemonism. We are against any country that commits aggression against others. . . . This policy has produced good results, and we shall follow it forever.”110 “Forever” is a long time, and “making friends with everyone” is not easy. And “being against hegemonism” did not imply immediately adopting a war footing. Deng hoped at least for several decades of peace so that China would achieve the quadrupling of its GDP by 2000 and in the following decades would achieve a modestly comfortable standard of development. Deng realistically assessed China’s weakness as a large developing country. During his December 1978 visit to Japan culminating in a new treaty, Deng became the first Chinese leader to hold a Western-style press conference at the

106  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” Japanese Press Centre. Deng again insisted: “We are very poor. We are very backward. . . . We have a lot to do, a long way to go and a lot to learn.”111 Deng “sincerely” insisted that China’s weak developing economy really needed peace, and he rebutted foreign criticism concerning “empty rhetoric”: . . . we really need a peaceful environment and thus . . . the goal of our foreign policy is a peaceful environment for achieving the four modernizations. These are sincere words, not just empty rhetoric. This is a vital matter which conforms to the interests not only of the Chinese people but also of the people in the rest of the world.112 Deng later told a visiting delegation from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University, on 22 February 1984: “We need at least twenty years of peace to concentrate on our domestic development.”113 Deng was equally strong in his remarks to yet another Japanese delegation: “Our political line is to focus on the modernization programme and on continued development of the productive forces. Nothing short of a world war could tear us away from this line.”114 Deng’s foreign policy featured a low posture reducing costly international commitments while focusing on the acquisition of foreign investment and technology so as to respond to the policy primacy of domestic economic development. In the early 1980s, Deng had the opportunity to revisit the fundamental objectives of foreign policy. In his elaborations on the importance of China’s “open door” to the outside world, he drew on the reasoning of his 1974 UN speech. The “open door” had to be placed within the perspective of “self-reliance.” The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences” would facilitate China’s adaptation to the increasing diversification of international alignments. This was not exclusively a matter of antithesis. The “open door” and “selfreliance” were placed in synthesis! Deng turned this synthesis into an interesting history lesson on Mao’s notions of opening and “self-reliance” that he shared with the Liberian head of state, Samuel Doe, on 6 May 1982: . . . while pursuing the policy of opening to the outside world, we must stick to the principle of relying mainly on our own efforts, a principle consistently advocated by Chairman Mao since the founding of our People’s Republic. . . . We have done many things on our own. The Soviet Union under Stalin gave us some assistance. But it began to take a hostile attitude towards us when Khrushchev came to power. It not only stopped helping us but stationed a million troops along the Sino-Soviet border. . . . The United States also was hostile to us. . . . From the mid-1950s to the 70s . . . we had no outside help, or virtually none, and had to rely mainly on own efforts. . . . we were forced to exert ourselves. In the spirit of self-reliance, we managed to make atomic bombs, hydrogen bombs and missiles and to launch man-made satellites. . . . Of course, that doesn’t mean we shouldn‘t seek outside help, but the main thing is to rely on our efforts.115

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  107 Reading between the lines, China, while a natural friend of the developing states of the Third World, expected each state to make similar self-reliant efforts, and China did not have the resources to make giant, unending material commitments to bring about development for them. The following September, Deng, who had unequivocally consolidated his position as Party leader, personally reported to the Twelfth National Congress of the CPC: Independence and self-reliance have always been and will always be our basic stand. While we Chinese people value our friendship and cooperation with other countries and other peoples, we value even more our hard-won independence and sovereign rights. No foreign country can expect . . . China to accept anything harmful to China’s interests. We will unswervingly follow a policy of opening to the outside world and actively increase exchanges with foreign countries on the basis of equality and mutual benefit.116 By decreasing the possibility of general war, Deng sought a foreign policy dividend in a new focus on “peace and development.”117 China’s development would create stability and a new standard of living in China, and this in turn would support peace and stability in the Asia Pacific region as well as throughout the world. Deng’s protege and new Party general secretary, Hu Yaobang, synthesized Deng’s idealism and realism, claiming that Chinese interests could not be realized “in separation from the overall interests of mankind,” hence he explained at the Twelfth National Party Congress: Being patriots, we do not tolerate any encroachment on China’s national dignity or interests. Being internationalists, we are deeply aware that China’s national interests cannot be fully realized in separation from the overall interests of mankind.118 During a 4 March 1985 talk with a delegation from the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Deng elaborated on the overall structure of his foreign policy. Recognizing that different observers will have different opinions about China’s development, Deng still insisted that China’s own development would make a substantial contribution to world peace. He also insisted that in order to preserve world peace, China would continue “to oppose superpower hegemony,” regarding it as the source of war. Only the two superpowers had the ability to create world war. China would in effect politically align with the developing world to try to offset related general war, but Deng advised that China’s capacity to apply force in this regard is modest. It was in this context that he debunked Western analysis that treated relations between China, the US and the Soviet Union as a “big triangle”; Frankly, the China angle is not strong enough. China is both a major country and a minor one. When we say it is a major country, we mean it has a huge population and a vast territory, although it has more mountains than arable

108  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” land. But at the same time, China is a minor country, an underdeveloped or developing country. It is a minor one in terms of its ability to safeguard peace and deter war. Mao’s “single-line” strategy was truly dead, as China could not hold up its end of the triangle and, at any rate, such triangles were less than helpful in explaining China’s role in the world. Uncritical acceptance of treaty assurances on the basis of an iron triangle between China, the US and the Soviet Union was seen as the denial of the complexity of reality and of the potential benefits that arise from more open-ended relations with a wider range of states and state organizations. China did not need alliances and China did not need to choose between the US and the USSR. For the time being, Deng said China would have to focus on its own development, but he hoped that by the end of the century China would be in a better position to play a more substantial international role.119 Deng relayed a similar message to Netherlands Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers concerning China’s need for international peace and China’s rejection of a strategic triangle of great power relations: Without a peaceful environment, economic development would be out of the question. At the same time we determined the policies for domestic development, we also made some adjustments in our foreign policy. We pursue an independent foreign policy of peace, a policy that helps preserve world peace. We do not “play the card” of any other country; in other words, we do not play the “Soviet card” or the “U.S. card.” Nor do we allow others to play the “China card.”120 Card-playing was also discredited as a great power game. Deng also expressed his gratitude for the European “liberal view” on the transfer of technology. Deng looked forward to Europe playing a progressive role in supporting world peace through the process of European development. Deng asked the question, “Why do we say that Europe is a force for peace?” He answered with some degree of prescience: “Because Europe has gone through two catastrophic world wars. If there were to be a third world war, only the two superpowers would have the capacity to unleash it. And once the war began, Europe would be the first to bear the brunt of it.”121 Deng concluded that while collective self-reliance in the Third World can result in positive outcomes, China would, nonetheless, be acquiring a lot of technology and capital from Japan, the main economies of Western Europe and the US. In a 6 October 1984 interview with Chinese and foreign delegates to a symposium on China’s economic cooperation with foreign countries, Deng reiterated that China would not be able to build itself up “behind closed doors,” but that such a large country could not “depend on others for development”:

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  109 . . . while holding to self-reliance, we should open our country to the outside world to obtain such aid as foreign investment capital and investment capital and technology from other nations, particularly the developed ones, it will in turn make a greater contribution to the world economy.122 In a 10 October 1984 meeting with the towering and indefatigable German chancellor, Helmut Kohl, Deng revealed how much Chinese policy was beginning to change: When you visited China in 1974, you and I talked about the danger of war. Now we Chinese have slightly different views. We feel that although the danger of war still exists and we still have to remain vigilant, the factors that can prevent a new world war are growing. Our foreign policy is to oppose hegemonism and safeguard world peace. Under this general policy, we seek to improve our relations with the United States and the Soviet Union. . . . The last thing China wants is war, China is very poor and wants to develop. . . .”123 As the editors of Zhongguo da waijiao (China’s great diplomacy) point out, there is also a notable difference in the way that Deng’s foreign policy dealt with the requirements of “proletarian internationalism.”124 There is a declining level of material commitment to the latter in the changing mix of Deng’s “idealism” 理想 主义 and “realism” 现实主义, as Deng articulated a low-posture foreign policy that served the internal priorities of national economic development. If countries wanted revolution, then their best option was to pursue their own “independence and self-reliance.” This extended the 1955 logic to the effect that revolution cannot be exported. The latter internalized revolutionary responsibilities and regretted dependence on external leadership and the creation of a guiding “centre.” On the other hand, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence supported a greater pattern of economic cooperation between a wider range of state partners without regard for the differences of social systems. The head of the Party Central Committee’s International Liaison Department explained the 1982 understanding: That means our party does not recognize any so-called leadership or guiding “centre,’ or any ready-made “model” in the international Communist movement. Neither at present nor in the future will our Party act as a “centre” or create a “model.” We maintain that only in this way can a new type of relationship between parties be established, characterized by independence and equality as well as mutual support on a completely voluntary basis.125 Deng contrasted “self-reliance” with the unqualified advocacy of “models” at the expense of the rational consideration of discrete national conditions. Deng gradually revised his original UN statement on Mao’s Three Worlds theory. He put less

110  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” emphasis on the competition between the worlds. His open door envisaged three directions or elements of cooperation facing the US, Japan and Western Europe; the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe; and the Third World.126 The 1974 emphasis on the need for the countries in the South to engage in self-reliance and not adopt an exclusively conflictual focus on changing the relation between North and South was retained as was the political support for a New International Economic Order that more keenly addresses the problems of development in the South. Deng, however, concluded that with the declining opportunity for general war, a greater internal focus on development is possible. He moderated but retained the dialectical relation between self-reliance and the open door. The door was to be opened further so as to give more policy priority to new opportunities for trading and economic cooperation with the developed countries. Although this is not an exclusive policy position, in reality there is a greater priority assigned to acquiring foreign technology, foreign aid and development from Japan, Europe and the US. Chinese policy was becoming more sensitive to the international market and the “open door” acquired new policy implications with the increasing focus on the use of foreign funds and imported technology to increase foreign exchange earnings through exports. Deng needed to explain his focus on peace to the PLA. He walked the powerful Party Military Affairs Committee (MAC) through his reasons for disbanding one million soldiers. This reorganization would better facilitate the objective of “military modernization,” but it would also facilitate greater opportunities for world peace supported in China’s own development. In remarks to the leading members of the Party’s Central Committee, he had already conceded that past emphasis on general war had been overdone: “War is not going to break out, so there is no need to fear it and no problem of risk. We have been worried about the possibility of war and have had to be on the alert every year. I think we overdid it.”127 Deng elaborated to the powerful Party MAC what he meant by “overdoing it.” The Party had made the mistake of “dispersing production projects in three lines” so as to place important assets in the interior out of reach of a nuclear attack. The issue of nuclear war had been overblown, and in the current context there was a greater prospect for China to focus on its development in light of the restraint that comes with fear of the superpowers who worry lest any precipitous competition for hegemony triggers nuclear war and destroys themselves along with the rest of the world. On 4 June 1985, Deng again discussed China’s foreign policy with the MAC. International change had impacted the two superpowers. They are the only powers able to launch world war, yet “neither dares to do so,” as they would destroy each other and they have suffered “setbacks and failures” in their global strategic deployments. Deng emphasized that Chinese foreign policy would continue to “oppose hegemonism” but that China’s “independent foreign policy” would also seek normalization with both the US and USSR:

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  111 The second change is in our foreign policy. In view of the threat of Soviet hegemonism. . . . we formed a strategic line of defence – a line stretching from Japan to Europe to the United States. Now we have altered our strategy. . . . People around the world are talking about the big triangle composed of the Soviet Union, the United States and China. We don’t put it that way, because we have a sober estimate of our own strength. . . . We pursue a correct, independent diplomatic line and foreign policy opposing hegemonism and safeguarding world peace. . . . In accordance with our independent foreign policy of peace, we have improved our relations with the United States and with the Soviet Union. China will not play the card of another country and will not allow another country to play the China card, and we mean what we say. This will . . . enable us to have more influence in international affairs.128 Deng “soberly” rejected “triangular diplomacy.” Instead, he subscribed to an “independent foreign policy” that rejected overemphasis on Soviet hegemonism as the key aspect of the international system often described as “one line, one big surface” 一条线一大片.129 The past focus on an horizontal “strategic line of defence – a line stretching from Japan to Europe to the United States” was transcended by a more complex strategy of normalizations with the US, the USSR and Eastern European countries and “seeking friends everywhere” on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence transcending the differences of values and systems. The foreign policy conception of the political and economic structure of international relations was becoming increasingly complicated. The Chinese notion of emergent “multipolarity” pushed beyond the traditional focus of the great powers as exclusive “poles.” The following discussion by General Xiong Guangkai, School of International Strategic Studies, expands on this point: . . . our concept of “pole” is not limited to a number of big powers. It can well embrace some groups of countries. . . . China not only pays heed to promoting relations with major powers . . . but also attaches great importance in developing friendly and cooperative relations with the EU, ASEAN, and other organizations as well as cementing its solidarity and cooperation with medium-sized and small nations and developing countries in particular. 130 In other words, not only “superpowers” or “great powers” acted as “poles,” but China could act as a “pole,” as could Japan and the EU, as well as regional organizations such as ASEAN. In the throes of the Cultural Revolution, a transitory “revolutionary diplomacy” had threatened to negate the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, but now in light of growing relations with Europe, the US and the USSR and the prospect of China’s own development, not to mention that of the Third World countries in general, these principles needed continuous emphasis within China’s “independent foreign policy.”

112  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” After the Sino-Indian border war and subsequent years of mutual suspicion and acrimony, Deng later sought to repair the damage of the 1962 border war. He was effusively positive in his earnest dialogue with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. He reiterated, “. . . while relying on our own efforts we should not close our doors but seek friends everywhere.” Deng hoped to revive the mid-1950s cooperation between their two large developing countries as a positive international development. He believed: “If China and India are developed, we can say that we have made our contributions to mankind.”131 Moreover, the two countries, as they had together with Burma sponsored the original five principles, were in a good position to focus international attention on the UN General Assembly debates on the “New International Economic Order” and the “New International Political Order.”

Deng and the legacy of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence Deng hoped to revive the original Sino-Indian démarche of 1954. He made a strong personal plea to restore the Sino-Indian relationship on the familiar basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, which he believed could withstand “all tests” arising from changes in international relations: As for a new international political order, I think the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, initiated by China and India, can withstand all tests. These principles, established by Premier Zhou Enlai and Prime Minister Nehru, are very clear and simple. We should take them as norms for international relations. If we want to recommend these principles as a guide to the international community, first of all, we should follow them, in our relations with each other and with our other neighbours. . . . our two countries should make some readjustments in relations with our neighbours. I am suggesting we do this; please consider it, Your Excellency. . . . if we act wisely and adopt a bold strategy, we can surely accomplish it.132 Indeed, the final communique reiterated the five principles as the core content of Sino-Indian and international relations, and the communique was accompanied by the creation of a working group to study the resolution of thorny outstanding border issues.133 The two sides looked forward to increased economic and technological cooperation. Deng had already make a similar approach to President U San Yu of Myanmar that the North, if it is going to sustain itself, will need to find new markets in the South, and given changing international conditions, the five principles were “the best way” to order the relations between all states: The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence provide the best way to handle the relations between nations. Other ways – thinking in terms of “the socialist community,” “bloc politics” or “spheres of influence,” for example – lead to

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  113 conflict, heightening international tensions. Looking at the history of international relations, we find the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have a potentially wide application.134 With the diminishing chances of a nuclear attack targeting China’s most important production projects, Deng referred less and less to the underlying theme of conflict in Mao’s Three Worlds theory. The First World was urged to cooperate with the developing countries, but it was not be encircled in a final victorious confrontation. In an important speech to a forum of the Party’s powerful Military Affairs Committee, Deng reordered the world in relation to contemporaneous opportunities for domestic development and international cooperation: Some of our people are not clear about our policy of opening to the outside. They think we mean only opening to the West, whereas in fact we mean opening to three regions. One is the developed countries of the West, which constitute our chief source of foreign funds and technology. The second is composed of the Soviet Union and the East European countries. Even though state-to-state relations are not normal, exchanges can go on. . . . [Noting the example of Soviet support in the 1950s for 156 projects Deng moves to the third region.] The third region is the developing countries of the Third World, each of which has its special characteristics and strengths and offers enormous potentialities. Hence, opening to the outside world involves three regions, not just one.135 Deng’s “three regions” diverged from Mao’s “three worlds,” which exclusively placed the Soviet Union and the US in the First World while aspiring to encourage their developed allies in the Second World to join with the Third World in opposing First World superpower hegemonism. The “three regions” alternatively reflected the greater priority assigned to national economic development in such a way as to downplay the 1974 line on “the countryside of the world (the developing states) encircling the cities of the world” (i.e., the developed states). Support for the New International Economic and Political Orders continued, but Deng moderated the strident nature of the 1974 line. He was not interested in conducting a cacophonous world revolutionary chorus. In August 1985, he told the radical Zimbabwe Prime Minister, Robert Mugabe, for example, that while “In our darkest days we were sustained by the ideal of communism . . .” it was high time for China to develop its productive forces. In the past, maybe we were too impetuous.” . . . the time had come to focus on economic realities.136 Deng acknowledged that “our very eagerness” stood in the way of “making a sober analysis of subjective and objective conditions.” Deng believed that the development of China’s productive forces would benefit the world economically and that if China were to collapse into disunity, this would be an unthinkable disaster. Deng supported the revival of relations with Yugoslavia, and he told President Radovan Vlajkovic of the Socialist Republic

114  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” of Yugoslavia on 4 April 1986: “If China, with its one billion people, took the capitalist road, it would be a disaster for the world. It would be a retrogression of history, a retrogression of many years.”137 “Seeking the truth from the facts” addressed such “retrogression.” Deng reweighted the contradictions of domestic and international affairs to craft a foreign policy, a nuanced and realistic foreign policy that supported his drive to modernization. Deng reminded his Western critics that if “peaceful evolution” were to bring about such a “retrogression of history,” then not only China would suffer the resulting chaos, but the world as the result would suffer chaos. Deng’s correlation of peace and development emphasized China’s position as a developing state drawing on the success of Zhou Enlai’s Bandung strategy to deal with changing North-South relations. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were ideally tailored to advance China’s position on the new international political and economic orders at the UN. Moreover, the same principles were written into the agreements for both Sino-US and Sino-Soviet normalization and later enshrined in the post-Soviet context of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Deng dropped Mao’s trend to general war, accepted the declining relevance of conflict in the “three worlds” and refocused on the possibilities of foreign direct investment and aid supporting China’s development. Deng’s understanding of “independence and self-reliance” presumed that China would choose its own social system and constitutional order but that learning from the outside world, if handled properly, would facilitate China’s modernization. Opposition to hegemony was still important, but it was less state specific and more problem specific. “Hegemonism” would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis in relation to the prospects for peace. Deng’s protege, Party General-Secretary Jiang Zemin, drew attention to a related change in the usage of “united front”: It is necessary to form a united front with many other third world countries based on the current international situation. . . . It must be pointed out, however, that we use the term “united front” in a somewhat different sense now than in the past. Our current usage . . . does not single out any country or group of countries, nor does it imply that we will organize a united front, much less lead it. This united front opposes hegemonism. . . . It is not organized by anyone; rather, it is a collaborative activity that occurs naturally in certain international circumstances to deal with certain problems.138 Jiang elaborated on what one might call “low posture” foreign policy when he stated that China has “little influence over major international problems and regional conflicts far from us, so we should stand relatively aloof from them while championing justice.”139 Deng’s understanding of independence also confirmed that China would practice non-interference and not become involved in great power politics. China was certainly not a typical great power. Deng eschewed alliances, balance of power politics, hierarchical competition over models of economic

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  115 development, “internationalism” and the creation of a centre to guide the world revolutionary movement. The Cultural Revolutionary confrontation involving the countryside’s encirclement of the cities in a conflagration of people’s wars lost ideological influence in favour of an open-ended expansive “independent foreign policy” that sought both Sino-US and Sino-Soviet normalizations and “to make friends with everyone” while mainly opposing hegemonism through multilateralism and UN collective security. Most importantly, Deng’s “modest” foreign policy was tied to the priorities of national economic development. Deng’s “pragmatism” sought to avoid direct military conflict with hegemonism while politically opposing it in international diplomacy.140 Does such a nuanced “realist” view, rooted in an ideology that seeks to elevate Chinese praxis, convey “rough nationalism”? Is there a “China threat” inherent in Deng’s low-posture foreign policy? Have Western countries misunderstood or ignored the core principles of Deng’s foreign policy? These questions are pursued further in the succeeding chapters dealing with specific key aspects of China’s foreign policy.

Notes 1 Centre for the Study of Deng Xiaoping Theory, Peking University, Deng Xiaoping yu dangdai Zhongguo he shijie, (Deng Xiaoping and today’s China and the world), Beijing: Peking University Press, 2004, pp. 703–4. 2 See, for example, Xi Jinping, “Jianchi he yunyong hao Mao Zedong sixianghuode linghuo,” (Firmly grasp and use well the spirit of Mao Zedong thought), (26 December 2013), Xi Jinping, Xi Jinping: tanzhiguo lizheng (Xi Jinping discussing governance), Beijing: Waijiao chubanshe, 2014, p. 30. 3 Deng Xiaoping, “For the Great Unity of the Chinese Nation,” (18 June 1986), Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, vol. iii, (SWDXPIII), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1994, p. 165. 4 This was explicit in Deng’s discussion of the draft party resolution on Party history. See Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks on Successive Drafts of the ‘Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic,’” (March 1980-June 1981), Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, (SWDXPII), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984, p. 289. 5 Deng Xiaoping, “Excerpts from Talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” (18 January–21 February 1992), SXDXPIII, p. 359. 6 Ye Zicheng, Xin Zhongguo waijiao sixiang: zong Mao Zedong dao Deng Xiaoping, (New China’s Foreign Policy Thought: From Mao Zedong to Deng Xiaoping), Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2001, preface, p. 3. 7 Gurtov and Hwang suggest that there are actually “three dialectics,” “historical dialecticism,” “revolutionary dialectics,” and “socialist dialectics.” Melvin Gurtov and Byong-Moo Hwang, China under Threat: The Politics of Strategy and Diplomacy, Baltimore and London: The John Hopkins University Press, 1980, pp. 6–7. 8 Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Expand Political Democracy and Carry out Economic Reform,” (15 April 1985), DXPSWIII, p. 124. 9 Mao Tse-tung, “Reform our Studies,” Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. iii, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967, p. 41. 10 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at All-Army Conference on Political Work,” (2 June 1978), SWDXPII, p. 130. For detailed discussion, see R.C. Keith, “‘Egalitarianism’ and

116  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” ‘Seeking the Truth from the Facts’ in the People’s Republic of China,” Dalhousie Review, Summer 1983, p. 327. 11 Mao Tse-tung, “On Contradiction,” Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. i, (SWMTT1) Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967, fn. 23, p. 347. 12 Mao, “On Contradiction,” p. 315. 13 Mao, “On Contradiction,” p. 337. 14 Mao Tse-tung, “On Practice,” July 1937, SWMTT1, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967, p. 300. 15 Mao, “On Contradiction,” p. 318. 16 Mao, “On Contradiction,” p. 338. 17 Mao Tse-tung, “Strengthen Party Unity and Carry Forward Party Traditions,” (30 August 1956), SWMTTV, p. 316. 18 Mao, “On Contradiction,” p. 328. 19 “Learn from Mao Zedong,” Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. i, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1981, p. 381. 20 Ye Zicheng & Li Hongjie, Zhongguo da waijiao: Zhechong zunzu60nian (China’s great diplomacy: observing the balance over 60 years), Beijing: Dangdai shijie chubanshe, 2009, pp. 47–8. 21 Zhou Enlai, “Womendi waijiao fangzhen he renwu,” (The strategies and tasks of China’s foreign policy), Zhou Enlai xuanji, (Selected Works of Zhou Enlai), vol. i, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1980, p. 85 22 Ruan Hong, The Diplomat from China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2007, pp. 55–6. 23 Zhou Enlai, Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. ii, p. 99, as cited and discussed in Ronald C. Keith, China from the Inside Out: Fitting the People’s Republic into the World, London: Pluto Press, 2009, p. 23. 24 Mao Tse-tung, “On People’s Democratic Dictatorship” (30 June 1949), The Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. iv, p. 417. 25 Deng Xiaoping, “Our Magnificent Goal and Basic Policies,” (6 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 86. 26 As cited and discussed in R. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s ‘Independent Foreign Policy,’” International Journal, vol. xli, no. 1, Winter 1985–6, p. 99. 27 “The Common Program of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference,” Theodore Chen, ed., The Chinese Communist Regime: Documents and Commentary. New York: Praeger, 1967, p. 45. 28 Zhou Enlai, “Wei gonggu he fazhan renminde shengli douzheng,” (Strengthening and developing the victorious struggle of the people), (30 September 1950), Zhou Enlai xuanji, II, (Zhou Enlai selected works, vol. ii), p. 34. 29 The post-1949 relevance of united front dual politics and the related texts of Mao are discussed in King C. Chen, ed., China and the Three Worlds, White Plains: M.E. Sharpe Inc., 1979. Mao’s thoughts here are on pp. 70–1. Mao’s opinion on Chiang’s failure to recognize the singular importance of “self-reliance” and “independence” was of course not shared by Chiang himself. The latter saw himself as a nationalist who was very much concerned with China’s independence. Chiang’s biographer Jay Taylor highlights the following entry in Chiang’s diary concerning the great power politics needed to ensure China’s independence: “If China could develop into a self-reliant country with a neutral foreign policy . . . then the USSR would allow an independent [non-Communist] China to exist. But if China was weak – that is, unwilling or unable to take on the Communists in Manchuria – the Soviets would support the CCP, no matter how accommodating the Nationalist government might be to Soviet interests.” Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2009, p. 310. Taylor tends to regard Chiang’s foreign policy as inspired by real politique, but he also notes Chiang’s dislike of Kissinger as a “realist” who advanced the logic of Sino-US detente on p. 538.

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  117 30 Zhou Enlai, Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. ii, p. 99 as cited in related analysis in Keith, China from the Inside Out, pp. 22–3. 31 Ronald C. Keith, “The Relevance of the Border Region Experience to Nation Building in China,” The China Quarterly, no. 78, June 1979, pp. 274–95. 32 Keith, China from the Inside Out, p. 22. 33 Mao Tsetung, “Talks at a Conference of Secretaries of Provincial, Municipal and Autonomous Region Party Committees,” (27 January 1957), Selected Works of Mao Tsetung, vol. v, (SWMTTV), Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 363. 34 Keith, China from the Inside Out, p. 23, fn. 8. 35 Wang Jiayun, Kaiguo waijiao (New Diplomacy of a New Country), Beijing: Shishi chubanshe, 1999, p. 356. 36 Ronald C. Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, London: Macmillan, 1989, p. 118. 37 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 119. 38 As outlined in the analysis and research of Shu Guang Zhang, “Constructing ‘Peaceful Coexistence’: China’s Diplomacy toward the Geneva and Bandung Conferences, 1954–5,” Cold War History, vol. 7, no. 4, November 2007, p. 519. 39 “Joint Declaration of the Government of the USSR and the Government of the Chinese People’s Republic,” 12 October 1954, in John Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute: A Commentary and Extracts from the Recent Polemics 1963–1967, London: Oxford University Press, 1968, Appendix B, p. 289. 40 As cited in Huang Hua’s explanation of the concept, “seeking common ground while reserving differences,” Huang, Memoirs, p. 159. 41 Michael Yahuda, China’s Role in World Affairs, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1978, p. 228, as discussed in R.C. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s ‘Independent Foreign Policy,’” International Journal, vol. xli, winter, 1985–6, p. 124. 42 Lee, One Man’s View, p. 86. 43 Mao Tsetung, “On the Question of Whether Imperialism and all Reactionaries Are Real Tigers,” (1 December 1958), Peking Review, nos. 37 & 38, 13 September 1977, p. 8. 44 Deng Xiaoping, SWDXPI, p. 191. 45 “State Constitution of the People’s Republic of China,” (1954), Chen, ed., The Chinese Communist Regime: Documents and Commentary, p. 76. 46 Zhongguo guoji wenti yanjiusuo (China centre for research of international problems), ed., Lun heping gong zhu wuxiang yuanze (On the five principles of peaceful coexistence), Beijing: Shijie zhishi chubanshe, 2004, p. 83. 47 Mao Tsetung, “On the Draft Constitution of the People’s Republic of China,” SWMTTV, p. 146. 48 Ye Zicheng & Li Hongjie, Zhongguo da waijiao: Zhechong zunzu60nian (China’s great foreign policy: observing the balance over 60 years), p. 71. 49 Deng Xiaoping, “With Stable Policies of Reform and Opening to the Outside World, China Can Have Great Hopes for the Future,” (4 September 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 310. 50 Deng Xiaoping, “We Are Confident that We Can Handle China’s Affairs Well,” (16 September 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 315. 51 Deng, “With Stable Policies of Reform and Opening to the Outside World, China Can Have Great Hopes for the Future,” p. 310. 52 Deng, “With Stable Policies of Reform and Opening to the Outside World, China Can have Great Hopes for the Future,” p. 311. 53 Deng, “With Stable Policies of Reform and Opening to the Outside World, China Can have Great Hopes for the Future,” p. 311. 54 Jiang Zemin, “Constantly Innovate and Keep up with the Times,” (19 October 1992), Selected Works of Jiang Zemin, vol. 1, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2010, p. 246. 55 Deng Xiaoping, “An Important Principle in Handling Relations between Fraternal Parties,” (31 May 1980), SWDXP1, p. 301. 56 See Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 96. Keith’s italics.

118  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” 57 Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping: Transformation of China, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011, p. 39. 58 For more discussion on Party debates over the imperial ti-yong strategy, see Stuart R. Schram’s introduction to Schram, ed., Authority, Participation and Cultural Change, New York & London: Cambridge University Press, 1973. 59 See Liu Shao-chi, “The Political Report of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,” Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, vol. 1, Documents, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1956, p. 92. 60 Zhou Enlai, “The Implementation of the First Five-Year Plan,” Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. ii, pp. 230–1. 61 Chen Yi, Speech at the CCP 8th National Congress on September 1956, Current Background, No. 414, Peking, September 25, 1956, p. 3, 62 Mao Tsetung, “On the Ten Great Relationships,” SWMTTV, p. 303. 63 Mao Tsetung, “Speech at the Second Plenary Session of the Eighth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,” SWMTTV, p. 330. 64 Mao Tsetung, “Talks at Conferences of Party Committee Secretaries, SWMTTV, p. 363. 65 Mao Tsetung, “On the Correct Handling of the Contradictions Among the People,” SWMTTV, p. 417. 66 Mao Tsetung, “On the Ten Great Relations,” SWMTTV, p. 305. 67 “More on the Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” People’s Daily, 29 December 1956, in John Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute: A Commentary and Extracts from the Recent Polemics 1963–1967, p. 303. 68 Mao Tse-tung, “Speeches at the Second Session of the Eighth Party Congress, First Speech,” (8 May 1958), p. 92, in US Joint Publications Research Service 61269-1, 20 February 1974, Miscellany of Mao Tse-Tung Thought (1949–1968) Part 1, translated documents from Mao Tse-tung ssu-hsiang wansui, (Ten thousand years to Mao Tsetung), 1967, 1969. 69 Stuart R. Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, Harmondsworth, England: Penguin, 1977, p. 126. 70 Mao Zedong, “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions among the People (Speaking Notes),” in Rod MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek & Eugene Wu, eds., The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao: From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward, Cambridge: Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1989, p. 488. 71 Mao Tse-tung, “Speeches at the Second Session of the Eighth Party Congress, First Speech,” p. 97. 72 Mao Zedong, “Talk at an Enlarged Central Work Conference,” 30 January 1962, Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1974, p. 181. 73 Mao, “Talk at an Enlarged Central Work Conference,” Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, pp. 173–4, 74 Mao, “Talk at an Enlarged Central Work Conference,” Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 174. 75 Deng Xiaoping, “Adhere to Party Line and Improve Work Methods,” (29 February 1980), SWDXPII, p. 262. Deng thought that the campaign in and of itself was ideologically appropriate but that in practical terms it had been “unduly broadened” in targeting the enemy. 76 Red Guard Service Center, “Thoroughly Smash the Foreign Affairs Ministry’s Privileged Stratum,” Waishi hongqi (Foreign Affairs Red Flag), 14 June 1967 in SCMP no. 4004, 18 August 1968, p. 11. 77 Huang, Memoir, p. 197. 78 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, pp. 168–70. 79 Mao Tse-tung, “Talks at Three Meetings with Chang Ch’un-ch’iao and Yao Wen-yuan,” February 1967, Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 279. 80 See Liu Jintian and Zhang Airu, Yingxiang shijie gaibian Zhongguode Deng Xiaoping (Deng Xiaoping influences the world and changes China), Beijing: Taihai chubanshe,

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  119 2013, p. 148, and Liu Wusheng, Zhou Enlaide wannian suiyue (Hard times in the twilight years of Zhou Enlai). Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2005, pp. 290–1. 81 Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiaoping, at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, p. 6. 82 Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiaoping, at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, pp. 11–2. 83 Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiaoping, at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, p. 15. 84 Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiaoping, at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, p. 16. 85 Chai Ch’ing, “Read an Unpublished Manuscript,” Hsueh-hsi yu p’i-p’an, (Study and criticism), no. 4, 14 April 1976, Selections for People’s Republic of China Magazines, no. 870, 10 May 1976, p. 10. 86 Deng Xiaoping, “Hold High the Banner of Mao Zedong Thought and Adhere to the Principle of Seeking Truth from Facts,” (16 September 1978), SWDXPII, p. 142. 87 Deng, “Hold High the Banner of Mao Zedong Thought and Adhere to the Principle of Seeking Truth from Facts,” p. 143. 88 “Some Problems in Accelerating Industrial Development,” in Chi Hsin, ed., The Case of the Gang of Four with First Translation of Teng Hsiao-ping’s “Three Poisonous Weeds,” Hong Kong: Cosmos Books, 1977, p. 263. 89 See related discussion by Chi Hsin in Chi, ed., The Case of the Gang of Four with First Translation of Teng Hsiao-ping’s “Three Poisonous Weeds.” p. 175. 90 Ronald C. Keith, “China’s ‘Emergence from Continentalism’: The Study of Underlying Continuities in Chinese Foreign Policy,” F. Quei Quo, ed., Politics of the Pacific Rim: Perspectives on the 1980s. Burnaby, B.C.: SFU Publications, 1982, p. 145. 91 Ye Zicheng & Li Hongjie, Zhongguo da waijiao: Zhechong zunzu60nian (China’s great foreign policy: observing the balance over 60 years), p. 49. 92 Deng Xiaoping, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” (2 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 176. 93 Deng, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” p. 176. 94 “Chairman Mao’s Theory of the Differentiation of the Three Worlds is a Major Contribution to Marxism-Leninism,” Peking Review, no. 45, 4 November 1977, p. 107. 95 “Pravada Assails Peking’s Foreign Policy,” The Current Digest of the Soviet Press, vol. xxvii, no. 8, 19 March 1975. 96 Mao Tse-tung, “US Imperialism Is a Paper Tiger,” SWMTTV, p. 310. 97 Deng, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” p. 171. 98 Deng Xiaoping, “The Present Situation and the Tasks before Us,” (16 January 1980), SWDXPII, p. 234. 99 Guo Jai, “Building Stronger Armed Forces Through Science and Technology . . . ,” Renmin ribao, (People’s daily), 17 December 2001, FBIS-CHI-2001-1217, p. 2. 100 Deng Xiaoping, “The Two Basic Elements in China’s Policies,” (4 July 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 245. 101 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at a Plenary Meeting of the Military Commission of the Central Committee of the CPC,” (28 December 1977), SWDXPII, p. 93. 102 The “three changes” included 现代化, 正规化 and 革命化 (modernization, regularization and revolutionization). See Guo Shouhang, Deng Xiaoping guofang xiandaihua sixiang yanjiu (Studies in Deng Xiaoping’s thought on the modernization of national defence), Beijing: Guofang daxue chubanshe, 1989, pp. 90–1. 103 Deng, “Speech at a Plenary Meeting of the Military Commission of the Central Committee of the CPC,” p. 92. 104 Deng, “Speech at a Plenary Meeting of the Military Commission of the Central Committee of the CPC,” p. 94. 105 Related Western historiography is reviewed by Xiaoming Zhang, Deng Xiaoping’s Long War: The Military Conflict between China and Vietnam, 1979–1991, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2015, pp. 2–3.

120  Deng’s “independent foreign policy” 106 Deng Xiaoping, “Uphold the Four Cardinal Principles,” (30 March 1979), SWDXPII, p. 168. 107 As cited in Vogel, Deng Xiaoping: The Transformation of China, p. 5. 108 Communist Party of China, The Twelfth National Congress of the CPC (September 1982), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1982, p. 56. 109 “Speech by CPC General Secretary Hu Yaobang at the Banquet in Honor of Peace Activists from Various Countries on 6 June 1985,” Current Digest, no. 604, 26 June 1985, p. 3. 110 Deng Xiaoping, “For the Great Unity of the Entire Chinese Nation,” (18 June 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 165. 111 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and China’s Transformation, p. 304. 112 Deng Xiaoping, “The Present Situation and Our Tasks,” (16 January 1980), SWDXPII, p. 226. 113 Deng Xiaoping, “New Approach to Stabilizing the World Situation,” (22 February 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 60. 114 Deng Xiaoping, “Building Socialism with Specifically Chinese Characteristics,” (30 June 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 75. 115 Deng Xiaoping, “China’s Historical Experience in Construction,” (6 May 1982), SWDXPII, p. 384. 116 Deng Xiaoping, “Opening Speech at the Twelfth National Congress of the CPC,” (1 September 1982), SWDXPII, p. 396. 117 For a related summary of Deng’s foreign policy theory as it concerns peace and development, see entry under Deng Xiaoping 外交思想 in Deng Xiaoping lilun xuexi cidian, (Dictionary for the study of Deng Xiaoping theory), Beijing: Dangjian duwu chubanshe, 1999, pp. 81–2. 118 Hu Yaobang, “Create a New Situation in All Fields of Socialist Modernization,” 11 September 1982, The Twelfth National Congress of the CPC, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1982, p. 56. 119 Deng Xiaoping, “Peace and Development Are the Two Outstanding Issues in the World Today,” (4 March 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 111. 120 Deng Xiaoping, “Reform and Opening to the Outside World Can Truly Invigorate China,” (12 May 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 231. 121 Deng, “Reform and Opening to the Outside World Can Truly Invigorate China,” p. 231. 122 Deng, “Our Magnificent Goal and Basic Policies,” (6 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 86, author’s italics. 123 Deng Xiaoping, “We Regard Reform as Revolution,” (10 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 89. 124 Ye Ziaocheng, Li Hongxu, ed., Zhongguo da waijiao, (China’s great diplomacy), Beijing: Dangdfai shijia chubanshe, 2009, pp. 35–6. 125 “Foreign Contacts of the Communist Party,” Beijing Review, no. 42, 15 October 1984, p. 19. 126 Jiang Yiguo, ed., Deng Xiaoping gaige kaifang sixiang yanjiu (The study of Deng Xiaoping’s reform and open door thought), Beijing: Guofang daxue chubanshe, 1990, pp. 97–9. 127 Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks after an Inspection Tour of Jiangsu Province and Other Places,” (2 March 1983), SWDXPIII, p. 35. 128 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at an Enlarged Meeting of the Military Commission of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,” (4 June 1985), SWDXPIII, pp. 132–3. 129 Peking University Centre of Research on Deng Xiaoping Theory, Deng Xiaoping yu dangdai Zhongguo he shijie, (Deng Xiaoping and contemporary China and the world), p. 661. Kissinger seemed to think that this one line was “a muscular version of the Western concept of collective security” and that it could not be reconciled with “self-reliance.” Kissinger, On China, p. 286.

Deng’s “independent foreign policy”  121 130 Xiong Guangkai, International Situation and Security Strategy, Beijing, 2006, pp. 205–6. 131 Deng Xiaoping, “A New International Order Should Be Established with the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as Norms,” (21 December 1988), SWDXPIII, p. 275. 132 Deng, “A New International Order Should be Established with the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as Norms,” (21 December 1988), SWDXPIII, pp. 275–6. 133 Ye and Li, Zhongguo da waijiao, (China’s great foreign policy), p. 314. 134 Deng Xiaoping, “The Principles of Peaceful Coexistence Have Wide Application,” (31 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 102. 135 Deng Xiaoping, “The Army Should Subordinate Itself to the General Interest, Which is to Develop the Country,” (1 November 1984), SWDXPIII, pp. 104–5, Ron Keith’s italics for emphasis. 136 Deng Xiaoping, “Reform is the Only Way for China to Develop its Productive Forces,” (28 August 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 141. 137 Deng Xiaoping, “Keeping Socialism and the Policy of Peace,” (4 April 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 161. 138 Jiang Zemin, “Our Diplomatic Work Must Unswervingly Safeguard the Highest Interests of the State and the Nation,” (12 July 1993), SWJZMI, p. 305. 139 Jiang, “Our Diplomatic Work Must Unswervingly Safeguard the Highest Interests of the State and the Nation,” p. 304 140 Ye and Li, Zhongguo da waijiao, p. 72.

3 Sino-American normalization without closure

Zhou Enlai’s key portfolio on Sino-US relations was passed on to Deng Xiaoping during a highly contested generational leadership succession. After a visit by Kissinger, from 25 November through 5 December 1973, Mao organized Politbureau struggle sessions accusing Zhou Enlai of “rightist capitulationism.”1 Apparently, Zhou had worked too closely with Kissinger. Deng, like Mao and Zhou, opposed hegemonism, and at the same time he was greatly interested in pursuing “normalization” so as to enlist American investment and technology in the development of China’s economy. During Deng’s control of China’s US foreign policy, the emphasis on development overtook the original tentative search for “parallel” geopolitical understanding with the US. Featuring China’s “independence and self-reliance,” Deng moved beyond the original geopolitical aspirations of Sino-US normalization and revised essential aspects of Mao’s strategies further to subordinate China’s foreign policy to his goals of open door and economic reform. In particular, Deng expanded the horizons of China’s foreign policy. Even as he established diplomatic relations with the Americans, he was thinking about future normalization with the Soviets. Kissinger, however, thought, that Deng “. . . if anything [was] more anti-Soviet than Zhou” and that Deng discussed “containment” of the Soviet Union “. . . as if, in fact, we were members of the same alliance.”2 Kissinger thought that he was crafting a common strategy with his Chinese hosts, and he claimed: “No allied leaders received fuller briefings regarding our policy and intentions than the Chinese.”3 Disregarding his critics in subsequent administrations, Kissinger may have claimed too much when he protested that the “blueprint” that Mao and Nixon established in early 1972 “remained remarkably consistent through five administrations of both parties: a parallel strategy with China for preventing ‘hegemony’ – in other words, preservation of the global balance of power against the Soviet threat. . . .”4 Indeed, there were extraordinarily candid exchanges about world affairs between Beijing and Washington in the early 1970s. The high oxygen talks were exhilarating. Kissinger wanted the Chinese to know American thinking so as to encourage new levels of trust. Kissinger may have wished to demonstrate US

Sino-US normalization without closure  123 trustworthiness in the disclosure of sensitive strategy and information so as draw a unflattering contrast with Sino-Soviet experience. The Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship had failed miserably with regard to the exchange of vital information. Zhou Enlai and Henry Kissinger were really engaged in their respective explanations of geopolitics, and Zhou once said to a departing Kissinger: “Come back for the joy of talking.” Diplomacy does imply talking, but what were the end results? The two sides did not substantively cooperate in Southeast Asia. There was a growing concern on China’s side that the US would not keep its promises on Taiwan. The emphasis on “playing the China card” was increasingly seen as a liability in light of Deng’s insistence that not only would China not play the “United States’ card,” or the “Soviet card,” but China would not allow others to “play the China card.” Mao had been concerned that Kissinger would play the “China card” in his negotiations with the Soviets. Ultimately, Deng’s new “independent foreign policy” required a wider spread of international relations including the dual focus on improving relations with both the Soviet Union and the United States as well as “making friends everywhere.”5 Following in the footsteps of Mao and Zhou, Deng initially sought to avoid a showdown over Taiwan so as to further greater geopolitical understanding and cooperation with the US, but it is arguable that he would not have accepted Kissinger’s view that “China was turning into one of our better NATO allies.”6 Deng would have bristled at Kissinger’s advice to Nixon that the US will “have our mao tai and drink our vodka too”: “To date the Soviet factor has been the main leverage in our dealings with the PRC. . . . Beijing has no alternative to us as a counterweight (despite its recent reaching out to Japan and Western Europe as insurance).”7 There was, however, a ready alternative in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence that were designed to facilitate China’s “self-reliance and independence.” Kissinger may not have taken full account of the depth of Deng’s commitment to China’s “independence and self-reliance” and Deng’s negative view of the balance of power as an aspect of “hegemonism.” Deng had emerged out of a revolutionary struggle for independence. Could he have genuinely shared in Kissinger’s view that the classical balance of power delivers order to the international system of states? On the contrary, the balance of power was seen as a dangerous recipe for inequality and injustice in post-colonial international relations. To endorse the balance of power would have been to ignore the history of imperialism in China, and the history of the CCP leaders in the revolution. Nixon had pledged that the US side would establish diplomatic relations by mid-1976, but this was before the “Watergate incident” 水门事件. At the same time, there was significant leadership change in China with the deaths of Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong in January and September of 1976. Normalization started well, but it took seven years to finally agree on exchanging ambassadors. Canada, Australia and Japan established diplomatic relations with China before the US did, and they did so with a lot less bad feeling.

124  Sino-US normalization without closure

Vice-Premier Deng goes to Washington! Deng wanted to go to Washington before going “to see Marx.”8 When Deng finally got to Washington in January 1979, he went with three personal tasks, namely “to bring the American people a message of friendship,” “to understand your people . . . and your experience of development” and “to exchange views on developing bilateral relations and on keeping world peace and security.”9 President Carter invoked the earlier spirit of the 1972 Shanghai Communique and spoke of the importance of “living with differences.” The “nasty little man” could not be found in the streets of America. Indeed, by the end of Deng’s tour of the US, President Carter wrote in his diary: “In the process [of negotiating], I learned why some people say the Chinese are the most civilized people in the world.”10 Deng piqued the curiosity of the American media and public. Downplaying security risks, Deng plunged into American society, attending 80 events and 20 dinners in what the American press dubbed the “Deng storm.” Deng happily obliged US congressmen, who button-holed him to autograph the cover of Time celebrating Deng as “Man of the Year.” On a quiet Sunday, Deng paced up and down the centre of world capitalism, Wall Street. He privately dined over family roast beef with Zbigniew Brzezinski, and he had meetings with ornery senators who initially did not want to be photographed with the Communist leader. Deng, to use an English idiom, “charmed the birds out of the trees.” He kissed the young children who sang Chinese songs at the Kennedy Center – an occasion that caused an influential opponent of normalization, Senator Paul Laxalt, to say “. . . there was no way to vote against little children singing Chinese songs.”11 Deng also paid his respects at Martin Luther King’s grave site. He toured a Ford assembly plant. He sat in a NASA space simulator – all to marvel at the wonders of American technology. In Seattle, he escaped a Boeing employee who reportedly was carrying a gun to assassinate him. He was not distracted by the failed attack by a disaffected KKK member at his hotel in Texas. He went to a Texas rodeo, where he famously posed for photographs of himself in a large Texas gallon white hat.12 George H.W. Bush even arranged for Deng to receive the title, “honorary citizen of Texas.”13 Deng really did make a grand tour of American society and politics. President Carter described Deng’s trip as a great success and one of the most pleasant occasions during his presidency. Also, Carter came to appreciate Chinese diplomacy in light of the foil provided by Soviet diplomacy. Initially, when he consulted Henry Kissinger, Carter had asked whether the Chinese could be trusted. Kissinger replied: “Yes, they will carry out meticulously both the letter and spirit of an agreement.”14 Kissinger then added that this was unlike the Soviets, who would insist on the letter of an agreement while looking for loopholes to exploit. Deng’s 1979 trip to Washington was indeed a tour de force; nevertheless, it was a long time in coming. It took twenty-two years to bring about the Shanghai Communique, another seven years to seal the deal with a second communique

Sino-US normalization without closure  125 establishing diplomatic relations and still three more years to lay out what was an imperfect deal on the outstanding issue of US arms sales to Taiwan. President Carter conceded that there was a lag between the 1972 and 1979 communiques that was due to “the absence of consistent presidential leadership,” which created an opportunity for the Taiwanese lobby in the US to achieve significant influence in shaping US foreign policy.15 Carter acknowledged that he was part of the inconsistency, as when he first came to office he was greatly preoccupied with the energy crisis and the Panama treaty crisis, and his foreign policy admittedly reflected an existing policy bias that too exclusively focused on “the chronic US-Soviet confrontation mentality” and the need to concentrate on critical Strategic Arms Limitation Talks.16 Normalization had already started before Deng’s return to power in the Spring of 1973, but its formal consolidation was left to the cycle of negotiations that culminated in the last-minute rush to announce the establishment of embassies in Beijing and Washington in 1979. Deng was overly optimistic when he commented that it only took “one second” to negotiate the 1971 Sino-Japanese Communique and it would take just “two seconds” to finalize the Sino-US communique establishing diplomatic relations.17 The I January 1979 communique establishing Sino-US diplomatic relations was an important milestone on the way to normalization, but this milestone did not represent a completed journey. Without the benefit of closure on the Taiwan Question, “normalization” was not fully consummated even under Deng’s talented leadership. It was hard enough for American presidents, let alone Chinese leaders, to deal with the mysteries of the US Congress. The Taiwan Relations Act severely affected the new opportunity to build trust and the Sino-US relationship was increasingly at odds over “differences” such as “human rights” performance. As former Chinese Foreign Minister Huang Hua summed up, the US had committed “to sever relations, withdraw troops and abrogate the defence treaty” 断交, 撒军, 废约. America, however, “did not keep its word” 口惠而实不至.18 America’s words and the deeds did not match.

Handling differences through the stages of normalization In discussions with Mao and Zhou Enlai in February 1972, Kissinger, responding to Chinese claims that the US was too soft on the USSR. He claimed that the US had to be more complex in its view of relations with China and the USSR. The Americans had to carry the weight of the world in terms of facilitating strategic arms limitation talks. The Chinese side was not all that sympathetic in that they claimed to prefer total disarmament. They suspiciously regarded any treaties with the USSR as a possible step in the direction of a US-Soviet condominium of power that would constrain rather that recognize China’s sovereign equality. Zhou Enlai reproached Kissinger, saying, “We prefer to be more straightforward.” The honest statement of differences in the drafting of the Shanghai Communique was a case in point. The Chinese side believed that it had the right

126  Sino-US normalization without closure principles for negotiation in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” Indeed, each one of the five principles was cited in the 1972 Shanghai Communique, and Chinese diplomacy has cited with pride the fact that these principles have since been written into China’s agreements with more than one hundred countries.19 Had the Taiwan Question been the only significant issue on the table, perhaps there would have been less pressure to negotiate, but Politbureau decision-making took the Taiwan Question in tandem with the issue of Soviet “socialist imperialism,” Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia and the advancement of normalization with the US. The result was to postpone negotiating the resolution of the Taiwan issue while the two sides concentrated on the rapidly changing international issues. In his confidential discussions with Carter, Deng asked Carter to be “prudent” in the sale of weapons in 1979, but Carter also acknowledged: “. . . [Deng] let it be known that they are not in favour of any sale of weapons.”20 While protesting China’s diplomacy tended to postpone issues that would have negated normalization altogether so as to participate in parallel geopolitical understandings with the US, particularly in relation to resistance to Soviet expansionism. It seems as though “firm principle” could still be dealt with by protesting and then concentrating on other matters. The 1 January 1979 communique on establishing relations was quite short in comparison with the Shanghai Communique. However, it was more robust than in 1972, when the US merely recognizing the Chinese view on both sides of the Taiwan Straits that there is only one China. In 1979, the American government itself recognized the Beijing government as China’s lawful government and recognized Taiwan as “part of China.”21 The Taiwan Question demonstrated the difficulties of synthesizing principle and flexibility, especially as the two sides could not agree on the meaning and detailed application of their joint communiques and increasingly the American position reflected an ex post facto conditionality, as the US retained an interest in protecting “old friends” in Taiwan after the establishment of official diplomatic relations with the PRC. Negotiations were not built on an effective closure that clearly closed the door on past Cold War mistrust. The issue of ideology did not go away even though Deng revised Mao’s “one-line” strategy and the Three Worlds theory so that Beijing could broaden its cooperative options in international relations. Truncated normalization requires an in-depth explanation of Deng Xiaoping’s management of Sino-American relations from within his new “independent foreign policy,” which he officially endorsed at the Twelfth Party Congress in 1982. The early- to late-1970s aspirations to rise above ideology and to “reserve differences” on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were negated in the 1989–90 US-led attempt to punish China for its alleged human rights disaster in Tiananmen Square in 1989. The Chinese concern over appropriate American recognition of their regime was all the more heightened in the context of the Soviet and East European collapse of socialist regimes.

Sino-US normalization without closure  127 Deng referred to the Taiwan Question as the “biggest obstacle” to improved relations. Associated mistrust spawned a continuing focus on the nature of China’s regime as China’s modernization deepened. With the growing American focus on a “China Threat,” the Chinese leadership was increasingly wary of American complicity in a strategy of “peaceful evolution” or “disintegration” as a means of peacefully infiltrating the Chinese society and economy and eventually overturning the China’s Communist Party leadership and Chinese socialism without having to resort to war. The Taiwan Question remained a perennial irritant, as it focused attention on the essential issue of mutual trust, and Deng ruefully admitted that Taiwan would not join the mainland in his lifetime. Deng, however, was resigned to be patient, as he believed that the modern history of China’s development was on his side. In a revealing interview with Mike Wallace, Deng emphasized that time was on his side and that the difference in development between Taiwan and the mainland was “temporary.” He quickly rattled off a number of points of argument to claim that the mainland’s growth rate would match that of Taiwan: Taiwan is short of resources, while the mainland abounds in them. Taiwan has already tapped its potential, while the potential on the mainland has not yet been tapped and certainly will be soon. Besides, in terms of overall strength, the mainland is much stronger than Taiwan.22

The lead-up to 1972 normalization As the Chinese analysis might suggest the road to normalization was typically characterized by “zigs and zags,” once the latter are mapped against the chronology of events, one will have a better understanding of the underlying difficulties of completing the process of Sino-American normalization. The 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia and the Brezhnev Doctrine that claimed to limit socialist state sovereignty on the basis of Soviet-led proletarian internationalism seriously affected Sino-Soviet relations. Chinese analysis saw in this doctrine a false notion of community that whitewashed “bloc politics” 集团 政治, “spheres of influence” 势力范围 and “great family” 大家庭. It was the “worst of times”! Fleeing Soviet citizens and diplomats as they attempted to clamber on to departing trains in Beijing had to run the gauntlet of screaming, frenzied students who stuck stickers on their luggage saying, “Fry Brezhnev in Oil.” Direct military confrontation between Chinese and Soviet military forces over competing claims to Zhenbao Island in the icy Ussuri River brought the two sides close to war, which was at the eleventh hour averted in a hastily arranged summit between Zhou Enlai and Premier Alexei Kosygin in the Beijing Airport on 11 September 1969. Their frank exchange helped to moderate the escalation to SinoSoviet war, but their related agreement was never realized. Mao later mentioned to President Nixon that he had told Kosygin that he would reduce the coming ten

128  Sino-US normalization without closure thousand years of principled struggle by one thousand years in acknowledgment of Kosygin’s coming to Beijing in person.23 It was this brush with a potentially wider war with the USSR that led to Mao’s urgent instructions to marshals Chen Yi, Xu Xiangqian, Nie Rongzhen and Ye Jianying to prepare two research reports, “A Preliminary Analysis of the War Situation” and “A Perspective on the Present Situation.” The reports summed up the relevant contradictions, arguing that while the Sino-Soviet contradiction was greater than that of the Sino-US contradiction, the US-Soviet contradiction was greater than the Sino-Soviet contradiction.24 Such research and opinion was followed up in the Spring of 1971 with the creation within the Polibureau of a Central Foreign Affairs Group that included Zhou Enlai, Marshal Ye Jianying and Huang Hua that was to work on the guidelines for future Sino-US negotiations.25 These reports supported Mao’s strategy in favour of “one strategy, and a large number,” which was eventually rolled into his “Theory of Three Worlds” as later explained by Deng at the UN General Assembly in April 1976. Zhou had hoped that the US and China could apply the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to govern their relations, but there was little practical follow-up. Meanwhile, Sino-Soviet relations were deadlocked in ideological dispute over “Soviet revisionism” and the Soviet tendency to place detente ahead of the priorities of national liberation. The developing Cultural Revolution was all about Mao’s effort to pre-empt the “restoration of capitalism” as it had been portended in Khrushchev’s earlier revisionism. Mao’s view of the world changed in that he believed that China had to contend not only with US imperialism but also with a much more dangerous Soviet “socialist imperialism” 社会主义帝国 主义.26 In Mao’s agitated mind, the issues of Soviet revisionism abroad and capitalist restoration at home were closely entwined. In the last years of the Cultural Revolutionary tumult and leadership struggle, Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong repudiated revolutionary diplomacy. They turned suddenly to focus on the possibilities of Sino-US normalization. As Huang Hua observed, the CCP Central Committee disliked China’s “sandwiched situation” and particularly the stationing of one million Soviet troops along the Sino-USSR border and, therefore, “decided to relax relations with the US.”27 To counter the Soviet threat to China, Mao had decided on a change in his united front strategy. Former Foreign Minister Huang summed up “. . . a line and a large number,” meaning that simultaneously with making major efforts to strengthen its relations with the developing countries, China should energetically develop its relations with Europe, the United States and a number of developed countries including Japan, so as to increase China’s strength vis-à-vis the Soviet Union.”28 The Chinese decided to play ping pong with the Americans in April 1971. They received Kissinger secretly on 9 July 1971, thus “. . . the small ball turned into the big ball [the globe].29 Subsequent Sino-American diplomatic flexibility seemed extraordinary given an entire generation of practically no contact between the PRC and the US. Kissinger later wrote that he had detected a “modern

Sino-US normalization without closure  129 Machiavellianism” in Beijing that overrode ideology to focus on the realities of the balance of power.30 Normalization in its first stage was well launched. It was an international media sensation. American public opinion swung to Nixon, but there were underlying ambiguities that were left unaddressed. Most importantly, Kissinger did not fully appreciate the difference between Chinese praxis and Western “pragmatism.” But these different “pragmatisms” converged on reserving the Taiwan Question – a tortured difference involving old and new “friends.” Both the Chinese and Americans focused on the big picture that placed normalization within changing geopolitics. The Chinese conceptual language embedded in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, at least initially, served to progress the interests of both parties. Not realizing that the Americans had in Warsaw already accepted the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as the basis for negotiations in January 1970, Chiang Kai-shek had written to President Nixon not to accept these principles, as they would be used to reinforce the argument that the “so-called Taiwan Question” was an internal matter and that these principles could then be used to “rationalize Peking’s use of force to reunite with the mainland.”31 When Zhou Enlai and Henry Kissinger secretly met at the crossroads of praxis and pragmatism in Beijing in July 1971,32 they set in motion the process of “normalization,” the first stage of which included Nixon’s “journey for peace” and the signing of the Shanghai Communique in February 1972. Although Kissinger fostered the notion of a meeting of geopolitical minds in Beijing, this meeting was not between “twin Machiavellis.”33 As an Harvard Professor earlier in his career, Kissinger had written about how diplomacy could not be attempted with states that have absolute faith in a single ideology. Perhaps the most obvious dilemma was how to explain past Sino-US geopolitical misunderstanding. American policy practitioners had gorged on a high caloric diet of Cold War anti-Communist propaganda. Kissinger had claimed it impossible to deal with regimes that traded in the absolute truth. How could Zhou Enlai suddenly become so logical in his svelte understanding of geopolitics and the balance of power? Part of the answer lies in the disciplined logic of Mao’s dialectics. At his personal residence on 12 November 1973, Mao engaged Secretary of State Kissinger in discussion concerning Hegelian philosophy and dialectics. He asked Kissinger about the “unity of opposites.” Mao may have been probing to establish the depth of Kissinger’s knowledge of Chinese dialectics and foreign policy formation. Kissinger responded claiming that he “was very much influenced by Hegel in my philosophic thinking.” Kissinger then abruptly changed the subject, saying that the chairman knows much more about philosophy and besides, the German language in its original form is “too complicated.”34 In a subsequent 14 April 1974 discussion with Deng and Vice Foreign Minister Qiao Guanhua, Kissinger discussed the relation between foreign policy and dialectics. Whether Kissinger forgot what he had said to Mao, or he wished to steer the conversation away to a more congenial topic, Kissinger declared that he

130  Sino-US normalization without closure knew nothing about Hegel: “I am always at a disadvantage with the Vice Foreign Minister. The Vice Foreign Minister has studied philosophy. And he has studied Hegel, but I have only studied as far as Kant.”35 The Chinese would almost certainly have noticed the difference in his response to Mao and Qiao Guanhua.

China’s UN victory vs. “power politics” Subsequent to Kissinger’s secret July 1971 visit to Beijing, the UN General Assembly voted to seat the PRC and to expel the Taiwan regime. This made a compelling case for the recognition of a new international reality through normalization that had been delayed much too long. The circumstances of China’s entry into the UN vindicated China’s “independence and self-reliance.” When Kissinger raised the idea of “dual representation” in conversation with Zhou, Zhou said that China would not allow its rights to be compromised. Mao had interjected: “We will never board their ‘two China’ pirate ship.”36 US Secretary of State Rogers had promised a “fight to death” over the American proposal to reseat Taiwan in the UN General Assembly. China’s sponsors handily fended off this rearguard action, and the Americans endured a significant loss of face over the conditions of the PRC’s entry into the UN.37 The Third World voted for China, and later Deng noted that China will always “vote” with the Third World against hegemony. Zhou Enlai, while very pleased that the UN majority was even greater than he expected, insisted that China’s entry into the UN would proceed with modest “caution.” In his 28 October 1971 interview with Moto Goto, managing editor of the prestigious newspaper, Asahi Shimbun, he reiterated the importance of learning with modesty: “There is an old Chinese saying which goes, “Be careful when facing a problem.” We do not have too much knowledge about the United Nations and are not too conversant with the new situation which has arisen in the United Nations.”38 Again, learning required modesty, not arrogance. For Mao, the vote was a sweet united front victory that had brought together a large majority of carefully differentiated states publicly to defeat American arrogance in the UN General Assembly. His approach demonstrated an open-ended flexibility that optimized the equality of small and big states so as to support his united front calculations: Unity is based on our principled position of maintaining the independence and sovereignty of all nations. . . . We must unite with the 23 co-sponsoring nations that are our friends. We must also unite with the other 53 nations that support us. We must correctly deal with the 17 nations that abstained in the vote. We are grateful to them for refusing to follow the US while under great pressure, and for showing sympathy to us by abstention. We should keep in touch with the 35 nations that opposed us, as they do not form a monolithic bloc.39 Zhou worried about the lack of available senior diplomatic resources in light of the Cultural Revolution, but Mao insisted that China take up its position right

Sino-US normalization without closure  131 away in New York. Nixon was antagonized by what he regarded as the disgraceful behaviour of anti-Taiwan delegates who danced in the aisles of the UN, but regardless, he ploughed ahead with his preparations for his Beijing visit.40

The Taiwan Question, deferred, in favour of aspiring geopolitical understanding? Rather than upsetting the process of normalization, the UN vote on the China question underscored the degree to which US diplomacy had fallen out of step with the international community. Early negotiations on “normalization” focused on the exploration of each side’s perception of the international order rather than specific issues and differences. Kissinger described this as the “ultimate form of practical diplomacy.”41 In a 9 August interview with The Times columnist, Premier Zhou drew James Reston’s attention to China’s self-restraint on the Taiwan Question. The Sino-US agenda of important questions had placed the Indo-China question ahead of the Taiwan Question. While there was a spreading war in Southeast Asia, there was no state of hostilities in the Taiwan area. The former had to be solved first.42 In fact, Mao had personally in the February negotiations with Nixon indicated that Taiwan was a “small question” compared to the world, as the “big question”43 Just in case the message did not get through, Mao told Kissinger again when he visited Beijing to prepare for the visit of President Ford. Mao said: “The small issue is Taiwan, the big issue is the world.”44 This was the day after Kissinger and Deng had, according to Mao, quarrelled over the Taiwan Question. Mao was curiously quixotic, if not too sanguine in his belief in the unifying trend of Chinese nationalism. At that point in time, he seemed satisfied that the Taiwan Question would be amenable to solution in the near term as normalization took hold. Mao told Nixon that Chiang Kai-shek was after all an “old friend” who “. . . still believes in one China. That’s a good point. That’s why the question can be settled comparatively easy.”45 Chiang was also against the “two China” policy. However, take away American support and Chiang would have to negotiate. Mao may have underestimated both his “old friend” and the Americans. Kissinger was happy to reserve the Taiwan Question. Rather that stating that it was the US’ own view that Taiwan was part of China, the wording of the 27 February 1972 Shanghai Communique simply noted: “The US acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China.”46 Such clever wording avoided a direct US statement in support of the PRC at the expense of Taiwan, but it revealed the underlying political difficulties of the American recognition process. Zhou Enlai and Henry Kissinger met at the crossroads of praxis and pragmatism in Beijing in July 1971. They set in motion the process of “normalization,” the first stage of which was launched with the signing of the Shanghai Communique in February 1972. Although Kissinger has fostered the notion of a meeting of geopolitical minds in Beijing, this meeting was not between two equivalent realisms.47

132  Sino-US normalization without closure Kissinger as Harvard Professor had written of how diplomacy could not be attempted with states that have absolute faith in a single ideology. Indeed, American policy practitioners had lived on a diet of Cold War anti-Communist propaganda that accepted as gospel the non-recognition of “Communist” states. How could one then explain the sudden discovery in Beijing of Chinese “pragmatism” that was akin to classical European statecraft. How could Zhou Enlai and Mao become “scientists of relativity”? Nixon’s initial impression conceded Zhou Enlai’s “unusual combination of elegance and toughness,” but his Cold War intuition led him to believe that Zhou’s “perspective” was “badly distorted by his rigid ideological frame of reference.”48 When Kissinger first met Zhou Enlai, he referred to China as a “mysterious land.” His desire to share a “fundamental purpose” with Zhou, namely “to remove the mystery” that obscured China’s relation to the rest of the world, was impolitic, if not patronizing. Zhou quickly asserted that any related mystery may in fact lie in the mind of the observer and that this could be corrected with appropriate observation of China’s contemporary realities. The relevance of the “Middle Kingdom” 中国 concept has been a matter of reoccurring speculation in Western observation of China. In that this concept conveyed a notion of a culturally superior universal empire, Western historians have used it to suggest imperial paternalism persists at the core of contemporary Chinese foreign policy. This of course is to dismiss the Chinese revolutionary experience and to ignore the emphasis on equality of large and small states that was seminal in Chinese international relations. Kissinger himself referred to the “conduct of Middle Kingdom diplomacy” as it conveys a deceptive strategy on the part of Chinese diplomats “to induce their opposite numbers to propose the Chinese preference so that acquiescence can appear as the granting of personal favour to the interlocutor.”49 Even President Carter, when later commenting on what he alternatively regarded as “Chinese patience” and “stubbornness,” claimed that the Chinese still see themselves as at the centre of civilization, and they are prepared to wait for as long as it takes for their negotiating partners to accept their position on matters of principle.50 Kissinger, who was increasingly impressed with the patience and geopolitical knowledge of his Chinese interlocutors, admitted to Huang Hua what he and Nixon had originally expected: “We thought that you’d bump the table and shout ‘Down with American imperialism.’”51 Mao’s position on Taiwan was cause for even greater pause. Kissinger and the State Department were aware that 136 ambassadorial meetings had made no headway on this thorny issue. Kissinger records that Mao did not want Taiwan to stand in the way of a Sino-American rapprochement. In the first few minutes of his meeting with Nixon, Mao flatly stated: “The issue [of Taiwan] is not an important one.” Mao went on: “The issue of the international situation is the important one.”52 Mao suggested that not everything could be solved in the first meeting and claimed that he was willing to talk about anything. What was this if not “flexibility” 灵活？The Warsaw Talks had become a distant memory.

Sino-US normalization without closure  133 Kissinger recalled that both Zhou and Nixon understood that “our nascent strategic cooperation would have to be sustained by intangibles.” Such “intangibles” might include a rude wake-up call in Moscow. However, all the issues were not going to be solved in one meeting, and Kissinger admiringly cited Zhou’s straightforward approach to the geopolitical big picture: Zhou eschewed “salami tactics” by which so many diplomats try to impress their publics or their superiors – of adopting some extreme opening positions, then negotiating backward toward a compromise. The difficulty with this approach is that its outcomes more often reflect endurance rather than substance and that it prolongs negotiations because the interlocutor never knows what position is the final one.53 During these discussions, it became apparent that Zhou and Mao had read Nixon’s 6 July 1971 Kansas speech in which Nixon appeared to assign the PRC new standing as one of “five great economic superpowers.” As Kissinger had been en route, Zhou updated him with a copy of Nixon’s speech and proceeded to argue that, while Europe and Japan had modified post-war bipolar configurations, China’s comparative strength did not warrant inclusion in the list of five powers.54 Independence and self-reliance had not only required rejection of the “export of revolution,” but rejection of the centre in the Socialist world. While there was at the time much ideological animosity towards Moscow, it was not the Chinese leaders’ intention to lead Kissinger on to believe that the PRC was exclusively focused on the Soviet Union in the Asia Pacific. The Chinese had agreed that the Soviet superpower was “more hungry,” but the Soviet Union was not the only superpower. Kissinger may have banked too much on China’s extreme hostility towards the Soviet Union. William Burr, senior analyst at the National Security Archive, has commented on Kissinger’s advice to Nixon to stress US reliability in supporting China’s interests: Kissinger advised Nixon that it was Mao’s and Zhou’s pragmatism that loved to deal with one “barbarian” nation in order to control another, but the relationship would not develop unless the Chinese believed that they could depend on Washington.55 Mao was unlikely to depend on any one, but he cheerfully claimed to have “voted” for Nixon. He liked “right wing” politicians. They were so predictable! Mao later changed his mind on trusting the Americans, as he increasingly suspected that they were trying to climb on to his shoulders to get at the Soviets. Mao could not see that the American side had good reasons to give SALT priority in their international relations. SALT was valued more or less on the basis of its repercussions for China. The big picture was different in Beijing as compared to Washington and Moscow. China’s Soviet policy was not an exclusive matter of severe doctrinal disagreement with the Soviets. Dialectics required more flexibility than this, especially in

134  Sino-US normalization without closure light of contradictions producing constant change in international relations. In the Chinese view, the geopolitical fulcrum of conflict was presently located in Europe and the Middle East. The relations with the Soviet Union were highly abnormal, but this did not mean that someday the two sides might someday deal with their contradictions and find their way to normalization. Nor did Sino-American negotiations change the fact that the US was still assigned the status of an “imperialist” country that was seeking hegemony. At any time, the Chinese could claim that the US was practicing “hegemonism,” but it was still possible in the normal conduct of relations to achieve a better understanding of the dangers of Soviet “socialist imperialism.” This understanding did not require an alliance so much as political cooperation based on a similar mindset on the part of “friends.” Indeed, neither the Chinese nor the Americans wanted an alliance. Both sides repudiated “hegemonism,” but they also insisted that their new formal relationship would not target “third parties” Responding to Kissinger’s view on “the Americas as the basis,” “Western Europe as the pivotal point,” “Asia being the flank,” the “Middle East being the throat” and the “oceans been the centre of world struggle in the future,” Zhou believed that Soviet strategy was concentrated on Europe and the Middle East. In other words, while the Soviet Union was behaving like “social imperialism” in Asia and especially along China’s border, Chinese analysis did not assume that the Soviet Union was primarily focused on Asia. Kissinger may not have fully understood the “interests” of his counterparts. He went to Beijing and encountered a seductive geopolitical pragmatism. In prepping Nixon for his visit to the PRC, Kissinger optimistically advised Nixon: “. . . proceed not on the basis of ideology, but on an assessment of mutual interests.” This assessment required some form of “quasi-alliance” against the Soviets. Beijing’s “scientists of relativity” had apparently persuaded Kissinger: “China was in the great classical tradition of European statesmanship.”56 Kissinger greatly admired Zhou’s finely honed capacity to sketch out the big picture in geopolitics, not realizing that a large part of such analysis originated in the extrapolation to the international level of the familiar domestic Chinese united front experience and the “pragmatic” acceptance of “dual tactics.” The Third World, for example, counted for much more in Zhou’s analysis than Kissinger’s. Indeed, the Third World had come to China’s aid after so many years of American stubbornness at the UN. During Kissinger’s October 22 discussion of a rough draft of what became the Shanghai communique, Zhou did not spare Kissinger’s sensitivities, arguing that they have to be upfront about their real differences. Otherwise, they would be no better than the Soviets. Zhou referred to the importance of revolution when discussing peace and security. He candidly told Kissinger, who had done his doctoral dissertation on Metternich and Lord Castlereagh on power and stability, that he was making the same mistake as Metternich. The latter had stuck with his “old friends” in the circles of great power and attempted to suppress the trend towards revolution after the Napoleonic Wars.57

Sino-US normalization without closure  135 Kissinger may not have realized the full extent of the Chinese apathy towards alliances and “playing cards.” The two sides did not share quite the same “pragmatism,” and the euphoria of first contact may have obscured the long-term implications of “reserving” both their geopolitical differences and the Taiwan issue.

Normalization, pragmatism and drafting the 1972 Shanghai Communique On 17 February 1972, deep in discussion with Mao and Zhou, Kissinger believed that he had discovered a “modern Machiavellianism” in Beijing. On 21 February 1972, Mao suddenly turned to Kissinger and inquired: “Do you have anything to say, doctor?” Mao, Zhou and Deng Xiaoping all seemed to take secret pleasure in addressing Kissinger as such. Taking no notice, Kissinger went on: “We had to learn a great deal. We thought all socialist/communist states were the same phenomenon.”58 President Nixon jumped in, complimenting the other side. Striking a positive note, he gave legitimacy to Chinese conceptual language and understanding referring to a “win-win” situation. The two sides had learned to deal with “differences” and to “find common ground.” Nixon then discussed the importance of American learning and referred to “. . . recognition that what is important is not a nation’s internal philosophy. What is important is its policy toward the rest of the world and toward us.”59 The two sides, in other words, need not be bothered about “philosophical” differences. “Normalization”, however, did require formal recognition of these differences. Zhou showed considerable initiative in this regard when in effect he applied the operational principle, “seek common ground while reserving differences,” in the negotiation of the 1972 Shanghai Communique. In order to reserve differences so as to move in new directions to foster common ground, it was necessary to honestly recognize the differences. Initially Kissinger wished to soften the Communique’s wording so as to downplay the differences between the two sides and was concerned that Zhou’s preference for an honest statement of differences might destabilize international relations. However, he warmed to the suggestion, as it created an opportunity to calm the nerves of unsteady allies. True to form, Nixon approved Zhou’s approach, noting that strong leaders do not use “weasel-worded communiques.” The authentic statement of differences would presumably create a more genuine basis for normalization. Ironically, this unusual combination of honest diplomacy with power interests did not allay the considerable fallout not only in Moscow, but in Tokyo, Berlin, Hanoi and London. The Chinese side too had to think about how normalization would affect their supporters in the Third World and the socialist world. Kissinger in fact recalled: “Too, the Chinese leaders knew that their Vietnamese allies were furious that China had given Nixon an opportunity to rally the American public.”60 Vietnam was indeed a sensitive issue. Negotiation of normalization occurred in the midst of continuing hostilities in Vietnam.

136  Sino-US normalization without closure China did not wish to mediate between the Americans and the Vietnamese but also hoped in vain that Hanoi might understand that Vietnamese interests were not being sacrificed to Sino-US normalization. Kissinger reported that Zhou Enlai had clarified that, while China would not intervene militarily, it had a “deep and encompassing sympathy” for the Vietnamese and that this was not so much a matter of ideology, but a question of “ancestral obligation.”61 The Shanghai Communique of 27 February 1972 itself had affirmed that “after so many years without contact,” it would be beneficial for the two sides to “candidly” present their different views on the changing international situation. The Americans believed that an improvement in “communications between different countries that have different ideologies” would reduce “the risks of confrontation through accident, miscalculation or misunderstanding.” The US side specifically reassured several allies. The US reaffirmed support for the eight-point proposal of the Republic of Vietnam and the aim of self-determination for each country of Indochina. It also supported its “close ties” with the Republic of Korea and “friendly relations with Japan.” The Chinese side generally rejected bullying in the relations between big and small states, endorsed the principle of sovereign equality, reiterated that China would “never become a superpower” and opposed “hegemony and power politics of any kind.” Furthermore, peoples everywhere were to be free to choose their own social systems and that therefore all foreign troops “should be withdrawn to their own countries.” Specifically, China supported North Korea’s eight-point program for peaceful unification as well as the seven-point proposal of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam. The Chinese side also warned that it would “oppose the revival of Japanese militarism” but support the Japanese people’s desire “to build an independent, democratic, peaceful and neutral Japan.” Mao’s horizontal “one-line strategy” included Japan in China’s united front response to Soviet expansionism. Zhou and Mao were concerned that the “Nixon shock” might generate insecurity in Japanese society and possibly revive latent ultra-nationalism in Japan.62 In fact, in the wake of Nixon’s visit to China, the Japanese expressed their utter dismay that they had not been briefed in advance. The Nixon administration’s “leap-frog diplomacy” had left them with the feeling of “complete disgrace.”63 They were not alone; for example, the UK Prime Minister, Edward Heath, was miffed that he had not been briefed in advance. The special relationship had been trumped in Nixon’s secret diplomacy with the Chinese. The US and China agreed on two basic principles governing normalization, namely that “neither would seek hegemony in the Asia-Pacific Region” and that neither was “. . . prepared to negotiate on behalf of any third party or to enter into agreements or understandings with the other directed at other states.” “Normalization” was not to be attached to the creation of a Sino-US alliance against the USSR. The consequences of normalization were not to be spelled out in so many words. With this in mind, neither side mentioned the Soviet Union by

Sino-US normalization without closure  137 name, and opposition to hegemonism was not linked specifically to either one or two of the “superpowers.”64 Kissinger claimed that the notion of “resisting hegemony” was a term introduced by the American side; however, it is not fully clear whether the two sides were on the same page. Kissinger claimed that when Mao and Nixon pledged to oppose hegemonism, they implicitly subscribed to the balance of power: Even when not spelled out in detail, resistance to hegemony implies a policy of balancing power, of preventing any one nation from marshalling the resources and manpower conducive to world domination. The unspoken but unavoidable implication was that China and the United States were jointly engaged in counterbalancing Soviet power.65 While Kissinger began to sense the problem of Chinese “self-reliance” as it focused on domestic circumstances and circumscribed China’s international commitments, he nonetheless thought that this “unspoken but unavoidable implication” was a small matter in relation to the entirety of Chinese foreign policy thinking. The Chinese, however, had their own Marxist-Leninist concept of “balance of forces” 力量对比, which looked at not only the military, but also the economic, social and cultural dimensions of comparative national power in the world. The Chinese side questioned the legitimacy of the “balance of power” 实力均衡. The latter transcends the conventional understanding of power based on alliances to create a margin of force to deter threats. Mao and Zhou saw the “balance of power” as a pernicious system of great power politics that reduced the equal sovereignty of smaller nations to the will of the great powers. For the Chinese, the “balance of power” had to be negated rather than encouraged. Also, “opposition to hegemonism” in the Chinese mind had to do with a transitional political cooperation and psychology that would challenge Soviet expansionism. Certainly, if the Americans wanted to land “direct blows” on the Soviets, the Chinese would be more than pleased. The Chinese, however, were not ready themselves to become directly involved in frontal military action against the Soviets at key points around the world. Indeed, Mao could only in disproportionate rhetorical, but not in actual military, terms serve as a “loose cannon.” Of particular interest was the communique’s adoption of the Chinese side’s language concerning the settlement of disputes through the application of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. For the Chinese, this was new and important American recognition of their place in the world. At the news conference during which he fielded questions concerning the 27 February 1972 Shanghai Communique, Kissinger had been asked whether the communique marked the first time that a US president had picked up on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. This was a very important matter to the Chinese, but Kissinger was circumspect. He accepted the relevance of the principles without acknowledging their authorship:

138  Sino-US normalization without closure I have to say I am simply not sure. . . . The question is not who put forward the proposals. The question is: Does [the Shanghai Communique] contain principles that we can live by, and since we said we are prepared to apply these principles. . . it does not really make a crucial difference who put it forward first.66 Actually, it mattered a great deal in Beijing. The Americans for their part emerged relatively unscathed on the Taiwan Question. The Chinese still labelled it “the crucial question obstructing normalization.” The Americans rather than directly affirming “one China” themselves, “acknowledged that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is one China and that China is a part of China.” The Americans did add, however, their “ultimate objective” of withdrawal of all US forces and military installations from Taiwan. The Chinese gave Kissinger some credit for this clause on the cross-strait acknowledgement of “One China.” Zhou cryptically remarked to his colleagues: “After all, a Dr. is indeed useful as a Dr.”67 Enver Hoxha, the leader of the Albanian Workers’ Party, demonstrated how far China’s loudest critics would go in protesting Sino-US normalization. Just as the Cultural Revolution was starting to target Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, Mehmet Shehu and Zhou Enlai had signed in Beijing a joint statement on 11 May 1966 condemning not only American “counterrevolutionary dual tactics” over peace in Vietnam, but also Soviet “contemporary revisionism” 现代修正主义, which was breeding capitalist restoration. In February 1972, the Soviet press took what little pleasure it could in emphasizing that Nixon visited Beijing, and the Shanghai Communique was signed while the US was still bombing Vietnam. The Albanian Workers Party Leader Envers Hoxha – who was never at a loss for words – was irritated by Zhou’s concocted confection of putative differences. In his mind, the Shanghai Communique was a tragedy of Shakespearian proportions. Zhou Enlai’s “vacillating pragmatism” vis-à-vis the US betrayed class principles and was emblematic of a dishonest pragmatism, most foul!68 Reporting on Nixon’s journey for peace, Hoxha let loose a torrent of sarcasm: The communique . . . said only “the talks were sincere and frank”; hence, it was neither fish nor fowl, while the Chinese television spoke another language. Mao and Nixon appeared on the small screen happy and laughing, clasping each other not by one hand but by both hands. Kissinger was lolling, smiling and happy in an armchair as if in his own home. Chou En-lai was aux anges laughing and chuckling so loudly that he became embarrassed and covered his mouth with his hand.69 Hoxha criticized the lack of socialist principle in Zhou Enlai’s united front “dual tactics.” Zhou curtly responded that a genuine socialist policy must achieve the “dialectical unity of firm principle and great flexibility.”70 Hoxha did not stop with

Sino-US normalization without closure  139 Zhou Enlai. When it came to “cursing,” Hoxha could compete with Chairman Mao, whom he criticized for his bogus “Three World’s Theory” that lacked any real ideological purpose in its abject failure to support national liberation. In his report to the Seventh Congress of the Albanian Party of Labour, Hoxha put Mao in contradiction with Lenin and Stalin: However, the so-called theory of “three worlds” does not lay down any tasks for the revolution. On the contrary, it “forgets” this. In the scheme of the “three worlds,” the fundamental contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie does not exist. . . . another thing which strikes the eye . . . is the non-class view of what is called the “Third world,” its ignoring of classes and the class struggle, its treatment of regimes and political forces of this world as a single entity.71 A complementarity of strategic purpose characterized the original Sino-US desire for normalization, but there was an underlying lack of true congruence between the American and Chinese pragmatisms that eventually led to the Shanghai Communique of 27 February 1972. “Normalization” was announced but not completed. It was left as a work in progress. To get on the road to normalization, the Chinese leaders seemed ready to talk about anything and to postpone serious differences to another day. In the rush to normalization, no one stopped to ask the right questions. When and why did the Chinese stop being “ideological extremists”? How did the two sides differ in their geopolitical assumptions? Were their initial commitments sufficient to sustain significant collaboration on the basis of a new bond of trust? Was it “straightforward” to postpone solving the Taiwan Question? Was this in fact “practical diplomacy”? Both sides opposed “hegemonism,” but the quality of their coordination was unclear. There was a preference for an ethereal sense of common understanding, but there was no appetite for undertaking significant structural commitments. Kissinger even claimed that it was the US negotiators who took the initiative in drafting the communique’s tricky paragraph on “hegemony.” Perhaps unaware of the deep historical Chinese connotations separating “the way of the hegemon” from the “way of the King,” Kissinger claimed: “Though this later became a hallowed Chinese word, it actually was introduced first by us.”72 The Chinese, however, had deep history to fall back on, as well as the modern Leninist discussion of the term highlighting the European socialist democratic failure to oppose imperialism in the First World War. In the Chinese vocabulary, both US imperialism and Soviet “socialist imperialism” constituted “hegemonism.” The Chinese declared: “China will never be a superpower and it opposes hegemony and power politics of any kind.” The communique referred generally to opposition to “hegemony,” whereas Chinese pronouncements had often referred to the “hegemonism” of “one, or two of the superpowers.”73 They still believed that there were two hegemonisms, but they also believed that they could

140  Sino-US normalization without closure still sign a communique with the US government that committed the two sides to “oppose hegemonism.” This set the stage for a more extended elaboration of related policy by Deng Xiaoping at the UN General Assembly in 1974, where he discoursed on the contradictions highlighted in Mao’s theory of the three worlds. Both sides declared that they would not “negotiate on behalf of any third party” or “enter into agreements or understandings with the other directed against other states.”74 The agreement was sufficiently loose that it did not seriously constrain either party’s foreign policy options, but the underlying anti-Soviet perception surrounding the agreement had, nevertheless, created strong reverberations in Moscow. The protested qualifications of the communique offers a fascinating study of diplomacy. In hindsight, Kissinger, who did have some intimation of the depth of Chinese animosity to playing cards, may have realized that he had overplayed the “China card.” At any rate, Kissinger later wrote that “triangular diplomacy” is “only effective when one avoids the impression that one is ‘using’ either of the contenders against the other. . . .”75 Diplomacy is sometimes a question of manipulated ambiguity rather than clear and “straightforward” communication, which is much prized in the Chinese understanding of the term. On his return to Washington from China, President Nixon held a news conference to deal with “inevitable speculation.” While taking historically momentous steps towards normalization with the USSR, the president did not wish to compromise detente and the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks; hence, he clarified: “[Our policy] is not directed against any other nation. . . . Any nation can be our friend without being any other nation’s enemy.”76 Kissinger likewise attempted to assuage the anxieties of unhappy Soviet experts in the State Department who were increasingly concerned that it was becoming policy to “use” China against the Soviet Union. Kissinger was disingenuous, telling them: “The ‘China card’ was not ours to play.”77 Mao’s “one-line” strategy anticipated the inclusion of a “neutral” Japan within a Chinese-led international united front to politically contain Soviet expansionism. The Japanese had dropped their normal passive approach and gone all the way with the US in the UN, even supporting the American attempt to reseat Taiwan in the UN General Assembly, when they were blindsided by Nixon’s visit to China. A change of Japanese government subsequently facilitated a sudden change in Sino-Japanese relations. Less than eight months after the Nixon China visit, the heads of the Chinese and Japanese governments signed the September 1972 Sino-Japanese joint communique, establishing diplomatic relations between Tokyo and Beijing. More than one second was required, but the Japanese did sign a foundational treaty despite misgivings over the China’s seemingly opportune reference to “opposing hegemony.” They did not want to be placed in active opposition to the Soviet Union. The Sino-Japanese communique in effect “leap-frogged” the Shanghai Communique, not only ending the state of war between the two countries and dropping Chinese claims to war reparations, but it established normal diplomatic relations six to seven years before the Chinese and Americans finally

Sino-US normalization without closure  141 established relations in 1 January 1979. Deng Xiaoping was particularly successful in his use of governmental and non-governmental relations with Japan to calm serious Japanese reservations over committing to “opposing hegemony.” The problem was highlighted in the 8 August 1978 negotiation between Japan’s pro-China envoy, Sunao Sonoda, and China’s Huang Hua, both of whom were well aware of their “different approaches.” Sonoda commented that Japan would prefer “to conclude the treaty in a peaceful and understanding atmosphere and did not really regard it as appropriate to single out the Soviet Union.” Thanking Sonoda for his candour, Huang replied: “It is also our Chinese diplomatic style to speak our mind and air our views openly and straightforwardly.” The Chinese told the Japanese that there was really nothing to worry about. The Soviets had no means of retaliating with respect to the wording of the new Treaty of Peace and Friendship. It did, however, make Soviet attempts to establish a new collective security arrangement in the Asia Pacific as just that more difficult. In his final negotiation with Sonoda, Deng gave the Japanese several assurances. First, the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship was effectively dead. China would shortly announce its abrogation. Article II of the Sino-Soviet Treaty that had talked of a mutual approach to concluding a treaty with Japan was, therefore, irrelevant. The original Bandung notion of “reserving differences” avoided the “export of revolution” for diplomatic gains. Deng made a similar play for time by reserving the issue of the Diaoyu Islands (Senkaku Islands), telling Sonoda, “Let’s put it on hold for 20 to 30 years. We will not touch it.”78 Inevitably, the Shanghai Communique raised questions about the nature of the new Sino-US relationship in relation to the Soviet Union. If Kissinger worried that Chinese “self-reliance” might serve as an impediment, he still claimed: “The language of the Shanghai Communique implied a kind of alliance.”79 The Chinese wanted American cooperation but were not really convinced that the Americans would not “play the China card,” and US protestations of support for Chinese security aroused suspicion in the very cagey mind of Mao Zedong. On 30 January 1972, Alexander Haig, deputy assistant to the president for national security affairs, conveyed a message from Nixon and Kissinger to Mao and Zhou that if the Soviet “threat to China’s right to exist” were to materialize, then the US would “safeguard” China’s “independence.” Zhou was provoked and directly replied: “The right to exist of the People’s Republic of China requires no protection from any country or bloc.”80 Such talk still gave Zhou’s enemies ammunition in claiming that he had become too close to the Americans. Han Xu, the Foreign Ministry’s top protocol official, interpreted Haig’s message in terms of the American bad habit of “playing cards”: “[By safeguarding China’s ‘right to exist’] the U.S. intention was obviously to play the ‘Soviet card’ to force China to make concessions of principle during the final stage of negotiations.”81 The issue came to the fore again in 1973 when Mao personally warned Kissinger against “standing on China’s shoulders to reach Moscow.” Mao seemed anxious lest the Americans were using normalization as a “tactical manoeuvre” so that Washington and Moscow would then divide the world

142  Sino-US normalization without closure between them and the Soviets would surprise attack China. Kissinger was appalled at such a suggested American lack of faith. He protested that this kind of thinking was “too Machiavellian for the United States of the 1970s and, I dare say, of any other period.”82 Henry Kissinger had already broached the idea of the interim creation of liaison missions in Washington and Beijing as early as his second visit to China in October 1971. He was initially rebuffed. The Chinese side would not tolerate the opening of any form of diplomatic mission in Washington while the Taiwanese embassy was still in operation there. On returning to Beijing in February 1973, Kissinger, who did not fully appreciate Zhou Enlai’s deteriorating political position, was well within his comfort zone. He reopened the idea of liaison mission with the added provision that full diplomatic representation would be completed in the last two years of President Nixon’s second term of office.83 He had become Secretary of State after Nixon’s election landside. Kissinger reported with satisfaction: “Taiwan did not detain us long.” Zhou had given assurance that China did not intend liberation by force “at this time.”84 The two sides seemingly enjoyed their exchange of views about the Soviet Union. However, there is a nagging problem. Kissinger, while he had claimed the “great classical tradition of European statesmanship” was alive and well in Beijing, nonetheless believed that ideology was the key to Sino-Soviet relations. This puzzling anomaly would seem to suggest that the Chinese were somehow ideological extremists and “cold-blooded realists.” Nixon may have been more qualified than Kissinger in that he believed that the Chinese leadership was still quite ideological. Kissinger, however, elaborated on what he meant by the Chinese leaders were in the “great classical tradition of European statesmanship”: The Chinese leaders coldly and unemotionally assessed the requirements of the balance of power little influenced by ideology or sentiment. They were scientists of relativity, artists of relativity. They understood that the balance of power involved forces in constant flux that had to be continually adjusted to changing circumstances. Only one principle was inviolate: No nation could be permitted to be preeminent. . . .85 Ignoring the often-stated moral component of Chinese foreign policy, Kissinger argued that whereas Chinese analysis of the global equilibrium was “coldblooded,” American analysis was apparently less so because: “Americans are comfortable with an idealistic tradition that espouses great causes, such as making the world safe for democracy, or human rights.”86 In Western theory, the balance of power may be custom-made to preempt the instability that comes with the rise and fall of great powers, but Chinese experience had focused on the balance of power as it was used against themselves and the Third World in the post-colonial context. To be

Sino-US normalization without closure  143 sure, the Chinese thinking as it was informed by a dialectical understanding of such flux “continually adjusted to changing circumstances,” but this did not spring from a commitment to a European balance of power as the basis for world order and justice. Kissinger, however, claimed that Mao had told him that “ideological slogans were a facade for considerations of the balance of power” and that the two sides could play up their principles, while practically focusing on their interests. Kissinger wrote on this with reference to the “classic definition of modern Machiavellianism”: Each side would be expected to insist on its principles, but each had an obligation not to let them interfere with the imperatives of national interest – a classic definition of modern Machiavellianism. “I think both of us must be true to our principles,” I replied, getting into the spirit of things. “And in fact it would confuse the situation if we spoke the same language.”87 It is questionable whether the Chinese side would accept the bifurcation of principle from interest. While cherishing their own ideals they doubted the Americans had any real ideals. According to Kissinger, Mao had advised him that the all the slogans scrawled on the walls of China were meaningless, but Mao would not approve the Shanghai Communique draft without each party honestly stating its differences from the other. And there was one area where Kissinger himself argued that ideology was indeed a fully-fledged consideration in China’s international relations. “Intractable” and “ineradicable” ideological differences had in Kissinger’s view created a “mortal challenge” to the stable relations between the Soviets and the Chinese. Kissinger wrote: To Zhou, China’s conflict with the Soviet Union was both ineradicable and beyond its capacity to manage by itself. One of the ironies of relations among Communist countries is that Communist ideology, which always claimed that it would end international conflict, has in fact made it intractable. In systems based on infallible truth there can be only one authorized interpretation; a rival claim to represent true orthodoxy is a mortal challenge.88 The two sides tried to work through their respective “complex” and “straightforward” approaches to the Soviet Union. The Chinese side believed that the American response to an aggressive Soviet Union definitely needed more rigour. If the Soviet Union was a “principal threat,” the US still needed to engage with the Soviets to achieve strategic arms limitation. Kissinger was somewhat defensive about the Chinese characterization of the softness of the US approach and parried as follows: Secretary Kissinger:  I explained to the Prime Minister . . . our tactics are more complex and maybe less heroic, but our strategy is the same. We have no doubt who is the principal threat to the world today.

144  Sino-US normalization without closure Chairman Mao:  What you do is a Chinese kind of shadow boxing. (laughter) We do a kind of shadow boxing which is more energetic. Prime Minister Zhou:  And direct in its blows. When Kissinger returned to the difference of approach two days later, he hoped for better understanding when he said: Secretary Kissinger:  We manoeuver more than you, but we will get in the same direction. Prime Minister Zhou:  That is dialectic, but we understand. Perhaps you need to manoeuver. We want to be straightforward.89 Perhaps “to manoeuver” was also a natural component of united front “dual tactics.” On the other hand, the diplomatic niceties of fraternal ties in socialism had long since been abandoned, and the Chinese tradition and the Chinese socialist blend of idealism and realism demanded no less than an “energetic” and straightforward recognition of differences. The Americans were faulted for not being “direct in their blows.” The Chinese claimed a “Sha-lin” style; however, they themselves offered only “empty cannons,” “cursing” and as yet incomplete common understandings in their response to the Soviets. With respect to his “one-line concept” 一条线的构想, Mao had told Nixon and Kissinger we can go together “hand-in-hand” 手携手, meaning that “our purposes” 目标 are the same, and neither one side nor the other would harm the other.90 It was as if the two sides could go on a date, but only handholding, and not kissing, was permitted. One year later, when Kissinger returned to the same point in discussion with Deng Xiaoping, Deng replied that he had personally taken note of Kissinger’s earlier exchange with Mao: “I think that we had actually discussed the difference between shadow-boxing and boxing in the Sha-lin style, which is more energetic.”91 Kissinger’s “complexity” that included negotiations with the Soviets on strategic arms limitation was grudgingly acknowledged, but it did not satisfy Deng’s strong demand for more robust American deeds to confront Soviet expansionism. The two sides did not seem to get very far in establishing a common geopolitical understanding. If the Chinese were still hoping for a more forward US approach, Kissinger and Nixon hoped to accomplish Sino-US normalization without compromising detente and negotiations with the Soviets over nuclear arms control. Kissinger may not have fully appreciated the Chinese view of ideology as it relates to foreign policy that claims both strong principle and flexibility, but he opined that the Sino-Soviet conflict was “primeval,” as two systems “based on infallible truth” cannot co-exist; hence, he said: “The Chinese leaders saw no possibility of compromise with the Soviet Union that was not debilitating.”92 Did this miss out on the nuances of Chinese strategic thinking? The thicket of underlying metaphor needs to be cleared. The Chinese were very sensitive to American offers of “protection.” This was deeply offensive to their “independence and self-reliance.” On the other hand, they would prefer not to go it alone in

Sino-US normalization without closure  145 dealing with the Soviets, but they could and would if they had to. They were quite keen for the Americans to poke the Soviet bear, but they were not themselves looking to “play cards.” Kissinger claimed that Zhou wanted the US to take the lead in “organizing an anti-Soviet coalition.” Kissinger himself seemed to be looking for some form of “quasi-alliance” with China as some new form of ally, but he himself was not interested in China playing the American “card” against the Soviet Union in “unnecessary showdowns.”93 The “frank exchange of views” in Beijing was originally deeply gratifying for both sides, as it served to complicate Soviet geopolitical calculations, but their “differences” were never fully taken into account.

Deng Xiaoping’s approach to Sino-US relations There are at least two closely connected chapters in the saga of Sino-US normalization – one written by Zhou and Mao, the other by Deng Xiaoping. In May 1973, each side established liaison offices in each other’s capitals just before Deng Xiaoping was officially rehabilitated and returned to power. Mao had generously, or more likely disingenuously, concluded that Deng was not as bad as China’s number one capitalist roader, President Liu Shaoqi. Deng’s mistakes were more in the nature of non-antagonistic contradictions among the people.94 Ironically on Deng’s third fall, Mao would approve the Party Central Committee 7 April 1976 resolution that said, “. . . the nature of the [Deng Xiaoping] problem has turned into one of antagonistic contradiction.”95 The Chinese side had dropped its earlier objection to the liaison offices in what was for Deng the “incomprehensible” context of Watergate so as “to maintain the momentum of forward development in the eyes of the Soviets.”96 Indeed, there was great anxiety that China, in light of US weakness brought on by defeat in Vietnam and the explosive nature of Watergate, might encourage Soviet geopolitical opportunism. In discussion with the new deputy head of the liaison office, and former head of the Foreign Ministry’s Protocol Department, Han Xu, Kissinger was at pains to brief Han on a recent meeting with Soviet Party leader, Leonid Brezhnev. Brezhnev had claimed that once the Chinese were stronger, they would challenge the US. He refloated the idea of the US and the USSR signing an agreement whereby they would jointly stymie China’s bid to become a nuclear power. Brezhnev demanded a straight “yes” or “no” as to whether the US intended to ally with China. Kissinger, relaying the conversation to the Chinese, told him that the US would never unite with the Soviet Union to do anything unfavourable to China.97 Deng Xiaoping did not have Zhou Enlai’s long and deep experience of relations with Americans that stretched back through the 1930s and 1940s, but this history was well known, and its lessons had a definite bearing on his approach to relations with the US. Zhou had long ago affirmed the utility of united front tactics and that the capitalist countries do not necessarily “form a monolithic bloc.” Deng introduced the open door so as to facilitate economic reform, and he drew on Mao Zedong Thought and the early 1940s and mid-1950s debates on

146  Sino-US normalization without closure flexible foreign policy. Zhou and Mao had insisted that they wanted to “learn” from all countries even while they “leaned” to the Soviet Union. Moreover, the treaty experience with the Soviet Union had been extremely disappointing. The Soviets had been very modest in their offerings of material support. The Chinese had paid high prices for Soviet goods and technology. Instead of supporting Chinese learning, the Soviets in 1960, at a very critical point of downturn in China’s economy, ordered their experts to leave China taking with them the blueprints for new factories. Not only did their erstwhile comrades side with India in the 1963 border war, but later they signed a collective defence treaty with Vietnam in a bid to encircle China. All this simply confirmed the Chinese in their need for “independence and self-reliance.” Deng’s “independent foreign policy” was anchored in such belief. Nixon had resigned on 8 August 1974 to pre-empt impeachment. He was no longer in place to complete US diplomatic and military withdrawal from Taiwan as promised. It fell to Deng’s leadership to consolidate the weakened normalization process to a point where embassies could be established in Beijing and Washington. This he had hoped to do without falling into a compromising position on the Taiwan Question. The process of negotiation proved much tougher than anyone had first realized. President Ford claimed that Nixon’s foreign policy was a great success and expressed the hope that normalization would happen during his term of office. He would follow the principles of the Shanghai Communique, but at the same time he hoped to continue to support America’s “allies and friends in Asia” to ensure their “security, independence and economic development.” This time the Taiwan Question was not so easily dismissed. Kissinger flew to Beijing on 25–29 November 1975. At this point unknown to Kissinger, Deng himself was labouring under severe political pressure. Jiang Qing constantly regaled Mao that Deng had not “repented” and remained a “capitalist roader.” Unlikely but damaging rumours were flying around Beijing that Deng was hoping for some form of rapprochement with the Soviets.98 Moreover, the left was constantly bending Mao’s ear about how the Americans were trying to manipulate China with their emphasis on the Soviet threat. In this politically fraught context, Deng’s instinct was to stay as close as possible to Mao’s thinking. Deng did not take any initiative on matters relating to normalization and Taiwan. He wanted the American side to adopt the Japan model, requiring the immediate severing of diplomatic relations with Taiwan. He accused the Americans of pursuing a “variation of one China and one Taiwan.” At the Great Hall of the People on 26 November 1974, Vice-Premier Deng told Secretary Kissinger: “. . . we have established our liaison office in Washington and you have established one in Beijing. And you keep an embassy in Taiwan. This in itself indicates that there has not been the necessary conditions for the normalization of relations.”99 Deng further argued that for the Americans the defence treaty relationship with Taiwan still has meaning and that they “need Taiwan” as their “unsinkable aircraft carrier.”100 Kissinger’s candid explanations about the pitfalls in domestic American politics could not dissuade Deng. Kissinger claimed that the

Sino-US normalization without closure  147 Administration needed to move carefully in a step-by-step manner “to neutralize the pro-Taiwan element in the United States.” He conceded that the US had no leg to stand on when it came to continuing arms sales to Taiwan: “Our problem is this: on the face of it, it is of course absurd to say one has a defense arrangement with a part of a country one recognizes, that is, which belongs to that country.” The US administration then needed time politically to defuse related public opinion, but Kissinger reassured Deng: “It is not a question of maintaining [the defense commitment to Taiwan] for an indefinite period of time.”101 He pleaded that the US needed to “disassociate from Taiwan in steps.” On November 27, Deng placed the ball in Kissinger’s court, telling him that if the US “needed” Taiwan and was experiencing “domestic difficulties,” then Beijing will simply wait for the right conditions before proceeding with normalization. Deng put the onus where he believed that it belonged, using one of his favourite Chinese metaphors, “it is for the one who has tied the knot to unfasten it.”102 The Chinese side reverted to its waiting position. Kissinger had just come from Vladivostok and the meetings between Ford and Brezhnev. Complaining about the cold weather, Kissinger had an unusual lapse in judgement and joked: “Now I know why the Chinese never settled in that territory.” Deng angrily lectured Kissinger on how in the past most of that territory was mainly populated by Chinese. This was all quite inopportune, as Kissinger had come to ask for Deng’s forbearance. This could only confirm the Beijing leftist viewpoint that the US was in decline. Meanwhile, pro-Taiwan forces were circling their wagons in American Congressional politics. Kissinger complained that there was a politically awkward unwillingness to sever the Mutual Security Treaty without some kind of reassurance from the Chinese side that the Taiwan Question would be settled by peaceful means. Kissinger told Deng, who had had great personal success in negotiating the Sino-Japanese Joint Communique, that the US would normalize on the same basis as the “Japanese formula” plus two conditions, namely after the US established relations with the PRC, it would set up a liaison office in Taipei, and second that the PRC would state that it would settle the Taiwan issue by peaceful means. Deng make it clear that it was not America’s prerogative to tell China what to do about Taiwan. Deng, who had gained Mao’s confidence at the UN General Assembly several months earlier, had angrily told Kissinger that his proposals were unacceptable interference into China’s internal affairs and was not the “Japanese formula” but instead a “one China, one Taiwan” formula. Kissinger was especially miffed that he did not get the usual audience with Mao during his Beijing visit. In Deng’s view, the disingenuous Americans wanted the benefits of normalization without paying the costs associated with their original promises. Kissinger suggested the completion of agreements on trade and shipping and cultural, scientific and technological exchanges before the establishment of relations. To this, Deng gave Kissinger a categorical “no,” and the usual communique that comes at the conclusion of such summitry was dropped.103 In late September, Foreign

148  Sino-US normalization without closure Minister Qiao, Vice-Premier Deng and Secretary Kissinger had yet another meeting to discuss President Ford’s upcoming Beijing visit. There were no obvious solutions to the interconnected issues of Taiwan and geopolitical understanding. On 19 October 1975, Deng was dismissive of what he derisively referred to as the “European Insecurity Conference,” and he relied heavily on Mao’s flat instruction to deal with the Soviet Union on the basis of “self-reliance”: We have always believed that we should rely on our independent strength to deal with the Soviet Union, and we have never cherished any illusions about this. We depend on two things: First is the perseverance of 800 million Chinese people. If the Soviet Union wants to attack China, it must be prepared to fight for at least two decades. We mainly depend on millet plus rifles. . . . We pursue a policy of self-reliance in our economic construction and also in our strategic problems. 104 Dropping any pretence to diplomatic tact, and much to Kissinger’s instant umbrage, Deng lashed out, claiming that the US was dropping into “appeasement,” comparing the weak American approach to Soviet expansionism to that of Chamberlain and Daladier appeasing Hitler at Munich.105 Kissinger himself believed that the Helsinki Final Act served only to feed Western illusions,106 but Chinese analysis nevertheless zeroed in on the American failure to discredit such illusions as a gift to the Soviets and their plans for expansionism. The Helsinki Final Act was regarded in Beijing not so much as a treaty commitment as propaganda that was lulling the West into ignoring the underlying Soviet agenda for expansionism with the fine sounding phraseology of what the Soviets claim is a “charter of peaceful coexistence” extolling sovereign independence and refraining from the use of force. Beijing was anxious less the Soviets gain traction in their strategy of encircling China by sponsoring “Asian Collective Security” and using the Helsinki Conference to propagate their own version of peaceful coexistence at China’s expense. Commentary in the Renmin ribao (People’s daily) enlisted Lenin’s support, claiming that Lenin had warned that in judging the actual motivation of individuals, and by implication, states, “We judge a person not by not what he says or thinks of himself but by his actions.”107 The Soviet “superpower” had in other words mastered “strategy” as the art of deception. Again, the authority of Lenin was cited, “. . . treaties and laws are worth nothing but a scrap of paper in the face of international conflicts.”108 On 21 October 1975, Mao met with Kissinger. He referred to Deng on the importance of “millet plus rifles” and noted that Kissinger and Deng had quarrelled. Despite Kissinger’s protestations, Mao famously tapped his own shoulders and said: “We see that what you are doing is leaping to Moscow by way of our shoulders. . . .”109 This passing exchange was not at all innocuous, and the warning was not lost on influential Washington insiders. President Ford’s “symbolic” visit to Beijing went ahead as scheduled, but he left Beijing empty-handed. During Ford’s visit, Deng and Ford disagreed on the

Sino-US normalization without closure  149 lessons of World War II, and Mao and Ford did not get very far in terms of nailing down how they would cooperate in dealing with Soviet “expansionism.” When Ford mentioned the need for “parallel actions,” Mao demurred, claiming: “We do not have much ability. We can only fire some empty cannons.” President Ford disagreed: “I do not believe that, Mr. Chairman.” Mao remained non-committal, again offering to fire “empty cannons”: “With regard to cursing, we have some ability in that respect.”110 Mao could curse, and he could keep the Sino-US channels of communications open, but he did not expect much movement on normalization. It was the Chinese turn to look weak as they were confounded by domestic politics. Normalization diplomacy was overtaken by the dismissal of Deng in April 1976 and the deaths of Zhou Enlai in 8 January 1976 and Mao on 9 September 1976. It was not until mid-summer 1977 that Deng returned to Beijing, and it took about eighteen months for him to fully consolidate his hold over the leadership and the Party’s policies. In the US, President Carter took the oath of office on 20 January 1977, and his initial administration privileged US-Soviet relations over US-PRC relations under Kissinger’s replacement, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance. Strategic arms limitation with the Soviets continued to take precedence over Sino-US normalization. Chinese analysis appreciated Soviet and American fears of nuclear holocaust, but Chinese strategic analysis tended to treat any progress on arms limitation as a zero-sum proposition by which detente with the Soviets was an unnecessary and ephemeral advantage that represented a failure to respond to Soviet expansionism in the Third World. The US had orchestrated containment and had resisted China’s seating in the UN. Now there was concern in Beijing over the US “need” of Taiwan and the reliability of the US as a counter to the Soviet Union. Deng turned to focus on Japan. He personally reached out to Sunao Sonoda, former chief cabinet secretary, and the new Prime Minister Fukuda to calm Japanese concerns over “opposition to hegemony.” Deng persuaded Sonoda that “opposing hegemony” did not mean China and Japan would “take united action.” The Chinese claimed that both countries had independent foreign policies, and they subscribed to the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries. With Deng’s personal intervention, a Treaty of Peace and Friendship was signed in short order.111 On 31 January 1979, responding to the question of America’s leading TV newsmen regarding the possible signing of a treaty with the US against Soviet “hegmeonism,” Deng clarified once again that China preferred a “one-line concept” 一条线的构想 rather than an alliance with the US.112 Deng personally told President Carter that he intended to focus on China’s modernization. According to Carter’s diary, he also made a disturbing prediction: “The Soviets will launch war eventually but we may be able to postpone war for twenty-two years.”113 He hoped that the US, PRC and India would work towards constraining the Soviets, and he urged the Americans to engage the Vietnamese in negotiations so as to wean them away from the Soviets. Deng’s request set President Carter thinking about the “recurring question” as to how best to conduct relations with a “regime which had overthrown a government with whom we’d had good relations.” Carter claimed in his memoirs

150  Sino-US normalization without closure that he had on a few occasions thought about changing the recognition policy of the United States. The historical policy that was applied to the Soviet Union and China refused recognition to those regimes, and the results were not at all satisfactory. The alternative was the French option to give automatic recognition to “an undisputed regime” so as to gain “a toehold in the unfriendly country and an opportunity to ease tensions . . . ”114 Carter’s ruminations did not produce a change in related American policy, and there is an obvious contrast between this policy and that of China, which beginning in 1954–55 had dropped the “export of revolution” and alternatively subscribed to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Zhou Enlai, for example, had indicated in 1956 that China is “against placing our friendly relations with certain other countries on the basis of excluding other countries.”115 Carter decided to postpone a friendly response to Vietnamese overtures for recognition, and the issue immediately lost relevance once Vietnam invaded Kampuchea (Cambodia). Carter had also given Deng a handwritten note during their session in the Oval Office that summarized why he thought an invasion of North Vietnam would not be a good idea. The signing of the communique establishing diplomatic relations gave the Soviets reasons for pause. Non-recognition of China had been to their advantage now that they could not be certain what the US would do if the Soviet leadership decided to attack China. Deng began to lay the groundwork for his new “independent foreign policy,” emphasizing “no alliances and no playing of cards” 不结盟, 不打牌. The original early 1970s negotiations were greeted with a popular euphoria, but despite positive statements about “One China,” there was no solid agreement on Taiwan, and this “immense obstacle” according to Deng adversely affected the momentum of normalization. Deng’s optimism was not enough to unravel the Taiwan Question, but in the last minute he still went ahead with the negotiations finalizing the exchange of ambassadors. Deng had privately advised President Carter in December 1978 that he was going to invade Vietnam. Although he did not want the US as an “ally,” he could hardly blindside the US in the context of consolidating “normalization.” In advancing the process of normalization, Deng may have wished to deter Soviet intervention and its attempt to encircle China. Carter was asked for his opinion. President Carter rightly anticipated that the Soviets would surely attempt to make the US complicit in the Chinese attack on Vietnam. Generally, President Carter believed that Deng’s US visit was a great success. However, Tass condemned Deng’s “incendiary statements on the last day of Deng’s visit, and Pravda on February 4 demanded to know whether Sino-American “common interests” were based on “anti-Sovietism.”116 In his conference of 12 February 1978, President Carter distanced himself from Deng’s statements on the Soviet Union. Some observers have suggested that Deng’s antiSoviet rhetoric and his claim to teach Vietnam “necessary lessons” undermined Secretary of State Vance’s patient diplomacy reassuring the Soviets that Sino-US normalization was not directed at the Soviet Union.117

Sino-US normalization without closure  151 President Carter tried to dissuade Deng, arguing that such an intervention would make China look like the culprit at a time when the Vietnamese were isolating themselves and that it would undercut the representation of Sino-US normalization as a positive contribution to regional peace and stability.118 Deng replied that the Vietnamese could not be allowed to act in Southeast Asia with impunity. Essentially, theirs was a direct exchange of views. There was no violent disagreement. Each side did keep the other informed. Deng tried to insulate the early stages of Sino-US normalization against collateral damage as he sent the PLA across the border to “teach Vietnam a lesson” 教训越南. He took a big risk, but he believed that the Soviets would be less likely to intervene while engaged in key negotiations with the US over strategic arms limitation.119 Deng confirmed the integrity of his policy of “independence and self-reliance” by not entering a Sino-US alliance, so as to counter the new SovietVietnamese Treaty of Friendship. Perhaps, the rejection of an alliance contained some element of “shadowboxing.” Despite the Carter administration’s behind-the-scenes advice against intervention, Deng’s action, some observers have argued that Deng did in fact “play the American card ”打美国牌 while in Washington by forewarning Carter of his intended “lesson” against Vietnam, as the USSR had to be careful in trying to impose a similar lesson on the Chinese. Deng got Vietnam’s attention. He also laid bare the tenuous nature of Soviet treaty commitments to Vietnam. Despite huge casualties, Deng claimed that China’s victory “heightened China’s prestige in the international struggle against hegemonism,” and it “changed the world political balance” 改变世界政治力量 对比.120 In effect, Deng had discarded the triangle and severed the potential relation between “regional” and “global hegemonism” in Southeast Asia. The Three Worlds Theory was still in play at this point, but this putative victory that severed regional and global hegemonism gave Deng in the early 1980s added reason to revise Mao’s anti-Soviet “one- line strategy.” Deng subsequently moved forward, articulating his new “independent foreign policy” focusing on China’s internal economic development and facilitating the related transfer of technology and learning from the “advanced countries” to China’s “developing economy” under the “open door policy.” In late 1978, Ambassador Woodcock and President Carter privately agreed that America’s China policy had been irrational, and they made serious efforts to address Chinese concerns, but they could not overcome complicating Congressional politics. When Deng took over the Taiwan question, there was still serious reservation as to whether the US was seriously committed to its formal declarations for “one China” – that in fact the US was really for “two Chinas,” especially in light of continued arms sales. Deng took more than a year after his policy triumph at the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee to consolidate his hold over the Party leadership and to ease Hua Guofeng and his supporters out of key positions. Meanwhile, in the US, Watergate had left a mess. Nixon’s strong imperial presidency was followed by a period of uncertainty, and in this context Congressional

152  Sino-US normalization without closure support for the Taiwan lobby grew. There was an obdurate powerful “group” that still regarded Taiwan as America’s “unsinkable aircraft carrier.” Both China and the US were conflicted even as they came to agreement to start up their embassies in early 1979. The two sides wanted to exchange ambassadors. Secrecy had worked for them in 1971.The negotiations in the last months of 1978 were conducted with utmost secrecy. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Warren reported to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Warren singled out three changes in the Chinese position that broke the logjam in negotiations; namely, the Chinese dropped their insistence on the immediate unilateral abrogation of the US mutual defence treaty with Taiwan; they agreed in advance that they would not object to a statement highlighting the peaceful resolution of the Taiwan Question; and they acquiesced in the sale of defensive weapons to Taiwan.121 The 15–16 December 1978 Joint Communique gave stronger support to the “one China” idea: The People’s Republic of China [PRC] and the USA have agreed to recognize each other. . . . The USA recognizes the Government of the PRC as the sole legal government of China. Within this context, the people of the USA will maintain cultural, commercial and other unofficial relations with the people of Taiwan.” At a news conference on 16 December, Hua Guofeng emphasized that such normalization was not “directed at any country” and was not to be considered to be either an “alliance” nor an “axis” against the Soviet Union. A 21 December Tass report noted that Brezhnev, in a reply to President Carter’s reassurances, was disingenuous in his view that the “establishment of normal relations between two sovereign states was a natural thing”; however, Brezhnev reserved the right to test the underlying motivation for Sino-US normalization in light of the future development of Sino-US relations.122 Quite apart from the developing Chinese ideas on “self-reliance and independence,” the American view did nothing to encourage the idea of an alliance. At any rate, Deng believed that after its defeat in Southeast Asia, the US “. . . shifted to the defensive – the United States isn’t ready to fight a world war yet either.”123 The 1979 exchange of ambassadors did not complete the process of normalization. The subsequent US Congress passage of the Taiwan Relations Act and its signing into law on 10 April 1979 demonstrated the lack of closure. For Deng, this Act was especially egregious. Deng especially disliked the clause in the Act confirming that the US supply Taiwan with “enough defensive arms to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.” Congress had undercut any future PRC attempt to get Taiwan voluntarily to rejoin the mainland.124 In January 1980, the US lifted the moratorium of 1979 on arms sales to Taiwan and threatened to squander what trust had been generated by Mao, Zhou, Nixon and Kissinger. This was normalization without closure. Once Ronald Reagan took centre stage in the US, there was even less reason for optimism. In welcoming his running mate George H.W. Bush back from a China visit during the presidential campaign, Reagan had even cast doubt on the wording of the second communique:

Sino-US normalization without closure  153 I felt that a condition of normalization, by itself a sound policy choice, should have been the retention of a liaison office on Taiwan of equivalent status to the one we had earlier established at Beijing. . . . I would not pretend that the relationship we now have with Taiwan . . . is not official. . . .”125 According to Alexander Haig, Reagan’s Secretary of State, who was anxiously pushing to improve upon the normalization process, there was at times significant confusion at the highest levels over what had been agreed to with the Chinese. Haig was quite concerned about the lack of clear policy in the new Reagan Administration; however, he highlighted a related mistake by the previous democratic administration: “. . . the Carter Administration – apparently unaware that the United States would have ‘unofficial’ relations with Taiwan – had sought to keep ‘official’ relations.” Haig drew a lesson from this: “The question of officiality is deeply important to Beijing because any official action toward a foreign state implies recognition and recognition implies sovereignty.”126 Deng learned not to put too much investment in normalization with the US. He did not want it to collapse. At times, it provided some leverage; however, he increasingly treated it as one important element in a much bigger picture. Deng progressively moved away from Mao’s “one-line of defensive strategy” to invest in a new foreign policy initiative that eschewed all alliances in favour of a complex strategy of independent foreign policy. The latter more easily contemplated normalization with both the US and the USSR as well as diversified relations with as many states as possible. In 1981, Deng messaged Haig to sound him out as to a visit to Beijing. Deng, in character, told Haig: “I won’t use diplomatic jargon, just straight talk.”127 The US had failed to deliver on promises made by the Carter administration. Vice President Mondale had promised $2 billion in Export-Import Bank credits that had never materialized. A promised American computer that was to help with a new national census never materialized. Such aspects were irritating, but not crucial. The real deal-breaker was the continued sales of arms to Taiwan under the Taiwan Relations Act. Huang Hua had driven this point home with his analogy between US arms sales to Taiwan and British policy during the Civil War to supply arms to the Confederacy. The two sides tried to deal with the arms sales question on the sidelines of the Cancun Summit meeting of leaders from the North and South. Premier Zhao Ziyang’s meeting with Reagan was rushed, and Zhao left it to Foreign Minister Huang Hua to spell out Deng’s position. The US was to establish a specific timeframe that would see the reduction in sales on a yearly base and to give an undertaking that sales in any one future year would not exceed the annual sales in the Carter years. The US subsequently offered what it knew to be a less than meaningful concession that it would not exceed the $1 billion in sales that had taken place in January 1979–January 1981 during the Carter Administration. This was disingenuous in that the Reagan administration had no intention of going to that high a level of sales.128

154  Sino-US normalization without closure Reagan wanted some element of cooperation vis-à-vis Moscow and wished to avoid a collapse in Sino-US normalization, but he was not one to throw his Taiwan friends under the bus. In a final bid to revive the normalization process, the President sent to Beijing a draft communique that highlighted three key points: the US would affirm that it has no “Two China” nor “One China, One Taiwan” policy; the US would affirm that it would not carry out a long-term policy of arms sales to Taiwan and had the ultimate objective of eliminating these sales altogether Deng wanted more, but he accepted Reagan’s draft that served as the basis of a third communique on Sino-US relations that was signed on 17 August 1982. The Americans went further than in 1972 and 1979 in accepting Chinese revision that expanded on the first of Reagan’s three points and was placed in the communique that read: “The US administration attaches great importance to its relations with China and reiterates that it has no intention of encroaching upon China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, interfering with China’s internal affairs, or carrying out a policy of ‘two Chinas’ or ‘one China, one Taiwan.’129 The wording aligned with but was an improvement over the original commitments of 1972. The declining relevance of the “one-line” was explicit in Deng’s new flexibility and included taking new soundings in Moscow as to the future development of Sino-Soviet normalization. And Deng began to set out his first formal statement on “independent foreign policy” at the early September 1982 Twelfth Party Congress. Deng’s reaction against “triangular diplomacy,” “great power politics” and “card playing” did not come as a complete surprise to Washington, and American policy began to adjust. Referring to the 4 June 1980 address of Assistant Secretary Richard Holbrooke to the National Council for US-China Trade, Professor Allen Whiting advised the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs that American policy should drop reference to the “China card” and replace “mutual security” with “parallel strategic interests.” Also, the term “mutual security” had created a misrepresentation of Sino-US relations as an “alliance relationship.”130 Doak Barnett, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, whom the Chair of the Committee deferred to as a “perpetual witness” on the Hill, made similar observations and recommendations. He noted that China under a new “pragmatic leadership” is more interested in economic rather than military relationships. Referring to Mao’s warnings not to “stand on [Chinese] shoulders” to attack the Soviet Union,” Barnett challenged the notion of a “triangular relationship” and concluded: “. . . we should not expect the Chinese to take military risks on our behalf from their position of weakness.”131 In August 1981, with Haig’s resignation and the appointment of George Schultz as Secretary of State, US China policy shifted gears, moving away from “triangular diplomacy.” China’s US ambassador Han Xu favourably described this shift, which he dubbed as “neo-realistic”: In fact, Schultz’s remark drew the basic outline of a “neo-realistic” policy toward China. . . . He placed less emphasis on the importance of the triangular relationship, and unlike his predecessors Kissinger or Haig, he did not

Sino-US normalization without closure  155 judge China by its strategic value. . . . He proposed a new American policy that sought “immediate interests” for both sides. This happened to coincide with China’s recent national policy of creating a peaceful climate so as to concentrate on economic development.132 Reagan at the outset of his second term finally made a presidential trip to China, landing in Beijing on 26 April 1984. The bonhomie of Reagan’s visit could not disguise the underlying differences over Taiwan. Although Reagan had mellowed in his approach to China, after twelve years of relations he was still only “laying a foundation for building a lasting relationship.”133 The Taiwan Issue refused to go away. Deng engaged in a forthright exchange with Mike Wallace who had asked what major issues divided America and China. Deng replied that there is one obstacle, which is the “the Taiwan question, or the question of the reunification of the two sides of the Taiwan Straits. Understandably, Deng nursed a strong grudge concerning Congress’ passage of the Taiwan Relations Act, which he now regarded as an “immense obstacle in Chinese-U.S. relations.” Deng later commented in October 1984 to the Party’s Central Advisory Commission that “. . . the United States policy is to hang onto Taiwan. . . . The Carter Administration [1977–81] committed itself to the withdrawal of American troops from Taiwan but at the same time adopted the Taiwan Relations Act, which constituted interference in China’s internal affairs.”134 Deng told TV correspondent Mike Wallace that he would have expected a “wiser approach” from Washington, and he wanted to know what the US had done to support reunification. He assumed that there was a problem of bad faith that persisted in American politics. The Americans could not forego Taiwan as their “unsinkable aircraft carrier”: In the United States, people say the US takes a position of “non-involvement” in the question of China’s reunification, that is the Taiwan Question. This is not true. The fact is that the United States has been involved all along. In the 1950s, MacArthur and Dulles regarded Taiwan as an unsinkable US aircraft carrier in Asia and the Pacific. 135 Where Deng had succeeded with Thatcher in Hong Kong, Taiwan was a different case. Hong Kong was a colony often described in terms of “borrowed place in a borrowed time.” It had since 1949 existed on the basis of Beijing’s sufferance. It was not militarily defensible. It needed mainland agriculture and water to survive. Although the original treaties varied on the question of recovery, there was a given timeline, namely 1997. And perhaps most importantly, Great Britain was not the United States, the world’s only remaining superpower. Taiwan was physically separated from the mainland. Despite the Shanghai Communique and its reference to the substance of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, including the principle of non-interference, the US had helped to maintain the modern standards of Taiwan’s military and its Taiwan Relations Act attempted to perpetuate Taiwan as a de facto state even in the light of very

156  Sino-US normalization without closure modest international relations. Also, Taiwan was more than a colony; it had become a more mature political entity. Its democratic institutions were much more advanced than those in Hong Kong. Mao could not really count on his “old friend,” Chiang Kai-shek, just because they coincidentally believed in “One China.” Mao had been overly confident that Taiwan would have to turn to China as China modernized and opened to the world. In the end, Deng had to acknowledge that he would not see Taiwan’s return to the mainland in his lifetime.

Managing the contradictions of normalization Sino-US normalization had its origins in Soviet aggressive behaviour in Europe and particularly in Asia. The Brezhnev Doctrine that claimed after the Czechoslovak invasion in August 1968 that the Soviet Union had the right of intervention to save socialism in socialist states was a jolt to Beijing. After so much controversy over the “centre” of the international movement and the CPSU as the “patriarchal Party,” the doctrine was offensive in the extreme, but it shed light on Soviet attempts to encircle China in Afghanistan and Southeast Asia. From the Chinese point of view, this could not be fixed with an unreliable US-led alliance, but new Sino-US understandings and political alignments could help to reduce the pressure on China as it struggled to assert its “independence and self-reliance” option. It had taken several years to consolidate President Nixon’s 1972 “journey for peace” initiatives. High hopes for normalization had fallen victim to intractable domestic politics that spawned the Taiwan Relations Act. However, during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, despite occasional quarrels over the terms of trade, the US foreign policy favouring the trade agenda flourished. Between the establishment of the embassies in 1979 and 1988, bilateral trade had increased eight times from $2 billion to $14 billion.136 In the US, there was a Chinese “cultural craze” in the mid to late 1980s. At the same time, an influential group of Anti-China US congressmen lobbied for human rights and religious freedom in China as well as for Tibetan independence. Both the Senate and House in mid-December 1987 voted for the Amendment on Violations of Human Rights in Tibet by the PRC, but in a subsequent press scrum, a State Department spokesman denied that there was any change in the government’s policy.137 Bilateral relations were sometimes interrupted, but not significantly altered. As Vice President Yang Shangkun said in his Washington visit in 1987, “there are no big twists and turns” and “the general situation is good.”138 On 9 September 1988, although problems of implementation persisted, Reagan authorized the launching of American satellites by China.139 Reagan had become more relaxed on the question of sensitive technology transfer and had indicated: “Taking into consideration the continued improvement in relations between the United States and the People’s Republic of China and the fact that the People’s Republic of China has promised to protect sensitive technology, we can, together with our allies, liberalize high-tech trade with China.”140

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Normalization stalled in Post-Tiananmen Square sanctions The general relationship was quite good when suddenly everything changed in light of the dramatic events of Tiananmen Square in June 1989. “Human rights” came on to the scene in a great rush as the result of massive Western backlash against the regime for its handling of the protestors. Led by the US, the Group of Seven was planning economic sanctions to punish China for related human rights violations. In Beijing, the issue of sanctions was treated quite seriously. The Western backlash looked like a rollback towards containment and another example of disrespect for China’s hard-won standing in the world as a nation-state. Deng described this reaction as a sinister part of an ongoing deliberate strategy of “peaceful evolution” 和平演变 by which Western ideas and technology would hollow out China’s socialist regime. According to Deng, the Western countries were waging a “third world war without gunsmoke.”141 Deng personally informed President Bush – and indeed the Japanese had carried the same message to the Chinese – that what China needed most of all was stability. Often in his defence of the ongoing relevance of the open door policy, Deng had shown concern for China’s “image” and related Western anxiety, but in the context of domestic disturbances, he told the leading members of his Party’s Central Committee: “We should not be concerned about what foreigners say. . . . They’ll only abuse us for being unenlightened. We have been berated for so many years! But have we been toppled by their criticisms?”142 Deng was more than miffed. He told Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau that China could take care of itself; it had endured and succeeded despite almost forty years of sanctions after the founding of the People’s Republic. The current Group of Seven sanctions were of little consequence by comparison.143 The spring 1989 Tiananmen disturbances had become an international media sensation. Deng accused the Group of Seven of “seeking hegemony and playing power politics” so as to undermine China’s sovereignty. “Human rights diplomacy” was a deliberate part of “peaceful evolution.”144 Deng was especially irritated by disingenuous American “human rights diplomacy” 人权外交 to undermine China’s sovereignty. In a talk with the former president of Tanzania, Julius Nyerere, Deng remembered his history. He noted that once China fought the US to a military standstill in Korea and claimed the upper hand, “. . . justice triumphed, and the United States had to sit down and hold talks with us in Panmunjom.”145 As a “son of the Chinese people,” Deng went further back in history to the sacking of Beijing by a coalition of imperialist armies in 1900: I am a Chinese. . . . When I heard that the seven Western countries. . . had decided to impose sanctions on China, my immediate association was to 1900, when the allied forces of the eight powers invaded China. Six of these same seven countries, excluding Canada, together with czarist Russia and Austria formed the allied forces in those days. Our people should study Chinese history; it will inspire us to develop the country.146

158  Sino-US normalization without closure Deng, although he had himself called repeatedly for calm, was fuming over the Group of Seven Paris conference of the leaders of the United States, France, Britain, the Federal Republic of Germany, Japan, Italy, Canada and the president of the Commission of European Communities to condemn China and to impose sanctions, including suspension of high-level government contacts, and to postpone World Bank loans. Deng regarded this latest attempt at ostracizing China as a blatant insult to Chinese dignity and sovereignty. On 31 October 1989, he met with an “old friend,” former president, Richard Nixon. Deng wanted relations genuinely predicated on equality based on respect for differences. Deng drew on the original 1972 framework of normalization and reiterated that, while he and Nixon had been very strong in their ideological views, that they could nevertheless further a “realism” respecting each other’s strategic interests on the basis of equality and mutual respect. US human rights advocacy had highlighted ideological conflict and made it difficult to reserve differences. In the past, China had recognized the importance of not “exporting revolution” and had subscribed to non-interference in the domestic affairs of other states. Why after so many years of misunderstanding and containment had the Americans not learned this lesson? Richard Nixon was solicitous and empathetic. Deng insisted that, despite recent tensions, China would continue its reform and open door policies, but he moderated somewhat his early heated warning about Western countries trying “to overturn China’s socialist government” when he said with important qualification: “I am not saying that governments of Western countries are trying to overthrow the socialist system in China. But at least some Westerners are trying to.” 147 Referring to the Chinese need for self-respect, he put the onus for the reduction of tensions on the Americans: I should like to tell President Bush that the United States should take the initiative in putting the past behind us, because only your country can to that. The United States can take some initiative, but it’s not possible for China to do so because the US is strong and China is weak. China is the victim. Don’t ever expect China to beg the United States to lift the sanctions.”148 Deng reasoned that if China was the “weak” party as well as the maligned “victim,” it would be inconsistent with China’s national dignity to “beg” for the indulgence of the US. Furthermore, if China was not part of the triangle, it was still a very influential actor that deserved respect. Deng’s moral umbrage may have been reinforced in unconscious parallel with the Confucian tradition that curiously required the prince of a great kingdom morally “to serve” the prince of a smaller kingdom. At any rate, Deng required the US, in light of its preeminence, to make the first move. China was not looking for superpower status, but it did expect the proper recognition that had been denied for decades. Deng was more positive in this conclusion: “We shall be happy to have American merchants continue to do business with China. This could be an important way of putting the past behind us.”149

Sino-US normalization without closure  159 President Bush, who prided himself in his personal China expertise, was overtaken by events. He certainly did not want to sacrifice the gains of normalization and to revert back to “containment,” but the American political context was hotly against Deng’s dictatorship in Tiananmen Square. Bush took what he probably thought was a pragmatic political decision balancing domestic and international considerations. He would not support an overall embargo, but instead he chose to suspend military sales and senior-level contacts between high American and Chinese officials. President Bush was personally conflicted and dismayed. In 2005, he confided in the editor of his diary, Jeffrey Engel: “Had I not met the man . . . I think I would have been less convinced that we should have relations with them going after Tiananmen Square.”150 To save Sino-American relations, Bush initially tried to reach Deng on the phone, but was abruptly informed that senior Chinese leaders do not accept telephone calls. Then Bush sat down at his electric typewriter and wrote a heartfelt letter to Deng. He tried to find what he regarded as middle ground: “I have tried very hard not to appear to be dictating in any way to China how it should manage its internal affairs. I am respectful of the differences in our two societies and two systems. . . . But I ask you as well to remember the principles on which my young country was founded.”151 Within twenty-four hours, Deng replied that he would be glad to meet with Bush’s confidential envoy in Beijing. Deng, as China’s retired paramount leader, met in secret with Brent Scowcroft, President Bush’s special envoy on 2 July. Trying to gain the high ground, Scowcroft started off by telling Deng that the Group of Seven economic summit was about to be convened and that it might impose new sanctions on China. Deng believed that their meeting was a “wise step” in showing the mutual resolve of the two parties to get relations back on an even track, but he rhetorically retorted: “Not even seventy can daunt us, let alone seven!” While Deng and Scowcroft could agree that President Bush was a “real friend,” Deng nevertheless recalled one of his favourite Chinese sayings, “It is up to the person who tied the knot to untie it.” His “friend,” George H. W. Bush would have to untie the knot. Jiang Zemin used a similar analogy referring to “whoever tied the bell around the tiger’s neck, must untie it” 解铃还须系铃人.152 Deng insisted that the US had barged into China’s internal affairs in an uninformed manner on an issue that was key to China’s very political survival and had led an international backlash that threatened to roll back the mutual benefits of new trade and was deliberately organizing sanctions against China. It was, therefore, incumbent on the US to take some kind of concrete action to demonstrate its genuine interest in repairing Sino-US relations. After Scowcroft’s secret visit, Bush wrote to Deng on 6 November, referring to the knot that had been “tied” and the key issue of non-intervention in China’s internal affairs. Bush did not take an initiative per se, but he pleaded with Deng: “Please do not be angry with me if I have crossed the invisible threshold lying between constructive suggestion and ‘internal interference.’”153 Deng claimed that disturbances in China were not only disruptive in China but would have repercussions elsewhere in the world and in the US. He claimed that

160  Sino-US normalization without closure in the 17 years since 1972, developing Sino-US relations had made a significant contribution to the stability of the world situation. Mutual respect meant carefully considering each other’s strategic interests and avoiding distorted and hot-headed interpretations of threat: China cannot be a threat to the United States, and the United States should not consider China as a threatening rival. We have never done anything to harm the United States . . . China and the United States should not fight each other – I’m not talking just about a real war, but also about a war of words.154 The Bush administration was quietly determined to move beyond the Tiananmen impasse, but was also wary in light of vitriolic domestic criticism for its soft stance on “human rights” in China. For example, one US critic, Jonathan Mirsky, criticized the Scowcroft mission and the weakness of the human rights response as “the latest sign that the US is pursuing a Kissingerian realpolitik that allows China far more latitude morally than any other People’s Democracy.”155 In fact, the Americans had already moved beyond such realpolitik to focus on economic issues when Tiananmen happened. Warm words were exchanged between Deng and Bush, but while Bush was straining to restore relations, the two sides had trouble agreeing on concrete proposals that would “untie the knot.” Deng was reassured that America’s support for the democratic struggles in Poland had no implications for the American view of China. In discussion with Scowcroft, Deng declared that the reduction of tensions would require effort by both sides; Deng then concluded with some sense of patient understanding: “I hope that as special envoy you will tell President Bush that there is a retired old man in China who is concerned about the improvement of Sino-US relations.” Scowcroft made a second trip to Beijing in December under the shadow of the collapsing regime in Romania that had resulted in Nicolae Ceausescu’s surprise televised execution on 25 December. This second trip publicly broke the moratorium on high-level exchanges. Washington was attempting to absorb and sort out the implications of the changes in Eastern Europe. According to the account of former Foreign Minister Qian Qichen, “serious doubt” was cast on China’s own survivability, and the US “backpedalled” in its consideration of Deng’s proposals for the restoration of relations, as it was no longer “so eager to improve relations with China.”156 Subsequently, Deng requested that the visiting Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak carry a message to President Bush: “Do not get excited over what happened in Eastern Europe, and do not treat China in the same manner.”157 Deng’s message was two pronged, namely do not think that because of Eastern Europe that China’s banner will also drop to the ground and that China will continue to place a priority on stability to support its economic development. Deng had already dispensed with Mao’s “single line,” and the Three Worlds Theory had receded into the historical mists of Party hagiography when on Christmas Day, 1991, the existence of the Soviet Union was terminated. Although

Sino-US normalization without closure  161 the Soviets and Chinese had for many years been locked in intense ideological combat, this still had a shattering effect in Beijing. The home of the original Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 was sacred. Its loss was incalculable. The implications for China’s own future and status were not clear. There was the question whether China could escape the collapsing trend of world socialism. In light of the disappearance of the “more hungry superpower,” China and the US no longer faced in the words of Kissinger “a common existential threat.” Now there was even less real reason for searching for some form of strategic understanding.158

China abstains from the UN vote on Kuwait Washington’s focus was trained on the Middle East. Iraq’s summer 1990 invasion of Kuwait reassigned an unexpected degree of significance to China, as the US needed China’s acquiescence in the UN Security Council to mount an attack to free Kuwait from Saddam Hussein. Former Foreign Minister Qian Qichen (1988–98) gives a revealing account of the Sino-American understanding on the Kuwait Question and its linkage with the US drawing down its sanctions against China. Qian was disappointed with Secretary of State James Baker, whom he says treated diplomatic issues as if they were some form of business wheeling and dealing. The US wanted China’s vote in the Security Council so as to launch an attack on Saddam Hussein. Qian conveyed China’s reluctance stating that military action only seems like it can render a quick solution when it can turn out to be both costly and unpredictable. Qian was quite candid in his response: . . . the war that the Americans had waged against China in Korea under the flag of the UN was still fresh in Chinese minds, and the United States was still applying sanctions to China, so our relations were not normal. Considering all this, it would be a great favour on China’s part if it did not veto the draft.159 China’s “central leadership” subsequently agreed that China would indeed abstain at the UN Security Council. Clearly, the strong had “bullied” the weak in Kuwait. China had condemned the aggression against Kuwait but wanted a peaceful settlement in the region. Secretary Baker wanted the Chinese to go further and to vote yes to the use of force in Kuwait. Baker’s sweetener was the offer to Qian to visit Washington after Qian’s UN appearance, thus in effect heralding the end of the moratorium on visits by China’s senior leaders to the US. Qian, however, thought that he and Baker had already crafted a deal on 20 November 1990 based on China’s abstention. Once Qian reached New York on 28 November, however, his deal-making counterpart, Secretary Baker, upped the ante and pressured for the PRC to change its position, and instead of abstention, to vote for the American UN resolution. This was “unacceptable” in Beijing. Once China voted to abstain in the UN Security Council, Baker did not follow through on the original understanding with the Chinese. Baker told Qian that Bush was too busy to see him in Washington,

162  Sino-US normalization without closure thus reneging on the original quid pro quo. Qian responded by going to Washington and demanding to see the president. The issue was settled with Bush’s personal decision to invite Qian to Washington for the promised meeting. Qian informed Bush that the US was lucky that China abstained, as the issue was very controversial in China: “The Chinese leaders had repeatedly discussed the issue.”160 The Western sanctions imposed on China that cut off senior political exchanges and cooperative loans lasted only two years before they were lifted. A threatened second round of containment never really got off the ground. Qian Qichen observed with some satisfaction: “The sanctions . . . went against the tide of history and against the principles guiding international relations.” While Baker was cultivating China’s UN vote, China had been focusing on Japan. Japan was the first of the seven to break ranks, arguing that Deng’s interest in ensuring China’s political stability was legitimate and that engagement was important to sustain China’s modernization program. As early as 1990, Japan approved its third batch of loans to China. Certainly, Chinese diplomacy was eager to foster Japanese independence on the issue. According to Qian Qichen’s account, Japan was the weak point in the Western “united front” against China: “Of course, Japan [approved the loans] for its own interests, and China regarded Japan as a weak link in the united front of Western countries that had imposed sanctions.”161 China invited the Japanese emperor to visit China. This was an extraordinary move in that, in 2000 years, no Japanese emperor had ever made such a visit. This would send an extraordinary signal, strengthening Japan’s relations with China and undermining the moratorium on high-level visits to China. Prime Minister Kaifu Toshiki became the first head of government from the Western-bloc countries to break with the sanctions on high-level exchanges when he arrived in Beijing on 10 August 1991. ASEAN countries led by Lee Kuan Yew also objected and helped to orchestrate a pro-China ASEAN position. Kaifu’s initiative was followed by the historic visit of Emperor Akihito and his wife to China from 22–27 October. Although he did not offer a full apology, the emperor expressed “deep remorse” over Japan’s wartime invasion of China. China’s door remained open. Various European countries followed Japan through China’s open door. The notion of containment as a response to human rights was a dead letter.

Conclusions Sino-US normalization never realized its true potential. The key to the problem lie in the failure to come to terms with the Taiwan Question and the related loss of trust accompanying this issue. Zhou, Mao and Deng had only temporarily broken the long deadlock over Taiwan that had originally characterized the ambassadorial talks in Warsaw. Arguably, in the 1970s, they adopted a negotiation strategy of playing for time, delaying resolution of the Taiwan Question until the fullest of time so as to focus on the international benefits of normalization and the development of the common geopolitical understandings of the two sides.

Sino-US normalization without closure  163 After the Third Plenary Session of the Party’s Eleventh Congress, the policy of “peaceful reunification of the motherland” was advanced. Deng’s “pragmatic” strategy of “one country, two systems” was “formulated according to China’s realities”; thus, Deng sounded like the very voice of reason: . . . China has not only the Hong Kong problem to tackle but the Taiwan problem. What is the solution to this problem? Is it for socialism to swallow up Taiwan, or for the “Three People’s Principles” preached by Taiwan to swallow up the mainland? The answer is neither. . . . As I see it, the only solution lies in the implementation of two systems in one country. . . . New problems must be solved by new means.162 “One country, two systems” was meant to apply to both Hong Kong and Taiwan, but thus far, with the exception of disagreements over the last few years of transition under the British, it has succeeded only in the case of Hong Kong. Deng had great success playing the “time” card – pushing society and constitutional issues in Hong Kong 50 years into the future. As for Taiwan, the clock had yet to start ticking. The solution to the Taiwan Question was originally postponed so as to move on to “parallel” geopolitical understanding. There was initially an extraordinary exchange of views and even exchange of intelligence, but sustained geopolitical understanding never materialized. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were cited but left unapplied as the normalization process stalled. The delay in the establishment of embassies in Washington and Beijing was largely due to domestic politics in both China and the US. Economic cooperation became increasingly important as US foreign policy progressively de-prioritized security relations within “triangular diplomacy” and began to regard China as an opportunity in and of itself. During the 1980s, China focused on “peace and development” and as China’s open door and economic reform took off, Sino-US trade moved to the top of the US agenda. Deng’s focus after the intervention in Vietnam on peace and development, his revision to the Three Worlds Theory and his dropping of Mao’s ideas on the trend to world war and the need for the “one-line” strategy – all supported peace and stability in the region. Deng was unable to achieve the return of Taiwan to the mainland, but his “independent foreign policy” was, nevertheless, extraordinarily successful in gaining the long period of peace that he needed to promote development at home. While postponing the final resolution of the Taiwan Question created distrust, the first stages of normalization were impressive in that they allowed Deng to successfully pursue “peace and development” on the basis of “reform and the open door.” The original Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were almost lost in the extraordinary international reaction to the military crackdown in Tiananmen Square in 1989. Deng quickly regained seemingly lost policy territory. As the “open door” was reasserted, the post-Tiananmen sanctions were successfully challenged in his foreign policy, which maintained a “low posture” based on the “twenty-four character” formulation, discussed in Chapter One.

164  Sino-US normalization without closure China was characterized as the “world’s largest developing country.” There was no Middle Kingdom to revive. The socialist and worker parties of Eastern Europe had collapsed. The heartland of the October Revolution had disappeared in a flash. Doubt was cast on the viability of the PRC itself. At times, Deng showed his frustration. He lambasted foreign interference in China’s internal affairs, but for the most part he remained modest and pragmatic in his actions. He continued to claim that “China would never practice hegemony.” He regarded any dream of world hegemony as unrealistic, politically unacceptable and a waste of scare resources. He would not “claim leadership,” as this would distract from the focus on China’s development. Normalization was left incomplete. It proceeded in fits and starts without a formally agreed upon timeframe finalizing the solution to the Taiwan Question, but Deng’s foreign policy even in the face of the domestic trauma of Tiananmen Square, the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and the Group of Seven’s international censure ably stayed the course of the open door and economic reform to facilitate the acceleration of 1990s domestic market reforms. The notion of a “China threat” emerged time and time again in the 1990s, and Beijing, recovering from so many years of non-recognition, was faced with Western sanctions and what it regarded as entirely unjust and manipulative “Sinomania.” Such reaction reinforced the notion of a malicious “peaceful evolution” in the minds of Party leaders, and still their foreign policy focused on “peace and development.” The Shanghai Communique claimed that the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence would govern Sino-American relations; however, over the years it has more often been honoured in the breach. Its reference in state-to-state relations has lost relevance. Originally, Kissinger had said that he thought these principles were quite appropriate, but he did not answer the question as to who authored these principles. From the Chinese point of view, this was potentially an issue of extending a sense of equal participation to the weaker party within an unequal hierarchy of material circumstances. This is the same question underlying the late 1980s disagreement over who should take responsibility for “untying the knot.” The issue of equality still persists. Obama’s “pivot” to Asia was seen in China as a strategic move to counter China’s growing regional influence.163 Diplomacy has not fostered a breakthrough. There has been little mutual exploration of confidence building in the region. The US has historically been reluctant to buy into Chinese formulations. Seemingly, the one superpower reserves unto itself the authority to determine the international terms of reference, as China is seen as practicing deception to take over from American leadership in the Asia-Pacific. When in 2013, for example, General Secretary Xi Jinping referred to a “new type of great-power relations” as integral to a “new type of international relations,” he connected the Five Principles with world peace, common development and common prosperity and highlighted Sino-US relations in terms of “no conflict, non-confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation.”164 Xi argued for each side to recognize and respect the other’s core interests. President Obama’s

Sino-US normalization without closure  165 administration distanced itself from the Chinese terminology, and again the issue of trust undercut the equality that comes with genuinely mutual recognition. Kissinger had once described Mao and Zhou as “scientists of equilibrium” and “artists of relativity.” He effusively praised Chinese pragmatism, proclaiming it to be “in the great classical tradition of European statesmanship.”165 Although there was some appreciation in Washington to downplay the strategic triangle and to focus more emphatically on the economic dimensions of the Sino-US relationship, the substance of China’s diplomacy was not well identified and recognized. Deng managed the Sino-US relationship so as to focus on “peace and development,” but he was not able to transform the relationship. What has been the long-term impact of weakened normalization in favour of genuine mutual understanding?166 Direct Sino-US conflict has been avoided while the two sides have grown trade and investment. However, after several decades of negotiation, the two sides have still not agreed to a working definition of their “normalized” relationship. Sino-American normalization – despite the enormity of often cited Sino-US mutual economic interests – has, in the long run, turned out to be comparatively weak. In his twilight years, America’s elder statesman, Henry Kissinger, returned to the issue of how best to promote a normal Sino-American relationship. In On China, Kissinger recommended “co-evolution”: The appropriate label for the Sino-American relationship is less partnership than “co-evolution” [共同进化]. It means that both countries pursue their domestic imperatives cooperating where possible. . . . Neither side endorses all the aims of the other or presumes a total identity of interests, but both sides seek to identify and develop complementary interests.167 “Co-evolution” is compatible with, and even looks like, “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” It challenged the original zero-sum approach of non-recognition. American non-recognition was originally predicated on the assumption that diplomacy cannot occur when the other party has a singular belief in the truth. This thinking represented an unhelpful displacement that shifted blame onto the Chinese for purported aggressive behaviour against the free world. US strategy does not focus on China as “the world’s largest developing country.” Instead China is an aspirant superpower engaging in a zero-sum struggle with American primacy in the Asia Pacific. According to Cold War historiography, China allegedly contained itself. China was faulted for being too ideological. Mao loved to “curse” and fire off “loose cannons,” but over the decades, Deng’s foreign policy substantively constituted a measured response to the history of non-recognition. The latter was not allowed to stand in the way of normalization negotiations. “Co-evolution” could represent a new opportunity to revisit the principles governing Sino-US relations. The two sides have not been able to push forward on the Taiwan Question. The ongoing issue of arms sales poisoned the well insofar as the Chinese were

166  Sino-US normalization without closure concerned, and the West’s reaction to Tiananmen Square and the prospect of new containment resulted in revived and perhaps more intense Chinese concern regarding “peaceful evolution” and the American desire to see regime change in China. In the absence of easy agreement over Taiwan, a strategy of “co-evolution” might entail a more forthright American subscription to Chinese terms of reference in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” This would begin to address longstanding Chinese disaffection over the US failure to treat China with equality and mutual respect. Deng’s foreign policy flexibly “reserved” enormously significant territorial, ideological and systemic issues so as to pursue the domestic agenda of national economic development. Even Taiwan remains a case in point in that it has been generally managed on the basis of “strategic ambiguity.”168 A certain gravitas would now be refreshing, especially in light of the contemporary sandbox antics over the freedom of navigation and the competing claims to the Scarborough Reef. This minor question has been given disproportionate significance in the definition of Sino-US security interests in the region. Indeed, “partnership” may be too much to expect, but the two sides can still “seek common ground” as the Asian states did at Bandung in the heightened Cold War context of aggravated East-West tension and the containment of “Red China.”

Notes 1 Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011, p. 78. 2 Henry Kissinger, Years of Renewal, London and New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999, p. 872. 3 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 874. 4 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 151. 5 This was to extend the implications of Deng’s formulation, “peace and development,” as it was adopted in September 1982 at the Twelfth Party Congress. See Deng Xiaoping, “We must Safeguard World Peace and Ensure Domestic Development,” (29 May 1984), DXPSWIII, p. 66; Deng Xiaoping, “We Regard Reform as Revolution,” (10 October 1984), DXPSWIII, p. 89. 6 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 872. 7 William Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, New York: The New Press, 1999, p. 115. 8 See Fan Jingguo, ed., Gongheguo waijiao fengyunzhongde Deng Xiaoping (The Charisma of Deng Xiaoping as republic diplomat), Harbin: Heilongjiang chubanshe, 2004, p. 162. 9 See Fan Jingguo, ed., Gongheguo waijiao fengyunzhongde Deng Xiaoping (The Charisma of Deng Xiaoping as republic diplomat), p. 174; Ruan Hong, The Diplomat from China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2005, 356. 10 Jimmy Carter, Keeping the Faith: The Memoirs of a President, Fayetteville: Arkansas University Press, 2013, p. 216. 11 Carter Diary, January 29, 1979 in Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 214. 12 Some of this detail is in the recent Beijing documentary, Lufeng jiuer (Nine days whirlwind). 13 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 521. 14 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 192.

Sino-US normalization without closure  167 15 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 192. 16 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 192. 17 Huang Hua, Huang Hua Memoirs, Beijing; Foreign Languages Press, 2008, p. 321. 18 Fan Qingguo, ed., Gongheguo waijiao fengyunzhongde Deng Xiaoping (The charisma of Deng Xiaoping as republic diplomat) p. 149. 19 See Huang, Memoirs, p. 152. 20 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 214. 21 See Chinese text in Waijiaobu, (Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Zhonghua renmin gongheguo tiaoyueji (Collected treaties of the People’s Republic of China), vol. 26, 1979, Beijing: Shijie zhishi chubanshe, 1983, p. 5. 22 Deng Xiaoping, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” (2 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p 173. 23 Ronald C. Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, London: Macmillan, 1989, p. 188. 24 Huang, Memoirs, p. 220. 25 Huang, Memoirs, p. 225. 26 Chinese commentary used this term citing the authority of Lenin who criticized “revisionists” at the Second International as “a gang of social-imperialists – “Socialism in words, imperialism in deeds, the growth of opportunism into imperialism.” See Total Bankruptcy of Soviet Modern Revisionism, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1968, p. 81. 27 Huang, Memoirs, p. 310. 28 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 198. 29 Huang, Memoirs, p. 223. 30 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 183. 31 As in the Foreign Relations of the United States, (1969–76) (FRUS), vol. 17: China, 1969–72, p. 187, cited by Jay Taylor, Generalissimo, p. 551. 32 For discussion of this theme, see Ronald C. Keith, “Zhou Enlai he Hengli.Jixinge zai shijian he shiyongzhuyide jiaocha koushang” (Zhou Enlai and Henry Kissinger at the crossroads of praxis and pragmatism) in Zhou Enlai Studies Centre, ed., Zhou Enlai yu ershi shijide Zhongguo he shijie (Zhou Enlai and twentieth century China and the world), vol. 2, Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 2015, pp., 1235–1249. 33 See this description of the back cover of Margaret Macmillan, Seize the Hour: When Mao Met Nixon, London: John Murray, 2006. 34 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 194. 35 Burr, The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 278. Kissinger had told Mao something entirely different. According to Niall Ferguson, Kissinger had “no interest whatsoever” in Hegel’s “dialectical fusion of theses and antitheses.” Ferguson, Kissinger: 1923–1968, p. 29. 36 Macmillan, Seize the Hour, p. 211. 37 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, pp. 193, 196. 38 Originally in New York Times, 9 November 1971, pp. 1, 16 cited and discussed in Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, fn. 67, p. 195. 39 Huang, Memoirs, p. 253. 40 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 195. 41 Kissinger, On China, p. 240. 42 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 193. 43 Ronald C. Keith, “China’s Emergence from Continentalism; The Study of Underlying Continuities in Chinese Foreign Policy”, Quei Quo, ed., The Politics of the Pacific Rim, Burnaby, B.C.: SFU Publications, 1982, p. 149. 44 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 882. 45 As originally in FRUS (1969–76), (Foreign Relations of the US), vol. 17: China, 1969–72, p. 765, as analysed by Taylor, Generalissmo, p. 576. 46 See related analysis in Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 201. 47 For extended analysis see Jisi Luoneide, (Ronald Keith), “Zhou Enlai he Hengli. Jixingen zai shijian he shiyongzhuyide jiaocha koushang”, (Zhou Enlai and Henry

168  Sino-US normalization without closure Kissinger at the crossroads of praxis and pragmatism) in Nankai daxue Zhou Enlai zhongxin (Nankai University Zhou Enlai Studies Centre), ed., Zhou Enlai yu ershi shijide Zhongguo he shijie (Zhou Enlai and twentieth century China and the world), vol. 2, Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 2015, pp. 1235–49 48 Nixon, Memoirs, p. 565. 49 Henry Kissinger, On China, London and New York: Penguin Books, 2011, p. 244. 50 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 194. 51 Chen Chunde, “Looking Back at Nixon’s First China Trip,” Beijing Review, no. 1, 2–8 January 1989, p. 36. 52 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 147. See also Gong Li, Deng Xiaoping yu Meiguo (Deng Xiaoping and America), Beijing: Zhonggongdangshi chubanshe, 2004, p. 62. 53 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 157. 54 In an interview with Neville Maxwell, 19 November 1971, Zhou Enlai critiqued the “five-power balance.” The Chinese text of this interview together with the texts of many of his early 1970s interviews is available in Zhou Enlai jinianji (Commemorative selections on Zhou Enlai), Hong Kong: Chishi niandai, 1977, pp. 440–57. 55 William Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 58. 56 Henry Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, Boston & Toronto: Little, Brown & Co., p. 50. 57 Macmillan, Seize the Hour, pp. 208–09. 58 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 64. 59 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 64. 60 Kissinger, On China, p. 255. 61 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 156. 62 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 192. 63 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 195. 64 Foreign Ministry, People’s Republic of China “ZhongHua Renmin Gongheguo he Meili jinhezhong guolian gongbao,” (Communique on Sino-American joint relations), Zhonghua Remin Gongheguo tiaoyueji (Collected treaties of the People’s Republic of China), 1972, vol. 19, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1977, p.23. 65 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 140. 66 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, pp. 201–202. 67 Macmillan, Seize the Hour, p. 210. 68 Keith, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, pp. 5, 159–60, 202. 69 Envers Hoxha, Reflections on China, vol. 1, 1962–1972: Extracts from the Political Diary, Toronto: Norman Bethune Institute, 1979, p. 688. 70 Ronald C. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s ‘Independent Foreign Policy,’” International Journal, vol. xli, no 1, Winter 1985–6 , p. 113. 71 “The Three Worlds Concept: Chinese and Albanian Versions,” China Report, January– February 1978, Documents, p. 60. 72 Henry Kissinger, The White House Years, New York: Little, Brown, 1979, p. 783. 73 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 201. 74 The English text of the communique is in Current Background, no. 952, 27 March 1972, pp. 37–42. The Chinese text is in Zhonghua renmin gongheguo tiaoyueji (Collected treaties of the People’s Republic of China), vol. 19, 1972, pp. 20–4. 75 Kissinger, The White House Years, p. 712. 76 See the text of this broadcast in Facts on File, vol. xxxi, no. 1603, 1971, p. 541. 77 Kissinger, White House Years, p. 763. 78 Huang, Memoirs, p. 327. 79 Kissinger, On China, p. 275. 80 See Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 181. According to another source, Haig had mentioned that the “viability” of China should be maintained. Zhou and his interpreter, Zhang Hanzhi, had to look the word up and thought to question China’s “viability” was patronizing. See Margaret Macmillan, Seize the Hour, p. 223. 81 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 181.

Sino-US normalization without closure  169 82 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, p. 883. 83 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 206. 84 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 47 85 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 50. 86 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 50. 87 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 67. 88 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 47. 89 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 209. 90 Gong, Deng Xiaoping yu Meiguo, pp. 106–7. 91 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 290. 92 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 49. 93 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, pp. 54–5. 94 Gong, Deng Xiaoping yu Meiguo, pp. 74, 101. 95 “Resolution of C.P.C. on Dismissing Teng Hsiao-ping from all Posts Both Inside and Outside the Party,” Peking Review, no. 15, 9 April 1976, p. 3. Deng was cast as a contemporary “Nagy.” The latter had been executed for his leadership of the “counterrevolutionary incident” in Hungary in 1956. 96 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 208. Kissinger had told Deng when they met in New York in April 1974 that when he first met Zhou, he had described China as a “land of mystery.” He admitted that now the US must seem like a “mysterious country.” Referring to Watergate, Deng replied: “Such an issue is really incomprehensible to us.” Burr, The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 278. 97 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 214. 98 Ross Terrill, Mao: A Biography, New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1981, p. 413. 99 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 297. 100 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 297. 101 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 295. 102 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 312. 103 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 244. 104 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 384. 105 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 384. 106 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 17. 107 Fan Hsiao, “The Superpower Label for Soviet Revisionism Cannot Be Removed,” Renmin ribao (People’s daily), 5 April 1974, as featured in Ugly Features of Soviet Social-Imperialism, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, p. 2. There is an interesting parallel between Lenin here and the Chinese tradition that argues that words are only confirmed in deeds. 108 Mei Ou, “Where Is the Dawn of Peace and Cooperation,” originally in Renmin ribao, (People’s daily), 5 August 1975, in Ugly Features of Soviet Social-Imperialism, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, p. 60. 109 Burr, ed., The Kissinger Transcripts, p. 391. Fan Hsiao, “The Superpower Label for Soviet Revisionism Cannot Be Removed,” as it appears in Ugly Features of Soviet Social-Imperialism, p. 2. 110 Kissinger, Years of Renewal, pp. 890–1. 111 Huang, Memoirs, p. 320. 112 “Deng Xiaoping tong Meiguo guangbo dianshi zhute rende tanhua,” Qian Hong, Deng Xiaoping yu ZhongMei jianjiao fengyun, (Deng Xiaoping and the fastchanging establishment of relations), Appendix 2, Beijing: Zhong Gong Dang shi chubanshe, 2005. 113 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 209. 114 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 199. 115 As discussed in R. Keith’s review of A. Doak Barnett, The Making of Foreign Policy in China: Structure and Process, Boulder, Co.: Westview Press, 1985 in International Journal, vol. xli, no. 2, pp. 468–70, p. 465.

170  Sino-US normalization without closure 116 Jones & Kevill, eds., China and the Soviet Union 1949–84, pp. 120–1. 117 Drew Middleton, “US Policy toward Moscow and Beijing in an Era of Declining Detente,” Douglas T. Stuart & William T. Tow, China, the Soviet Union and the West, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1982, pp. 242–3. 118 Carter, Keeping the Faith, p. 211. 119 See Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of Modern China, p. 527 120 Deng Xiaoping, “Uphold the Four Cardinal Principles,” (30 March 1979), DXPSWII, p. 166. 121 Christopher Warren’s testimony, US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Taiwan. Hearings on Bill s.245, Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1979, p. 56. 122 Jones & Kevill, comp., China and the Soviet Union 1949–84, p. 119. 123 “Speech at a Plenary Meeting of the Military Commission of the Central Committee of the CPC,” (28 December 1977), DXPSWIII, p. 93. 124 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping, p, 481. 125 Cited in Alexander Haig Jr., Caveat: Realism, Reagan, and Foreign Policy, New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1984, p. 199. 126 Haig, Caveat, p. 199. 127 Haig, Caveat, p. 206. 128 Haig, Caveat, p. 211. 129 Ruan, Diplomat from China, p. 354. 130 “Prepared Statement of Allen S. Whiting,” House of Representatives, US Congress, Hearings of the Committee on Foreign Relations, Washington D.C., The United States and the People’s Republic of China for the 1980s, 1980, pp. 45, 56. 131 22 July 1980 testimony of A. Doak Barnett to House of Representatives, US Congress, Hearings of the Committee on Foreign Relations, Washington D.C., The United States and the People’s Republic of China for the 1980s, 1980, p. 34. 132 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 359. 133 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 366. 134 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at the Third Session of CPC Advisory Commission,” (22 October 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 93. 135 Deng, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Mike Wallace,” (2 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 172. 136 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 463. 137 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, pp. 486–7. 138 Ruan , The Diplomat from China, p. 459. 139 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 473. 140 Ruan, The Diplomat from China, p. 467. 141 Deng Xiaoping, “We Must Adhere to Socialism and Prevent Peaceful Evolution Towards Capitalism,” (23 November 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 333. Deng argued that the new emphasis was in contrast to past attempts to bully China with the atom and hydrogen bombs. See Deng Xiaoping, “We Are Confident that We Can Handle China’s Affairs Well,” (16 September 1989), DXPSWIII, p. 315. 142 Deng Xiaoping, “China Will Tolerate No Disturbances,” (4 March 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 279. 143 Deng Xiaoping, “China Will Never Allow Other Countries to Interfere in its Internal Affairs,” (11 July 1990), DXPSWIII, p. 346. 144 Ronald C. Keith, China’s Struggle for the Rule of Law, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994, pp. 58–9. 145 Deng, “We Must Adhere to Socialism and Prevent Peaceful Evolution Towards Capitalism,” (23 November 1989), SWDXPIII, pp. 333–4. 146 Deng Xiaoping, “We Are Working to Revitalize the Chinese Nation,” (7 April 1990), DXPSWIII, pp. 344–5. 147 Deng Xiaoping, “The United States Should Take the Initiative in Putting an End to the Strains in Sino-American Relations,” (31 October 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 321.

Sino-US normalization without closure  171 148 Deng, “The United State Should Take the Initiative in Putting an End to the Strains in Sino-American Relations,” p 321. 149 Deng, “The United States Should Take the Initiative in Putting an End to the Strains in Sino-American Relations,” p. 322. 150 Jon Meacham, Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush, New York: Random House, 2016, p. 374. 151 Meacham, Destiny and Power, pp. 374–5. 152 Jiang Zemin used a more traditional expression: “Whoever tied the bell around the tiger’s neck is the one who has to untie it. China has always sought to develop friendly relations with other countries, including the United States, on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.” See Jiang Zemin, “We Chinese Have Always Cherished Our National Integrity,” (31 October 1989), SWJZMI, p.67. 153 Qian Qichen, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, New York: HarperCollins, 2005, p. 138. 154 Deng Xiaoping, “Sino-US Relations Must Be Improved,” (10 December 1989), DXPSPIII, p. 338. 155 See Jonathan Mirsky’s review of six book publications on Tiananmen Square, “The Empire Strikes Back,” The New York Review of Books, vol. xxxvii, no. 1, 1 February 1990, p. 23. 156 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 143–4. 157 Zbigniew Brzezinski, Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower. New York, Basic Books, 2007, p. 56. 158 Kissinger, On China, p. 394. 159 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 78. 160 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, pp. 78–81. 161 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 150. 162 Deng Xiaoping, “One Country, Two Systems” (22–23 June 1984), Deng Xiaoping on the Question of Hong Kong, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1993, p. 8. 163 “With One Eye on Washington, China Plots its own Asia ‘Pivot,’” Reuters, httpss://readtiger.com/www.reuters.com/article/us-china-diplomacy-idUSKBNOFR826X20140703. Accessed 7 April 2017. 164 For an interesting but controversial explanation of this, see Yan Xuetong, “From Keeping a Low Profile to Striving for Achievement,” The Chinese Journal of International Politics, April 2014, pp. 160–1. 165 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 50. 166 Keith, Ronald C., “Zhou Enlai he Hengli jixinge zai ‘shijian’ he ‘shiyongzhuyi’de jiaoyikoushang’,” (Zhou Enlai and Henry Kissinger at the Crossroads of ‘Praxis’ and “pragmatism”), Nankai daxue Zhou Enlai yanjiu zhongxin, (Nankai University Centre of Zhou Enlai Studies), ed., Zhou Enlai yu ershi shiji Zhongguo he shijie, (Zhou Enlai and 20th Century China and the World), Vol. iii, Beijing: Zhongyong wenxian chubanshe, pp. 1235–49. 167 Kissinger, On China, 2011, p. 526；Henry Kissinger, Lun Zhongguo, Beijing: ChinaCITIC Press, 2012, p. 515. 168 For related discussion, see Keith, Ronald C., “Strategic Ambiguity and the New Bush Administration’s ‘China Threat,’” The Review of International Affairs, Frank Cass, London and Ankara, vol. 1, no. 2, Winter 2001, pp. 1–19.

4 Ideology and the Five Principles in Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian normalizations

As early as 25 April 1956, Mao circulated his thoughts on “ten major relationships,” or ten key contradictions concerning policy, so as to get the Party studying and thinking about China’s particular national conditions and the suitability of copying Soviet experience in light of these conditions. The ten relations together revealed “certain defects and errors” that “have lately come to light” in the Soviet building of socialism.1 While there was a lot to learn from the Soviets, the following August Mao warned Party members against “subjectivism” in the form of blind copying of, rather than “learning” from, the Soviet model: “The slogan we have advocated all along is to draw on the advanced Soviet experience. Who told you to pick up its backward experience? Some people are so indiscriminate that they say a Russian fart is fragrant. That too is subjectivism. The Russians themselves say it stinks.”2 More and more Mao became interested in criticizing the “backward,” rather than learning from the “advanced,” Soviet experience. He had told his Party in November 1956 that the Sino-Soviet relationship was a “unity of opposites.” He increasingly emphasized the “differences” between the two “socialist countries.” These differences deepened and metastasized after Khrushchev attacked the Chinese delegation at the Bucharest meeting of communist and workers’ parties in June 1959. The Soviets on the following 16 July scrapped 600 contracts, relating to their support of 250 Chinese enterprises. The war of words between the CPSU and CCP spilled over into state-tostate relations and brought the two countries close to war in 1969. Both sides were quite familiar with the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Caught in the grip of stark ideological differences, they were incapable of bringing about successful negotiations to reestablish amicable state-to-state relations on the basis of such joint statements. The world’s two most powerful socialist states could not “reserve their differences” so as to reconcile the relation between fraternity in socialism and the sovereign equality of states entitled to their national self-determination. There was a precipitous reductionism in the relations between the CCP and CPSU that accompanied high-pitched “fractionalism” between communist parties at the expense of international unity. This “fractionalism” included gross interference by one party in the inner affairs of the other. Deng Xiaoping personally led the CCP delegation to Moscow from 5–10 July 1963 to discuss the two sides’

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  173 different points of view with M.A. Suslov, member of the CPSC CC Secretariat and a leading Party theoretician. Deng was directly involved in mid-1960 Party disputes. He defended the minority viewpoint of fraternal parties as against Soviet-led attempts to interdict individual party viewpoints through the manipulation of the majority of parties in the international communist movement.3 Professor, and subsequently National Security Adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski argued that the key issue over leadership and ideological correctness ultimately resulted in the counterintuitive “restoration of the primacy of interstate relations, and the consequent decline in the relative importance of the formerly paramount party channels. . . .”4 Indeed, when Deng and Mikhail Gorbachev later met in May 1989, the PRC and USSR again subscribed to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, ideology was treated as an exclusively domestic affair. Neither side was particularly concerned about the absence of a centre in the socialist world. The Five Principles, as they originally applied to relations between socialist and capitalist countries, were also featured in the Asian context of Sino-Indian agreement, at the Geneva Conference on Indo-China and at the Bandung Afro-Asian alignment. On 12 October 1954, the USSR and PRC issued a joint statement declaring that they would both conduct their relations with the countries of Asia and the Pacific on the “strict observance of principles of mutual respect for one another’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, non-aggression, non-interference in one another’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit and peaceful cooperation.”5 Zhou Enlai, with Mao’s authority, sponsored the same principles in Eastern Europe in the hope of ameliorating pent-up post-Stalinist nationalist tensions that were threatening the future of socialism in that region. While Mao had claimed that Stalin’s decision-making had been seventy percent correct, his calculation assigned many extra percentage points to Stalin for his emphasis on continuing the class struggle under socialism so as to prevent backsliding into capitalism. Stalin’s thirty percent error rate included “great nation chauvinism” towards supposedly inferior socialist parties and inappropriate intervention into “the internal affairs of certain brother countries and parties.”6 In China, for example, the CCP had to struggle to avoid mechanical copying of Russian experience that had caused “serious reverses to the revolutionary forces of our country.”7 Mao once summed up: “The Chinese revolution won victory by acting contrary to Stalin’s will.”8 The Five Principles were supposed to keep the peace between fraternal socialist states. Even though the latter in theory were presumed to be more contradiction-free than capitalist states, the hot animosities between socialist states seemed impervious to rational negotiated settlement. The issue of fraternal socialist intervention was tough to apply given the realities of the Polish “disturbances” and the “Hungarian Incident” of 1956, which raised the possibility of the collapse of the socialist camp. The Chinese government had been busy advocating the Five Principles in Eastern Europe in light of the negative experience there of Stalin’s “great nation chauvinism,” when Soviet intervention in Poland was narrowly averted in light of new First Secretary Gomulka’s assurances to the Soviet leadership that Poland would not withdraw

174  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations from the Warsaw Treaty Organization (WTO). The Hungarian case was not so easily contained, as the new Hungarian leadership precipitously withdrew Hungary from the WTO.9 In one of the most disappointing episodes in the annals of modern Chinese diplomatic history, the Chinese reversed themselves at the last minute and pressed for Soviet intervention in Hungary to save socialism and the WTO. The Hungarian crisis was sudden. There was no time to debate the issues. Mao later commented frankly on Beijing’s confusion over Hungary when discussing what the political leadership’s and responsible journalism’s approach to concrete conditions should not be: Or, as in the case of Nagy’s coming to power during the Hungarian incident: we were not clear about the situation, but couldn’t keep calm either, [so we] published [the news] three days too early. . . . when we published the news on day one, we didn’t say if he was good or bad. In day two’s news, we said he was good. On day three, we said he was bad. [So] the masses became confused.10 “Reactionary elements” in the Hungarian leadership had allegedly broken faith with the “broad masses of the people,” and the situation had been aggravated by Stalin’s big country chauvinism. The PRC government issued a statement supporting an earlier statement of the Soviet government of 30 October 1956 highlighting the Five Principles as the basis for the mutual relations between socialist states.11 However, while the entirely “proper” demands of the Polish and Hungarian masses for democracy, independence, equality and material well-being could not be ignored, the reactionary elite had suddenly threatened to undermine the very existence of socialism in Hungary. The Hungarian collapse threatened to create a knock-on effect, bringing down the Eastern European socialist states like falling dominoes. Imre Nagy had been impressed by the reiteration of the Five Principles at Bandung and in the 1955 Belgrade Declaration. In the last days of Nagy’s crumbling regime, his appeals to these same principles were ignored in Beijing. Mao gave priority to bloc unity and claimed that “all other countries in the socialist camp have learned a lesson.”12 The Chinese hastened to preserve the WTO alliance and appeared to forget the domestic and international problems associated with the “export of revolution” that would come to haunt Beijing as the later result of the Brezhnev Doctrine and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.13 Whereas Zhou’s diplomacy had met with great success in Bandung, the deep predicament in Eastern Europe was not easily resolved by protestations of support for applying the Five Principles in the mutual relations between socialist states. The issue of Stalinism and how to coordinate within the socialist world while respecting national conditions and sovereign state equality increasingly informed the arguments between the CPSU and the CCP over the nature of socialism and the need for global leadership of the socialist countries. The 1960s and 1970s ideological disputes between China and the Soviet Union were spectacular in their ferocity – “irreconcilable” and “intractable,” as Kissinger

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  175 put it.14 On the other hand, the history of the Sino-Soviet dispute suggests that as Chinese policy over time emphasized principles such as equality between states and parties and non-interference in the internal affairs of other parties and states, there was, as Brzezinski has suggested, a corresponding loss of relevance for the idea of a centre for the world communist movement. After years of intense mutual denunciation, Deng Xiaoping finally met Gorbachev in Beijing in 1989. Looking back, Deng acknowledged that there had been a “lot of empty talk” between the CPSU and CCP. Deng honestly acknowledged his own personal culpability: “I was one of the persons involved and played no small role in those disputes.”15 Indeed, he was highly regarded by Mao as he was fiercely anti-Soviet. Deng disclaimed the 1960s ideological disputes. At the same time, he argued that the real reason for the collapse in state-to-state relations actually originated in the failure to extend equality to the Chinese: “In 1963, I led a delegation to Moscow. The negotiations broke down. . . . I don’t mean it was because of the ideological disputes; we no longer think that everything we said at the time was right. The basic problem was that the Chinese were not treated as equals and felt humiliated.”16 In 1989, Deng welcomed Gorbachev to Beijing, buried the issue of “revisionism” and focused on his domestic agenda for “reform is revolution.” The Sino-Soviet ideological disputes, Deng claimed, had masked an underlying problem of inequality that could be addressed only through the genuine application of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Just as Zhou and Kissinger had reviewed their differences in July 1972, Deng and Gorbachev in May 1989 reviewed nineteen previous years of abnormal relations.17 Deng and Gorbachev duly agreed on an eight –character approach, “letting go of the past, and opening up the future” 结束过去, 开辟未来. Letting go of “bygones” is not easy! Remarkably, however, the two sides were able to cope with their Party-to-Party and corresponding state-to-state issues, and their ultimately successful normalization was strong enough to withstand the sudden collapse of the Soviet Union. Deng’s “pragmatism” allowed for contemporaneous opposition to hegemonism while pursuing normal relations with both the US and the Soviet Union. Deng led a progressive Sino-Soviet normalization that was not significantly interrupted by the apocalyptic collapse of the Soviet Union. “Normalization” survived to provide essential border security and political stability in the context of the creation of the Russian Federation and new states in a process that had unleashed pent-up competing ethnicities in the former Soviet space. This was remarkable progress considering what the two sides had been through in the 1960s through to the early 1980s.

The chronology of pathological Sino-Soviet animosity Mao claimed that Stalin was seventy percent correct, but he was never comfortable in his dealings with Stalin. Mao believed that in the 1920s through the mid-1940s, Stalin had issued bad instructions that encouraged “left” and “right” opportunist lines within the CCP, and that many Party comrades paid dearly with their lives in

176  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations order to get the Chinese revolution back on track.18 Stalin had thwarted the CCP’s attempts to harness Chinese nationalism to the cause of Chinese socialism. He would “not permit China to make revolution” and had urged the CCP to cooperate with Chiang Kai-shek in order to avoid a civil war. Having suffered severe losses due to Stalin’s errors of judgement, Mao went to Beijing in 1950, where he endured Stalin’s insults about China’s “fake revolution.” At first, Stalin claimed that because of the Yalta agreement, it would be improper to dump the former Sino-Soviet treaty with Chiang’s government.19 He was reluctant to sign a new treaty with Mao and had seriously entertained the possibly of merely amending the treaty which he had already signed with Chiang Kai-shek.20 Mao had to plead with Stalin for a treaty and for aid. The terms of the latter were punitive. After Stalin’s death in 1953, Khrushchev visited Beijing “to remove tensions” that had arisen with Stalin’s hard-nosed bargaining in 1950, particularly with reference to “demanding too much in return for aid” and the development of joint stock companies with mining and industrial concessions. Mikhail Suslov, Secretary of the CPSU CC, claimed that in addition to removing Stalin’s personality cult, his new boss, Nikita Khrushchev, had conscientiously revived the Leninist principle of equality in the relations between socialist parties and had also insisted on making up for the inequality that Stalin had imposed on China. Indeed, China had gained international stature in light of the 1954 Geneva Conference and the Bandung conference of the non-aligned. Zhou Enlai had been especially welcome in Eastern Europe, where, in some socialist countries, Stalin’s rough treatment of local nationalism created a backlash against Soviet leadership of proletarian internationalism. Khrushchev’s secret speech of February 1956 denouncing Stalin at the CPSU’s Twentieth Party Congress rocked Beijing. Mao believed that at this Congress, Khrushchev had “dropped” Stalin’s sword. Without warning, Khrushchev had in effect dropped the issue of personality cult in Mao’s lap. Moreover, Mao believed that Khrushchev had undermined Stalin’s emphasis on maintaining class struggle and that Stalin’s “sword” was needed to prevent socialism from sliding back into capitalism. Second, while Chinese foreign policy also stressed “peaceful coexistence,” Mao was concerned that the Soviets were too interested in their peaceful relations with US imperialism and that they were prepared to sacrifice Third World national liberation to “peaceful coexistence” and “peaceful transition.” In 1962, Mao reviewed the Khrushchev problem, claiming that “revisionism came and put pressure on us”: From the second half of 1958, [Khrushchev] wanted to blockade the Chinese coastline. He wanted to set up a joint fleet so as to have control over our coastline and blockade us. It was because of this question that Khrushchev came to our country. After this, in September 1959, during the Sino-Indian border dispute, Khrushchev supported Nehru in attacking us and Tass issued a communique. . . . at our Tenth Anniversary Celebration banquet in October, he attacked us on our own rostrum. At the Bucharest Conference in 1960 they tried to encircle and annihilate us. . . . We spent the whole of 1960 fighting Khrushchev.21

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  177 The Beijing publication of Khrushchev’s statements was prefaced with a laborious enumeration of the mistakes of the 1956 CPSU Twentieth Congress, which paved the way for the October 1961 Twenty-second CPSU Congress and its apparently astounding claim that “the state of the whole people” had replaced the “dictatorship of the proletariat”: . . . The Twentieth Congress of the CPSU is the root from which stems all the evils done by the Khrushchov (sic) revisionists. [There] we can the find the origin of all such things as the [October 1961] Twenty-second Congress of the CPSU, the Programme of the CPSU, the “three peacefuls” and “two entires” (“peaceful coexistence,” peaceful competition” and “peaceful transition,” and “the state of the entire people” and the Party of the entire people”), and the “four alignments with and four againsts” (alignment with imperialism against socialism, alignment with the United States against China . . . alignment with the reactionaries everywhere against the national liberation movements and the people’s revolutions, and alignment with the Tito clique . . . against all the fraternal Marxist-Leninist parties). . . .22 Out of respect for the unity of the socialist camp, the two sides had initially tried to maintain a public equanimity while bawling each other in private. The Soviets chastised the Chinese for their exclusive focus on “dogmatism” or “sectarianism” in their destabilizing focus on revolution at the expense of peaceful coexistence. Mao and Deng, together with Peng Dehuai, Li Xiannian, Guo Moruo and Chen Boda, all attended the meeting of the twelve socialist countries that produced the 1957 Moscow Declaration. Believing that the Soviets were making some progress in their thinking about Stalin’s successes and failures, Mao seemed conciliatory and ready to accept that the socialist world needed a “leader,” saying: “ . . . we must have a leader. The Chinese Communist Party is not worthy of this function. . . . China has not even a quarter of a sputnik, whereas the Soviet Union has two.”23 The issue, however, became what if the head of world socialism imposes revisionism on other countries. Eventually, the Chinese, rather than claiming leadership for themselves, abandoned altogether the idea of having an international head for the socialist states. Also, getting to communism first became a matter of “fractionalism” for domestic and international Party prestige. Khrushchev told Mao that he thought the People’s Commune movement in China was irrationally premature. If the Chinese had moved too fast into the future, according to the Chinese, the Soviets were moving back in time towards Eduard Bernstein and “economism.” On 6 November 1958, Mao told his Party: “The Soviet Union also brags [about entering communism], but you only hear a noise on the staircase, you don’t see anyone coming down.”24 A few days later, Mao derided the Soviet example and the lack of consumer goods in the Soviet Union: “[The Soviets] have fewer commodities than we have; [the Soviet economy] walks like Iron Crutch Li, one leg long, one leg short, the hands holding the crutches quite out of balance.”25

178  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Mao had already told his Party that the Soviets had committed “mistakes of principle” 原则性错误.26 The whole point of his discussion on the ten major relations in 1956 was to brace the Party against huge Soviet mistakes and to articulate China’s own path to socialism. If Stalin was indeed seventy percent correct, his mistakes seemed extraordinarily profound. Stalin had created problems in Eastern Europe, and instead of applying proper dialectics in his analysis there, had fallen into a subjective pit of metaphysics, especially in his push for heavy industrialization in national economies where the conditions were so obviously premature. Mao strongly disagreed with Khrushchev’s wholesale denunciation of Stalin, but Mao’s own long list of Stalin’s mistakes covered a whole range of policy areas, not to mention government structure and organization. Mao, however, was forgiving in his leadership mathematics. Because Stalin had focused on class struggle, he was deemed seventy percent correct! Neither side appreciated the other’s criticisms, many of which came too close to home for comfort. These criticisms cast doubt on the legitimacy of their respective regimes as predicated on their specific interpretations of “socialism.” Their respective national security was also at stake. The Chinese claimed to support nuclear disarmament, but they believed that Khrushchev’s attempt to arrive at an agreement with the Americans that would contain the global threat of nuclear war was a collaborative exercise to control international affairs at China’s expense. This was especially apparent in the intense Beijing reaction to the US-Soviet signing of a test ban treaty. The Soviet exchanges with the Chinese over this treaty had stressed that China was a backward developing country which should depend on the Soviet deterrent rather than squandering its own meagre resources. The Soviet rhetoric scraped the bottom of culinary racism when it quipped how could the Chinese manufacture and manage nuclear weapons “. . . when they eat watery soup and do not even wear pants.”27 For their part, the Chinese alleged that Khrushchev’s “revisionism” had resulted in “Hungarian goulash.” They were especially upset when they learned that Khrushchev had told the Americans that he cancelled his promise to the Chinese of a sample bomb and related materials. Mao was fond of “strategically despising the enemy while taking full account of him tactically” 战略上藐视敌人战术上重视敌人. Khrushchev, however, believed that he was a lunatic who wanted to plunge the world into nuclear war. Khrushchev was more interested in the survival of humanity than he was in the “East wind prevailing over the West wind.” For his part, Mao wanted to acquire the bomb so as to avoid being “bullied” and “blackmailed” by the nuclear powers. Chinese security could not rely on a Soviet nuclear umbrella. Moreover, the Chinese claimed that the Soviets tearing up the October 1957 agreement to provide China with a sample of an atomic bomb and related technical data was “a gift at the time the Soviet leader went to the United States for talks with Eisenhower in September. . . .”28 Khrushchev had failed the critical test of socialist solidarity. The imminent test of a Chinese bomb caused serious concern in Washington. According to declassified information, in a cabinet room meeting of 15 September

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  179 1964, President Eisenhower together with Secretary of State Rusk and Secretary of War Robert McNamara developed a two-pronged position, namely that the US would not commit an “unprovoked unilateral U.S. military action against Chinese nuclear installations at this time.” This option, however, was reserved in the event of future military hostilities with China. Second, the discussions raised “many possibilities for joint action with the Soviet government, including preventive military action that could be discussed privately with Ambassador Dobrynin “as soon as possible.”29 Although Moscow had accused the Chinese of pushing the world towards nuclear war, the Russian leaders actually seemed less concerned than the Americans over the Chinese carrying out their first nuclear test. In a memorandum to Deng’s delegation in Moscow, the Soviets had actually told the Chinese that the reason why they thought the Chinese should not have nuclear weapons is that the US would then insist on West Germany having the same nuclear option.30 While the Soviets and Americans dithered, the Chinese exploded their first nuclear device on 16 October 1964. Most of China’s senior Party leadership became directly involved in the antiSoviet polemics. Deng Xiaoping had been present with Mao in key conferences concerning Sino-Soviet relations in January, February and March 1960. He was given the lead at the Moscow Conference of 11–20 November 1960. This conference was supposed to heal the wounds inflicted at an earlier meeting in Bucharest that had witnessed a “stand-up slanging match” between Peng Zhen and Khrushchev.31 Deng Xiaoping was not very diplomatic either. He and Nikita Khrushchev sharply clashed. Ho Chi Minh had to separate the two scrapping leaders so as to rescue the Moscow Conference’s final communique. This meeting of eighty-one communist parties was the last to manage a partly meaningful, if not somewhat cosmetic, statement on the unity of the socialist world. Thereafter, according to one of his biographers, Deng had a “somewhat hostile attitude” towards the Russians well into the 1980s.32 On 14 November, Deng attacked Khrushchev’s friendship with the US as a means of consolidating the new line of “Soviet-US cooperation for the settlement of world problems.” Deng angrily denounced Khrushchev’s postCamp David tribute to Eisenhower for his help in averting nuclear war. Deng expressed utter disbelief: “. . . no considerations of diplomatic protocol can explain away or excuse Khrushchev’s tactless eulogy of Eisenhower. . . .”33 In the Chinese view, the utter uselessness of the treaty of alliance with the Soviets had been fully exposed. Certainly, it could not serve as a pillar of peaceful coexistence in the world. In light of the vigorous Chinese attacks, the Soviet delegation itself opposed the setting up of a new form of Comintern and the formal labelling of the CPSU as its head. The Chinese had referred to the CPSU as the “vanguard” and suggested that all was needed was an informal device facilitating ad hoc party consultations. Ignoring Chinese disingenuity, Khrushchev snapped: “What do you want a head for – so you can chop it off?”34

180  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Deng resented Soviet insinuation that China considered world war inevitable, but lamely argued that it was “probable while capitalism existed.” This thin reference to “probability” distinguished the Chinese position from Khrushchev’s, who had foreseen the exclusion of “world war from the life of society even before the complete triumph of socialism, even with capitalism existing in the world.”35 Ironically, Deng himself later came closer to Khrushchev’s position that peaceful coexistence was a permanent condition during the 1980s period of “peace and development” in China. Deng did say at the Conference that the Suez crisis had not led to world war. Later in 1962, he was unable to hide his dismay that the Soviet Union had taken the Indian government’s side in the border war with China. Then he addressed the key organizational issue of equality between socialist states and what this meant for proletarian internationalism. The CPSU was, to be sure, the “leading party,” but this did not obviate the equality and independence of all Communist parties, none of which should be forced to accept the resolutions of Soviet-led international congresses.36 Deng darkly warned the Soviets of the implications of a split in the international movement, and he put his own spin on the history of Bolshevism to make his point: “Lenin, by splitting the Social Democratic Party into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks, had formed what was a minority fraction in order, successfully in the end to win a majority.”37 The Chinese critique of Soviet world leadership was largely predicated on Mao’s concept of “self-reliance.” This concept ultimately proved subversive of the whole idea of a head for the socialist bloc. Hongqi (Red Flag) editorialized on this point in a key editorial of April 1960: We are Marxist-Leninists. We have always held that revolution is each nation’s own affair. We have always maintained that the working class can only depend on itself for its emancipation. . . . Revolution can neither be exported nor imported. No one can prevent the people of a foreign country from carrying out a revolution, nor can one produce a revolution in a foreign country by using the method of “helping the rice shoots to grow by pulling them up.”38 Mikhail Suslov, looking back on Chinese “splittism” at the Moscow Conference, rebutted Deng’s 1960 assumptions: [The CCP leaders] do not realize that international communist discipline in the present conditions does not imply the execution of orders given by someone at the top, but the assumption by the communist parties – of their own free will and from a keen awareness of their international duty of definite obligations towards the world communist movement as a whole and towards one another, as well as the consistent fulfilment of these obligations.39 Deng’s position attracted sympathetic advice as well as stiff criticism. Dolores Ibarruri, for example, found Deng’s position especially frustrating:

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  181 The Chinese representative’s statement is more an impermissible ultimatum than a summary of differences. . . . It is no small thing to belong to a country that has 650,000,000 inhabitants. We regard this demographic factor as having the greatest importance for the socialist camp. But it cannot be used as a means of exerting pressure on the international communist movement, which is threatened with a schism.40 The CCPCC issued “25 Points” on 14 June 1963 that featured a long laundry list of Chinese complaints. Among them, Point 22 reiterated Deng’s Moscow position: If the principle of independence and equality is accepted in relations among fraternal parties, then it is impermissible for any part to place itself above others, to interfere in their internal affairs, and to adopt patriarchal ways in relations with them.” Khrushchev’s “revisionist” leadership was accused of trying to manipulate the “common programme” of the international movement so as to subordinate socialist parties in an unequal relationship.41 The issue at hand was quite serious in light of factionalism inside communist and workers parties around the world that was resulting in the splitting of these parties as they adapted to the countervailing pressures of the Sino-Soviet dispute. Chinese insistence on the sovereign equality of states undermined the Soviet interest in international Party leadership. Published Chinese opinion was seen in the Soviet polemic of 1963 as an attempt to “mask a splitting policy with pseudo-theoretical talk.” Apparently, the Chinese were ideologically obsessed. The latter was predicated on Mao’s dictum that dialectics approve of “one splitting into two.” The CPSU claimed that Mao was setting up the “age of Mao,” or an international monopoly of theory: “In contrast to the great teachings of Marx, Engels and Lenin, the Chinese leaders seek to impose on the communist movement as its ideological banner the so-called ‘Sinofied’ Marxism.”42 The Soviet accusations also encompassed new criticisms to the effect that the Chinese leaders were taking a “racial” rather than a proletarian approach to Party affairs. The Soviets tried to turn the tables on the Chinese, accusing them of “Great China chauvinism,” not to mention outmoded Confucian attitudes. Both sides were highly emotive in their escalating, criticisms which in hindsight appear as distressed hysteria rather than honest expression of differences. Pravda, for example, ridiculed Mao Zedong Thought, citing his suggestion that “everything foreign” including Marxism itself had to be critically examined. Pravda caustically rejected Mao’s disrespectful earthy metaphor: “Everything foreign should be treated like food, which is first chewed in the mouth, then processed in the stomach, and then separated into waste, which is evacuated, and into extract, which is assimilated.” Mao’s metaphor on the discharging of waste through the human bowel was offensive especially when he should have focused on “the heart and soul of class brothers.”43

182  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Referring to “thousands of articles,” the CCPCC 15 June 1964 letter to the CPSUCC attempted a listing of polemical expletives that had been hurled at the CCP: You malign us as ‘pseudo-Marxists’ and ‘modern Trotskyites’; as adherents of ‘petty-bourgeois Utopianism in an undisguised form’, “plain anti-Sovietism,” “anticommunism,” “bellicose nationalism,” “racism,” “great-Han chauvinism” and “hegemonists”; as “Peking apostates,” “modern strike-breakers of the revolution,” “pseudo revolutionaries” and “spiritual fathers of present-day Right-wing socialists”; as “falling into the company of the forces of imperialist reaction” and “the company of inveterate colonialists,” etc. Can it be that you are defending Sino-Soviet friendship by this torrent of abuse.44 It seemed that “friends” turned out to be worse than “enemies.” The loose commentary was like a bad cartoon played over and over again during the Cultural Revolution; there seemed to be no bottom to the downward spiral of inflammatory exchange between supposedly fraternal socialist allies. Soviet experience and events had become the staple of Cultural Revolutionary politics in China. The Cultural Revolution made the mutual relations “irreconcilable.” The People’s Daily (人民日报) rejected any tentative Soviet suggestion of friendship as a “backstabbing rhetoric” worthy of Dean Acheson: Eighteen years ago, when US imperialism was driven out of China, Dean Acheson . . . [described] the US aggression against China over the past century as strengthening the friendship between the US and China. Now, the Soviet revisionist clique imitates Acheson by shamelessly blowing a broken trumpet for “friendship” while carrying out frantic anti-communist and anti-Chinese activities.45 The People’s Daily vented elaborating on a long list of betrayals, including the hardships caused by the withdrawal of Soviet experts in 1960, the failure to support China against India, attempts to use international conferences to isolate China and so forth. One does not have to read between the lines. Clearly, the Soviet Union was a disloyal “friend” who could not be trusted as an ally and was devolving into a pathological “socialist imperialism.” Sino-Soviet animosity became an embarrassment within the international socialist movement, which all could see in the failure to achieve “united action” on the frontlines of the struggle against US imperialism in Vietnam. The Soviets achieved some propaganda traction regarding the Chinese failure to agree, but this failure was bolstered with Soviet demands for passage through Chinese territory by air and land of Vietnam-bound equipment and troops that opened up old Chinese wounds of 1950 when the Soviets had tried to extend their stay in Northeast China. The CCP claimed that “united action” served as “Khrushchevism without Khrushchev.” It transposed “friends” into “enemies” and was designed to promote “splittism.”46 Grieving Chinese commentary lamented the “great historical retrogression” that was taking place in the Soviet Union.

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  183 The Soviet media alleged that the Chinese side was a bit too disingenuous. Notwithstanding the Chinese claim to deploy “all their forces to supporting the Viet-Nam people’s war,” the Soviets cited the Western “bourgeois press” coverage of Mao’s comments to Edgar Snow: “. . . the armies of China will not cross their frontiers to fight. That is clear enough. The Chinese will fight only in the event of a U.S. attack on China. Is that not clear? The Chinese are too busy with their domestic affairs.”47 Indeed, Mao responded by focusing on the form of war that he himself had excelled in, namely people’s war on China’s own soil. At the First Plenum of the Ninth Central Committee, Mao said that he would deal with the enemy only on Chinese territory: “Others may come and attack us, but we shall not fight outside our borders. We do not fight outside our borders. I say we will not be provoked. Even if you invite us to come out, we will not come out, but if you should attack us, we will deal with you.” Although Deng, in the crafting of the 1981 Resolution on Party History, refused to say that the Party had disappeared in the Cultural Revolution, its leadership and organization were fundamentally impaired in constant mass mobilizations against the class enemy and “power seizures” in various central and provincial ministries and departments. Such instability was closely watched with great interest in Moscow. Should China implode in Cultural Revolution there might be no need for intervention. China’s domestic weakness posed a serious national security issue for the Chinese. Foreign policy temporarily became especially unsteady during “power seizure” at the Foreign Ministry, and the diplomatic corps had been recalled to be dragooned into the process of Cultural Revolutionary class struggle. Mao settled scores with real and/or imagined enemies in his own Politbureau, but the Cultural Revolution was pushed to the provincial level. There it encountered stiff resistance, and the ultra-left wanted to cancel Mao’s instruction to support the army and to drag out the “capitalist roaders” in the army. Standing on the precipice of civil war and the spreading conflict between different military commands, Mao drew back, cancelled the Cultural Revolution and criticized the Red Guards for having gone too far. National security was in jeopardy and international speculation was rife as to what the Soviets might do should China descend into civil war. According to the 13 November 1968 Brezhnev Doctrine, the Soviet Union had the responsibility to intervene in countries where “hostile forces” threatened to undermine a socialist state. In November 1966, Deng had fallen along with Liu Shaoqi. He was allowed books to read, but for the most part he languished with his family first in Zhongnanhai and then later in Jiangxi. After he expressed heartfelt contrition to Mao for his mistakes, he was allowed to return to Beijing in February 1973. He was assigned as Vice-Premier to assist Zhou Enlai with foreign affairs and military matters. Premier Zhou at this time was physically and politically weak. The political context was extremely sensitive, as there was no real closure on the basic issues of the Cultural Revolution and the infighting over Mao’s succession remained intense.

184  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations

The political fortunes of Deng Xiaoping and China’s foreign policy Increasingly, Deng took over the portfolio of his mentor, Zhou Enlai, who was gravely ill. Deng pushed aside Mao’s heir apparent, Wang Hongwen, and stood in for Premier Zhou to welcome and meet foreign prime ministers and heads of state. In a major political coup, Deng went to New York to give the famous speech on Mao’s three worlds to the UN General Assembly in April 1974. His speech emphasized the competition between the two superpowers. In talks with leaders of the US Congress, he explained that China’s difficulties with the Soviet Union originated with Khrushchev’s attempt to control China.48 He also took the opportunity to needle the Americans about the need to deal more forthrightly with the Soviet Union. On his return to Beijing, Deng was given the same kind of triumphant fanfare that he had received on his return from his ideological battle with Suslov in Moscow in 1963.49 In his last years, Mao seemingly moved through all 72 metamorphoses of the Monkey King. In one final somersault, Mao settled on Hua Guofeng as his successor. Deng was yet again dismissed from all his government and party posts in April 1976. The Soviets held their breath and decided to wait out events. This time, however, it did not take long for Deng to return to power. He returned to his old posts in July 1978 and once again took on direct responsibility for several key areas, namely foreign and military affairs, education, science and technology. Deng then moved to place his supporters within the Party and military hierarchy and to insist on an exit strategy for Hua Guofeng. The latter resigned as Premier in August 1980. His Party powers were progressively sapped after he came under attack in November–December 1982.50 During this interregnum when Deng in effect served as paramount leader without the requisite formal positions, he took charge of the negotiations with the US over the establishment of diplomatic relations. He inherited an existing disposition towards “self-reliance.” Deng articulated a number of policy positions on the basis of “independence and self-reliance” which he, in the early 1980s, eventually bundled into his foreign policy of “peace and development.” In Deng’s view, the US Congress had grossly intervened in China’s internal affairs. The Taiwan Relations Act and American insistence on the sales of “defensive” military arms to Taiwan was a lesson in the need for “self-reliance” in the light of a lack of trust in American strategy and promises. “Self-reliance” was pitted against alliance systems, Deng confirmed in his rejection of “alliances and cardplaying,” and he pursued a correspondingly “low posture” foreign policy while bringing into China foreign technology and investment through the “open door.” The Taiwan Question was highly relevant to both Sino-American and SinoSoviet relations. During his 1980 campaign for the US presidency, Ronald Reagan made several pro-Taiwan speeches that attracted Beijing’s ire. When Deng met with Reagan’s running mate, George H. W. Bush, on 22 August 1980, Deng refused to accept Bush’s explanations of Reagan’s “retrogressive” speeches. He sent Bush back to Washington with a bluntly stated warning:

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  185 It is absolutely wishful thinking for the US government to think that China was afraid of the Soviet Union and had to plead with the US for help, so that if the US government implemented the China policy of the Republican election program and in the related speeches made by Reagan, China would have to swallow this insult.51 As far as Deng was concerned, such “pleading” was inconsistent with China’s national dignity and sense of “self-reliance and independence.” Although the Soviets had tried to arrest the process of Sino-American normalization by offering the Chinese the negotiation of a non-aggression pact, the Chinese had been unresponsive. “Socialist imperialism” clearly contradicted the substance of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Soviet invocation of the Brezhnev Doctrine in Afghanistan in 1979 to justify military intervention was anathema to Beijing. Relations with the Soviet Union were conflicted particularly with Brezhnev’s expansionism in Africa and Southeast and Central Asia, and yet in the 1980s, Deng’s thinking about the structure of international relations was undergoing a change that made future Sino-Soviet normalization more conceivable. The 16 September 1969 Beijing airport meeting between Kosygin and Zhou had arrested the immediate threat of a Sino-Soviet war, but the two sides, caught in the downward spiralling of their relations, were unable to negotiate related formal agreements so as to operationalize their 1969 understanding. That left the question open-ended as to the potential for Soviet intervention in China. The logic of Brezhnev could well have applied given the Soviet view that the Cultural Revolution was part of Mao’s “feudal cult” that drew on the negative antecedents of Confucianism and the Cultural Revolution was undermining socialism and the leadership of a Marxist-Leninist party.52 Initial progress towards Sino-US normalization may have provided some degree of creative ambiguity or counterbalance in that the Soviet Union could not be sure of the American reaction should the Soviet leadership opt for a stronger military option against China. For their part, the Chinese saw the international situation in largely negative terms, but geopolitically the issue was thought to be more pressing in Europe than Asia. At the same time, they believed that the post-Vietnam US response to Soviet expansionism was weak. Their description of the international forces highlighting the Vietnamese move into Cambodia and the Soviet move into Afghanistan in 1979 traces “the southward strategy” 南下战略 of Soviet hegemonism as an attempt to outflank Western Europe and to disrupt the strategic supply lines running in and out of the Middle East. The Soviet primary geopolitical focus on Western Europe was serviced in a secondary offensive in the East Asian-Pacific area which was dubbed the “dumbbell strategy.” The latter centres on the Strait of Malacca as the midpoint of a bar strategically joining Soviet naval activities in the Indian and Pacific oceans.53 China could not serve as a fully-fledged “pole” in Sino-US-Soviet relations. Essential deterrence against a Soviet strike on the PRC itself came from the threat of a long bitter struggle of attrition based on “dig tunnels deep, store grain every-where,

186  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations and never seek hegemony” 神挖洞广积粮不称霸. The Soviets would be swallowed up in the quagmire of a never-ending people’s war. Having already engaged in so much expansion, the Soviets would have to think twice as to the costs of attack on China as well as any impact on Soviet-US relations.54 The National People’s Congress passed a resolution on 3 April 1979 that the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship would not be renewed. It duly expired on 11 April 1980. However, China’s door was left slightly ajar, and under Deng’s developing leadership it became increasingly possible to assert new initiatives. The Chinese Foreign Ministry passed a note to the USSR’s embassy in the PRC indicating that the treaty’s expiry and the related “principled differences between China and the Soviet Union” should not prevent “normal state-to-state relations on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.” The principle of noninterference could be applied so as to avoid acrimony relating to the differences of social systems. Despite his own strong ideological reservations of the 1960s, Deng was ready to cool down the ideological dimensions of the Sino-Soviet dispute even as he pondered the problems associated with the consolidation of Sino-American normalization.55 On 24 March 1982, Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev gave a major speech in Tashkent indicating that he believed it was time to relax Sino-Soviet tensions. In a clever contrast with the Americans, he expressed full support for China on the Taiwan Question. He acknowledged that China was a “socialist” country. He disavowed any claim on China’s territory and he suggested negotiations on improving relations without preconditions. The Tashkent speech was received with great interest in Beijing, and Chinese analysis was alert to any evidence of changed Soviet thinking. The related statement of China’s foreign ministry reiterated the importance of Soviet “deeds,” but it signalled new interest in that it began, “We have noted what Chairman Brezhnev . . . said at Tashkent. . . .”56 Deng revised his foreign policy agenda, claiming that he now had “four aspirations” 四大愿望, namely to realize Sino-Japanese normalization and Sino-US normalization, to solve the question of Hong Kong’s return to China and to realize Sino-Soviet normalization.57 Interest in Sino-Soviet normalization had waned due to the December 1979 invasion of Afghanistan. The Soviet-US arms race was intensifying as a result of the deployment of new missile systems in Europe. In the uncertain context as to the real degree of American support for the Chinese, Soviet policy would prefer not to have consider simultaneous attacks coming from the East and the West. At the same time, their domestic economy had been hammered by poor harvests and declining availability of consumer goods, and policy desperately needed to refocus on agriculture and civilian-oriented industry. In short, imperial overreach was a heavy burden on the Soviet economy that was already failing. In such a context, normalization with China would be greatly beneficial to the Soviet need to refocus on the economy at home.58 There is in this readjustment some rough parallel with Deng Xiaoping’s own thinking as to the need to avoid costly conflict so as to secure peace and stability that supports domestic economic development.

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  187 Former Foreign Minister Huang Hua wrote in his memoirs that even before the Tashkent speech, Deng had given two key instructions, namely to change the foreign policy language that had emphasized opposing Soviet hegemony to opposing anyone who sought hegemony and, second, to avoid public discussion of Soviet internal affairs while continuing to oppose Soviet hegemony where necessary.59 Deng put a stop to ruinous Sino-Soviet public brawling. His instructions suggested a changing approach whereby Deng grafted together united front “dual tactics” and the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The ground rules for the Chinese approach to the “hegemonism” of the two superpowers was later explained in the May 1984 report of Premier Zhao Ziyang: We take a principled stand in handling our relations with the United States and the Soviet Union. We will not refrain from improving relations with them because we opposed their hegemonism, nor will we give up our anti-hegemonist stand because we want to improve relations with them, nor will we try to improve our relations with one of them at the expense of the other.60 Several rounds of October negotiations at the vice-ministerial level faltered on the question of preconditions for ministerial negotiations. The two sides were not quite ready for full-scale talks, but they managed to sign the “China-Union of Soviet Socialist Republics: Agreement on Economic and technical Cooperation” on 28 December 1984. The Agreement was prefaced by a commitment to apply the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and the first article affirmed that the signatories would take into account “the requirements and possibilities of the economies of each country.” 61 The fact that senior-level talks took place after so many years of deadlocked relations was significant, as was Deng’s beginning to move to “reserve differences,” but Deng still put the onus on the Soviets, insisting that they show the value of their words by performing relevant “deeds.” Deng was in tune with a tradition of honesty requiring words to match deeds 言行一致. When Gorbachev took over the Soviet leadership, he wanted him to demonstrate good faith by removing the “three obstacles” 三个障碍. The Soviets were advised to reduce and then withdraw Soviet troops from the border and from Mongolia, also to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan and finally to persuade Vietnam to withdraw its troops from Cambodia. Foreign Minister Huang Hua led the Chinese delegation to Moscow to conduct “burial diplomacy” 葬礼外交.62 The delegation conveyed sincere Chinese condolences on the death of Party General Secretary Brezhnev on 11 November 1982. Taking to heart Deng’s two instructions, it not only praised Brezhnev, but the delegation emphasized the traditional friendship of the Chinese and Soviet peoples and the “big socialist family.” This new attitude was well received. Foreign Minister Huang Hua (1976–82) reported on the warmth of the Soviet reception: “The Soviet media gave our delegation’s activities more conspicuous and important coverage than it did to delegations from other countries. For all its ceremonies

188  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations and activities, the Soviet side put our delegation in front of delegations from the socialist countries.”63 The friendly atmospherics in a diplomatic moment of sorrow did not immediately result in substantive changes in Soviet negotiating behaviour. In the first direct meeting between foreign ministers in twenty years, Gromyko, for example, referred to China’s identification of “three obstacles” and claimed that the Soviet Union could not negotiate the interests of third countries with China.64 Gromyko, who was well known in the Western political class as “Mr. No,” was still acting on the basis of an old script prepared by dying old comrades. If there was a new tone to Brezhnev’s last-minute China policy, substance was another matter. Serious negotiation was postponed due in part to the morbidity of Soviet leaders. Yuri Andropov died on 9 February 1984 and Konstantin Chernenko was scarcely in office when he too died on 10 March 1985. The breakthrough over the issue of preconditions came with the new generation of leadership under Mikhail Gorbachev. If one could for the moment discard the Chinese objection to such analogy, Gorbachev came to the negotiating table knowing that he had few cards to play. And at any rate, he was prepared to try a new game altogether – one that boldly addressed the issue of imperial overreach and focused on the renovation of the Soviet economy in an increasingly interdependent new world order.

“When the melon ripens, it falls off its stem: where water flows, a channel is formed” Finally, the relative timing of each side was propitious for meaningful negotiation. Deng had officially confirmed his foreign policy of peace and development at the Party’s Twelfth Congress in 1982. Deng buried the ideological extremism of large-scale class struggle. He had dropped Mao’s “single line” and downgraded Mao’s emphasis on general war. The revised state constitution of 4 December 1982 had sanctioned “independent foreign policy” 独立外观政策. Development demanded peace. His emphasis on military modernization was accompanied by the demobilization of one million personnel starting in June 1985. On the Soviet side, the internal budgetary and economic situation was exceptionally bleak. The Soviets could no longer suspend their disbelief, and the need to wind back past years of “overreach” was critical to restoring the national budget and economy. The Soviets were also interested in demobilisation. Both sides, in other words, had come to emphasize the central importance of their respective economies. Neither the Chinese nor the Soviets had much interest in supporting the notion of a “centre.” Deng acknowledged to Tito that he had not only opposed the idea of a “patriarchal party,” but also “. . . we ourselves have been guilty of criticizing other parties.”65 When in 25 February 1986 Gorbachev reported to the CPSU Central Committee, he lectured on the need for a clear understanding of the key tendencies of reality. The world had become “complex, diverse, dynamic, permeated with contending tendencies, and full of contradictions.” He viewed such contradictions as both the “source” and the “motive force of social progress.”66 Although Deng and

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  189 Gorbachev pursued very different political paths, there was in Gorbachev’s “new thinking,” conceptually at least, some parallel to Deng’s emphasis on “seeking the truth from the facts.” At the operational level, there was also some degree of comparison. Deng’s position had reiterated that China would not “export revolution,” as this contradicted “self-reliance.” Gorbachev looked at this issue and concluded that force lacks utility; hence, he stated: “Today, too, we are firmly convinced that ‘pushing revolution’ from outside, especially by military means, is futile and impermissible.” In effect, Gorbachev gutted the Brezhnev Doctrine, and this would have transformative consequences in Eastern Europe and Asia. Gorbachev was prepared to do whatever was necessary to free the Soviet Union of the economically debilitating burdens of imperial overreach. In his frank report to the CPSU, Gorbachev spoke of “satisfaction about a certain amount of improvement in the Soviet Union’s relations with its great neighbour, socialist China.” While there were “differences” in approach to a number of international problems, he believed that the “reserves for cooperation” were enormous. China was certainly on Gorbachev’s new listing of priorities, but he gave much more emphasis to US-Soviet negotiations on arms limitation as the core element of the Party’s “foreign-policy strategy.” Claiming that the “basic tasks of the country’s economic and social development also determine” international strategy, the latter’s main goal is “to provide the Soviet people with the possibility of working in conditions of lasting peace and freedom.” This “primary programmatic requirement for our foreign policy” in essence concerned “halting the material preparations for a nuclear war.”67 Deng claimed that he did not care what treaties were signed on strategic arms limitation. His main concern was whether they had any viability based on sincere intentions or whether they were directed towards the reduction of China’s own status in world affairs. On 28 July 1986, Gorbachev made a speech in Vladivostok that was even more of a breakthrough than Brezhnev’s earlier speech in Tashkent. The Chinese side recognized “new words” in this speech. At least one “melon had fallen from its stem”! There was no mention of “preconditions,” nor Gromyko’s temporizing reference to the “interests of third countries.” And Gorbachev had already made incremental but concrete moves to address the “three obstacles.” From the beginning in 1979, Gorbachev personally believed that the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan was a monumental mistake, and, in his 1985 summit with the Americans, he had already indicated that he intended to pull out.68 In his 25 February 1986 political report to the CPSU Central Committee, he revealed that he had reached agreement with the Afghan side on a staged withdrawal that would be completed upon the reaching of a political settlement.69 He announced at Vladivostok that he would immediately pull out six regiments from Afghanistan and had started negotiations with Mongolia over the total withdrawal of troops there. On 11 June, the CPSU Politbureau confirmed the withdrawal of the six regiments. Speaking in favour of Gorbachev, Defence Minister Sokolov noted that

190  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations this pullout proved that the USSR had no intention to control the “warm waters of the Indian Ocean.”70 Afghanistan had proven to be a colossal sinkhole in terms of money, human tragedy and military effort, and it was part of Gorbachev’s evolving strategy to reverse imperial overreach and reduce Soviet economic burdens in Eastern Europe and the Asia Pacific region. Ideological considerations had needlessly fostered imperial overreach. Brezhnev, Andropov and Chernenko had all failed to arrest the spiralling costs associated with the Soviet-American arms race. In Gorbachev’s view, normalization with China fitted well with the development of a new Soviet foreign policy, and, while the Chinese demands may have seemed onerous, they were not necessarily in conflict with Gorbachev’s own foreign and domestic priorities.71 Moreover, by this time, both sides had come to the same conclusion that a world “centre” was unnecessary and that socialism was multiform in its substance. Gorbachev started to link “words” and “deeds.” Especially pleasing to the Chinese side was Gorbachev’s readiness in Vladivostok to accept the central line of the main channel of the Amur River as the basis for border negotiations. Although he offered no immediate concession on Vietnam in Cambodia, Gorbachev announced that the time had also come for a positive resolution of this question. Abandoning the norms of protocol, Deng conscripted an unlikely American interlocutor to carry a reply to Gorbachev’s Vladivostok speech. In his 2 September 1986 interview with Mike Wallace, the correspondent for “60 Minutes,”72 Deng acknowledged that there was “something new” in the speech. However, he thought that Gorbachev still needed to take a “big step,” meaning he should urge Vietnam to withdraw its troops from Cambodia. When Deng met Prime Minister David Lange of New Zealand in March 1986, he confirmed that “independent foreign policy” opposes “hegemonism” on the part of either the US or the USSR, hence Deng said: We are improving our relations with both the United States and the Soviet Union, the two superpowers, but we will criticize them and vote against them if they do anything wrong. We don’t ride in anyone else’s car. Our independent foreign policy helps greatly to preserve world peace. The most important thing is that China’s present policies, both domestic and foreign, must not be changed.73 When TV Correspondent Mike Wallace asked Deng why China’s relations with “capitalist” America were better than relations with the Soviet communists, Deng reaffirmed that China would deal with both hegemonisms on an appropriately specific state-to-state basis: “China does not regard social systems as a criterion in its approach to problems. The relations between China and the United States are determined in the context of their specific conditions and so are the relations between China and the Soviet Union.”74 There was, in other words, nothing fixed about international relations. Indeed, China and the Soviet Union might yet enjoy improved relations. “Flowing water” can create

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  191 any number of channels, and Deng was serving notice that he wanted to keep as many channels open as possible. Normalization negotiations tended to focus on the third obstacle, namely getting Vietnam out of Cambodia. Negotiations on the Sino-Soviet border proceeded rather well, and Gorbachev, who was under tremendous pressure from both the Americans and Chinese over Afghanistan, had his own strong preference to get out of that country. When Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze came to Beijing in February 1989 to nail down the fundamentals of a normalization agreement and to organize Gorbachev’s future state visit to Beijing, he came to the conclusion that the Soviet Union would likely have to choose between China and Vietnam. In his account of his Shanghai meeting with Deng, he noted that Deng was “smoking frantically” and his hands shook with anger. Ignoring Shevardnadze’s reassurance that the Kremlin was open to cutting off its support to Vietnam, Deng had interrupted, insisting that no one knew the Vietnamese leadership better than himself. Deng then “railed” about the ungrateful Vietnamese attempts to create under its own leadership a Southeast Asian Federation.75 If there was any particular button to push to set Deng off, it was Vietnam! Yet Deng’s leadership did not preclude normalization even with Vietnam. About six weeks prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union, the PRC government signed the Sino-Vietnamese Communique of 10 November 1991. The two sides disavowed any claims to hegemony and accepted the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as the basic principles governing their relations. Gorbachev’s efforts on Afghanistan and the border issues got Beijing’s attention. Negotiations then focused on crafting an agreement on Cambodia that was tied to setting up Gorbachev’s first visit to Beijing. According to Foreign Minister Qian Qichen’s account, there were diplomatic skirmishes over the timing of Vietnam’s withdrawal of its troops from Cambodia. The two sides finally expressed the hope that withdrawal would take place in the shortest possible time, in the latter half of 1989 and not later than the end of 1989. Shevardnadze tried to get the Chinese to agree to a time for Gorbachev’s visit before the timetable of withdrawal was finalized. Deng wanted his quid pro quo and could not be outfoxed. The two teams established the timetable for withdrawal on 5 February and the very next day it was announced that Gorbachev would make a formal visit to Beijing from 15–18 May 1989. Gorbachev’s coming to Beijing was a truly momentous occasion, but it was badly timed in that the student movement had taken over Tiananmen Square. Deng could not hold formal ceremonies for Gorbachev in the Great Hall of the People. At any rate, the Chinese reception was muted. Deng had instructed that the two leaders would merely shake hands. There was to be no hugging! As was usual, Deng had no notes. He spoke lucidly and honestly without the benefit of politely crafted diplomatic wording. His method was reminiscent of how differences were honestly stated in the 1972 Shanghai Communique. So as to begin to put the past in the past and to facilitate the reserving of differences, Deng said that he would sum up the past so as to look towards the future. Deng took charge of the meeting’s agenda indicating to

192  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Gorbachev: “I should to tell you what the Chinese people and the Chinese Party think about the past. You don’t have to respond to these views or debate them. Let each of us talk about our own. That will help us advance on a more solid basis.”76 Deng began his narrative with a history lesson describing events before and after liberation in 1949. Before 1949, a dozen powers “bullied China,” but the two countries that “took greatest advantage of China” were Japan and czarist Russia – and at certain times and concerning certain questions, the Soviet Union.” Although Japan “owed China the most” given the Japanese invasion and tens of millions of dead, the only outstanding issue after the war related to the Diaoyu Islands, and this issue could be easily reserved for solution to sometime in the future. Deng went on about how czarist Russia and the Soviet Union had seized 1.5 million square kilometres of Chinese territory based on “unequal treaties.” Before Gorbachev could get a word in edgewise, Deng hastily added that “. . . we are still willing to settle border disputes on the basis of those treaties.”77 As for the overheated Sino-Soviet polemics of the 1960s, Deng acknowledged that he had himself participated in those extremist activities and that “. . . we no longer think that everything we said at the time was right.” Deng did not identify which things were not right, but during the polemics of 1960 and 1963, he had helped lead the charge against Soviet “splittism.” Back then, Deng had even suggested that the Great Leap Forward should have been internationally acclaimed. The 1981 resolution on Party history had dealt with the Great Leap and the Cultural Revolution as “grave errors.” “Revisionism” was no longer a key issue. Most importantly, Deng put his finger on the underlying problem. It was not ideology per se but the fact that “. . . the Chinese were not treated as equals and felt humiliated.” Deng finally concluded: “That is one thing that has already been achieved by our meeting. Now that I have said what I had to say, that’s the end of it. The past is past.”78 Throughout Deng’s Chinese version of events, Gorbachev for the most part was the picture of equanimity. He showed respect to Deng as the more senior leader. Without any drama, he noted that he entertained different views on some of the issues raised, but he did recognize that in the recent past the Soviet Union had made certain errors that caused friction. There was no further need to elaborate. Foreign Minister Qian reckoned that Gorbachev’s response was exactly what was needed and credited him with making a great contribution to the success of the normalization negotiations. While some Party conservatives were uneasy over Gorbachev’s notion of glasnost as a challenge to democratic centralism, various Chinese observers were interested in his “new thinking” 新思想 in foreign policy and international relations. Gorbachev challenged old-style “conservatism” that would match the US bomb for bomb and “adventurism” with new emphasis on “reasonable sufficiency.” Arguably, there was no need for further nuclear arms development, as both sides had enough to wipe each other out many times over even if they significantly scaled back their stocks of weapons. Gorbachev also adopted a strategy of “stage overstepping” 超越阶段的做法 that called for reductions in the Soviet budget

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  193 through paring back of overseas commitments so as to focus on the failing domestic economy as well as greater participation in economic interdependence.79 At last, it seemed as though the Soviets had rediscovered proper dialectics. To some extent, Gorbachev’s new direction could be compared with Deng’s established policy of “peace and development.” Qian reflected on the subsequent joint communique and summed up its significance: Hence, a new relationship emerged, different from that of the alliance of the 1950s, and different from the confrontations in the 1960s and 1970s. It was a relationship of nonalliance and nonconfrontation, and it was not aimed at any third country. It was a relationship between friendly neighbouring countries.80 Good neigbourly policy was superior to alliances. The two sides did not need “to play cards.” Both sides had learned the lessons of equality and non-interference in mutually respecting each other’s interests in state-to-state relations. Despite some initial missteps by Gorbachev’s successor, Boris Yeltsin, Deng was able to carry these lessons across the “great historical retrogression” that was the collapse of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev was placed under house arrest in a coup led by the State Committee for National Emergency on 19 August 1991. Consistent with the principle of non-interference and reciprocating Moscow’s neutrality over Tiananmen Square, Beijing’s leaders exercised a real effort in suppressing their opinion on events.81 The Beijing municipal party leadership, for example, insisted: “. . . the Soviet Union’s domestic affairs, no matter how chaotic, are their internal affair, and we are not going to meddle.”82 Such advice was especially necessary as many Party leaders increasingly believed that Gorbachev’s “perestroika” (political restructuring) and “glasnost” (openness) were an unmitigated disaster for socialism, more generally and specifically for the Soviet Union. Gorbachev was suddenly released on 21 August, as the coup collapsed in the face of spontaneous public demonstrations. Chinese Foreign Minister Qian then politely received the Soviet ambassador’s briefing on Gorbachev’s good health. Qian indicated that the Chinese government sincerely believed that the internal affairs of the Soviet Union have to be handled by the Soviet people themselves. He gave assurances that China would act on the basis of the Sino-Soviet joint communiques of 1989 and 1991 highlighting the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.83 Chinese foreign policy then acted with extraordinary despatch in reinforcing its words with deeds. The recognition of the former Soviet republics as new states was incredibly rapid. In a report to the Standing Committee of the Seventh National People’s Congress, Foreign Minister Qian emphasized that China would respond with alacrity: The collapse of the Soviet Union marked the end of the Soviet-US confrontation, the East-West cold war. . . . The people of China and all the republics of the former Soviet Union have a long tradition of friendship and contacts.

194  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Chinese government will continue to develop friendly relations and cooperation with these republics on the principle of non-interference in each other’s internal affairs and respect for the choice of the people of every state.84 China greatly helped to stabilize the situation by helping to control for the huge vacuum left with the implosion of the Soviet Union. On December 27 Qian sent a telegram to the Russian Foreign Ministry officially informing him of China’s recognition of the Russian Federation and Wang Jinqing’s appointment as China’s ambassador to the Russian Federation. Then a Chinese delegation in early January chased down the leaders and foreign ministers of the new republics in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan so as to conduct negotiations and sign the necessary communiques to recognize each country. According to Qian, the process was so fast that the diplomats had to use the original handwritten copies for the issuance of the communiques.85 Gorbachev’s 25 December 1991 sudden and unexpected televised open letter announcing the death of the Soviet Union was the cause of profound grief and anxiety within the CCP. China’s Former Foreign Minister Huang Hua wrote of his own shock. He sought solace in Deng’s 1991 remarks to the effect that the “glorious tradition of the October Revolution” and “the great influence of Marxism and Leninism” will one day see a resurrection of the socialist cause in Russia.86 This was one occasion when Deng’s optimism may have been misplaced. Russian President Yeltsin’s foreign minister, Andrei Kozyrev, came closer to the mark when he later wrote in Foreign Affairs: Communist ideology, like the tsarist ideology before it, has run its course. Russia already knows those two ideologies for their true value and will never step for a second time into either of these dried-up rivers of its past. However, the centuries-old, carefully cultivated and genetically encoded hopes for a messiah may still give rise to new forms of stultifying ideology, particularly in these difficult times of economic crisis. This raises the dangerous prospect of fascist ideology staging a comeback in some form.87 The demise of the Soviet Union raised the difficult question as to what was going to happen to China. Would China also collapse? In retirement and half deaf, Deng Xiaoping calmly displayed a masterly grasp of politics and diplomacy in his handling of the fallout from the Soviet and Eastern European collapse of socialism. His approach was captured in twenty-four Chinese characters that summed up his continuing commitment to a low-posture policy. China would respond to changing conditions by continuing to eschew international leadership but at the same react in a firm, but calm manner on the basis of informed observation so as to make a modest contribution in international affairs. Deng deftly maintained his policies of “economic reform and the open door” even in the aftermath of the suppression of the students in Tiananmen Square.

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  195 His acceleration of market reform made the China market even more tantalizing for Western investment, and Deng was quite adept at playing the Group of Seven members off one another. Once Japan broke ranks, they all did. This was not the same as 1950 containment. China was a member of the UN Security Council and China offered huge opportunities for trade and investment. In the immediate aftermath of Soviet collapse, the Five Principles were well applied. The Chinese leadership was at least outwardly calm. General Secretary Jiang Zemin acknowledged that the collapse of the Soviet Union “gave us a lot of insight” with respect to the unremitting nature of “peaceful evolution,” but Jiang concluded with all knowing equanimity that derived from learned independence: “. . . the demise of the Soviet Union and the drastic changes in Eastern Europe did not have any significant impact on our great socialist country of China. China did not participate in the Cold War or the arms race or join any military bloc, so our situation remains relatively good.” In short, extraordinary international change was met with an expression of faith in the continuity of Deng’s policies. Initially, there were some worrying differences in Yeltsin’s initial administration highlighting Russian democracy and human rights. When Yeltsin assumed political control, the CPSU lost its monopoly position. Lenin’s democratic centralism was gutted. Russian President Yeltsin and Foreign Minister Kozyrev, unlike Deng Xiaoping, made no distinction between ideological extremism and the necessity of ideology: all ideology was, in their opinion, extreme. In China, Deng Xiaoping theory was highlighting Mao Zedong Thought and the unity of theory and praxis. President Jiang Zemin and Premier Li Peng located the ideological origins of Deng’s foreign policy in “Mao Zedong foreign policy thought.” Foreign Minister Qian Qichen lectured Foreign Ministry personnel on how Mao’s emphasis on entwined economic and political independence was carried forward into the contemporary era and how policies such as the “good neighbourly policy,” the “open door” and “one country, two systems” developed out of Mao’s dialectics.88 Events in Russia produced tightly-held divergent foreign policy views. Over the course of their heated internal foreign policy debates, the Russians at first seemed to move away from the Chinese.89 With the support of his new foreign minister, Yeltsin initially leaned towards “Atlanticism” rather than “EuroAsianism.” Yeltsin was a fiery warrior who was reportedly fond of his vodka. He had not only dropped his Party membership and identified with democracy and human rights in his criticism of the old Marxist-Leninist regime, he was on public record for criticizing Deng’s crackdown after the Tiananmen Square incident. During a triumphal visit to Washington, Yeltsin addressed the U.S. Congress and used a grand rhetoric that could only have caused serious consternation in Beijing: “The world can breathe easily – the communist idol that sowed social discord, enmity and unparalleled cruelty on earth and that instilled fear in the human community has collapsed. . . . Freedom cannot be deceived. Democracy and a totalitarian system of state structures cannot coexist.”90 Yeltsin had yet to learn the principle of non-interference. By implication, Deng’s reform was illegitimate in its preservation of Leninist “state structures.” Beijing did not breathe “easily” after such a statement.

196  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations However, intense foreign policy debate in Moscow subsequently produced a direction that modified the Atlanticist dimension in favour of assigning more balanced recognition to “Eurasianism.” No Marshall Plan was offered to either the Soviets or the Russians. Towards the end of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev had pleaded with President Bush for emergency loans to keep his government afloat. President Bush expressed his deep personal concern, but he turned down Gorbachev’s pleas for funds saying that the US Congress would only approve loans based on creditworthiness. Bush expressed his hope for the USSR’s integration into the community of nations, but this hope meant little in light of Bush’s insistence that Gorbachev could not expect any foreign investment until such time as the full introduction of democracy and market economics.91 Essentially, Gorbachev had come begging for help and was humiliated for his effort. As the trend to “de-ideologization” of Soviet and then Russian foreign policy became more pronounced, and the notion of “communist internationalism” was abandoned, Russian conservatives rallied against what was viewed as a “sellout” of Russian power.92 Yeltsin’s initial pro-Western tilt had not resulted in huge economic assistance from the West. No “Marshall Plan” was on offer. Russia could not service its debts without repeated rescheduling. Liberal Westernization was then seen as national self-effacement, and, increasingly, foreign policy debate stressed the critical importance of Moscow’s independence, clearing the way for a renewal of vows concerning the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Yeltsin’s resort to the Group of Seven and the IMF had not solved the domestic economic problem, and in the meantime government foreign policy was increasingly criticized for failing to focus on compensating opportunities in Eastern Europe, China and the Third World.93 Yeltsin himself noted that the Americans were quite free with their advice on “shock therapy” for the Russian economy, but were not prepared to back up their expressions of sympathy with financial assistance. When he later went to Beijing, he favourably noted that Deng’s economic success had come “without cataclysms” and any decline in the standard of living.94 Gorbachev had publicly spoken with glowing rhetoric about the possibilities of new Sino-Soviet economic relations, but he privately had not fully appreciated the strength of Chinese economic reform. He had quietly doubted the underlying strength of Chinese science and technology, and the Tiananmen Square episode had, in his mind, exposed the weakness of Deng’s political reforms.95 Chinese critics, on the other hand, were increasingly convinced that Gorbachev had sacrificed political unity overemphasizing political reform at the expense of economic reform. The foreign policy debate under Yeltsin eventually benefitted from a better appreciation of the strength of China’s new socialist market economy. There was something to be learned, for example, in the rich experience of China’s “special economic zones.” Also, Moscow needed Beijing to support the principle of noninterference in the former Soviet space and at the same time become involved in economic cooperation with Russia’s neighbours in Central Asia who were even less creditworthy than the Russian Federation. Yeltsin, in light of his earlier remarks on the “unparalleled cruelty” of the “communist idol,” had expected some difficulty in his first meeting with Jiang

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  197 Zemin in Beijing. He was quite candid: “As you know, I left the Communist Party of the Soviet Union a long time ago, which is why I thought the meeting would be psychologically tough . . . particularly as from the first [China’s leaders] criticized me.”96 Yeltsin, however, changed his mind about China. He publicly recognized how the Deng reforms, based on “not to hurry, not to force, and without revolutions” had produced a remarkable rise in national living standards. He bear-hugged his hosts, assuring them that he was prepared to march down the “Asian silk road to prosperity.”97 The Chinese and Russians transcended the Soviet collapse and established a new working relationship based on the Five Principles that were reiterated in the 29 December 1991 memorandum of intergovernmental consultations and again in December 1992 with the signing of the Joint Declaration on the Basic Principles Governing Bilateral Relations. Beijing, unlike Washington, did not begrudge the Russians a sense of equality and independence. Perhaps the memory of the 1950 friendship treaty was too fresh, but the Chinese demurred when the Soviets suggested the format of a treaty. The two sides then agreed on the Chinese counterproposal of a declaration that the Chinese claimed was more consistent “with their current diplomatic practice” and that had the virtue of not requiring parliamentary ratification.98 The latter was possibly a congenial proposition for Yeltsin, who had to cope with sharply contending viewpoints in his government and in parliament. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were affirmed as the governing principles of the relations between the two countries and the best template for reducing the new opportunities for conflict and competition in Central Asia. Subscription to these principles helped provide for the crafting of successful diplomacy even in the extreme fallout from the Soviet Union’s disintegration, growing ethnic conflict in the former Soviet space and the negotiation of new stable borders between China and the new republics of Central Asia. China’s “words” in Central Asia largely matched China’s “deeds.” Referring to “pragmatic leadership in Beijing,” Sevodnya Commentary, for example, recognized the success not only in respect of border negotiations but subsequent border stability. The journal gave China high marks for its responsible policy of non-interference and sovereign state equality in Central Asia: The PRC’s desire to ensure stability on its northern borders, particularly in the Central Asian region, as well as Beijing’s concern over possible unrest within the Russian Federation, are of great importance to Russia. China is refraining from actions to take advantage of the active struggle for political influence in Central Asia, from attempts to push Russia out of the region, from the encouragement of separatist tendencies in the Russian Federation proper, and from support for opposition forces in the political struggle at the federal level. All of this predetermines the limited character of political conflicts between Russia and China and the potential for cooperation between the two countries as guarantors of stability in the vast border region.99 Deng’s peace and development strategy required no less.

198  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations Both Deng and Yeltsin had recently suffered what they regarded as American arrogance and hypocrisy. Notwithstanding President Bush’s behind-the-scenes entreaties, Deng was greatly taken aback by the American-led Group of Seven attack on his government. Yeltsin realized that the Americans were not prepared to provide assistance in the cause of Russian democracy, and his critics attacked domestic “infantile pro-Americanism” as an insult to the independence of the Russian state. On the other hand, Chinese foreign policy sought no dividend from the collapse of the Soviet Union. It treated the new, but comparatively weak, Russian Federation with the respect required under the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Deng’s approach to Soviet and Russian normalizations provided further evidence of his divergence from the underlying assumptions of Western realism in foreign policy-making. Foreign Minister Qian hailed a new era of healthier state-to-state relations and claimed: “The border negotiations between China and Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan gradually developed into the “Shanghai Five” mechanism.100 In turn, his successful mechanism resulted in the 26 April 1996 formation of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization on the basis of the Treaty on Strengthening Trust in Military Affairs in the Border Regions.101 The SCO has focused attention on confidence building to support regional security and state sovereignty and the expansion of economic and trade on the basis of the “Shanghai spirit”上海精神 that is predicated on the legacy of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.102

Conclusion: Deng and the progress of Sino-Soviet-Russian normalizations Chinese ideological extremism from the early 1960s and on through the ten years of Cultural Revolution had contributed greatly to the deterioration of state-to-state relations with the Soviet Union. In his angst over capitalist restoration, Mao’s Red Guards had internationalized the Cultural Revolution with fierce attacks on Soviet revisionism. Earlier joint subscription to the Five Principles was lost. Increasingly bitter extremes of polemics affected the international standing and foreign policy legitimacy of both sides. The different interpretations of revolution, national liberation and socialism were actively exported. Such polemics interfered with each society’s ability to choose and value its social order and moral preferences. Normalization with US imperialism opened up perhaps unexpected possibilities for new international relations, and may have even encouraged the prospect for Sino-Soviet normalization. Certainly, the timing was propitious. The two sides were much more concerned about their domestic economies in the context of “world technological revolution.” There were significant economic advantages in the reduction of tensions. In the three different contexts of Sino-US, Sino-Soviet and Sino-Russian relations, the formal framework for normalization consistently reasserted the Five Principles particularly with reference to the need to respect the equality of sovereign states and the need to avoid direct interference in sensitive internal affairs. Ideology was reserved in

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  199 state-to-state relations and the Five Principles applied to all states regardless of differences of social system. The Soviets and Chinese achieved their respective Westphalian moment on a familiar formal basis. Extreme ideological viewpoint and Party fractionalism were abandoned. The Chinese had already demonstrated the prospects for normalization with the US, Japan and even Vietnam. Both sides were looking to avoid extensive external security commitments and both sides emphasized the importance of the national economy. The territorial imperative was disappearing as they looked at the potential of interdependence and heightened interconnection with due regard to equality and reciprocity. The two sides wanted appropriate recognition, and the Russians were not burdened by a commitment to Taiwan. Their subscription to the Five Principles cast triangular diplomacy and alliances as anachronisms in the changing world order. Deng repudiated Cultural Revolutionary extremism and applied the ideological notion of “seeking the truth from the fact” so as to further China’s development with a stable, long-term peaceful environment. Sino-Soviet normalization proceeded contemporaneously with worldwide condemnation of Tiananmen Square. It proceeded regardless of the apocalyptic disintegration of the Soviet Union. The nature of these events could have severely aggravated state-to-state relations, yet the emphasis on “peace and development” persisted. This history of Sino-SovietRussian normalizations affirms the underappreciated success of Deng’s foreign policy. Deng’s concern for peace and development for China and his willingness to enter into normalization with the Soviets and then the Russians deserves accolades rather than the brickbats that come with the “China Threat.”

Notes 1 Mao Tse-tung, “On the Ten Major Relationships,” (25 April 1956), Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, vol. v, (henceforth SWMTTV), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 284. 2 Mao Tse-tung, “Strengthen Party Unity and Carry Forward Party Traditions,” (10 August 1956), SWMTTV, p. 317. 3 See the commentary of John Gittings in his edited volume, Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute: A Commentary and Extracts from the Recent Polemics 1963–1967, London: Oxford University Press, 1968, p. 145. 4 Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Soviet Bloc, Unity and Conflict, rev. ed., Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967, p. 433. 5 “Joint Declaration of the Government of the USSR and the Government of the Chinese People’s Republic, 12 October 1954, Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 290. 6 “The Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” 29 December 1956, Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 298. 7 “The Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” p. 300. 8 Mao Zedong, “Talks at Chengtu,” 10 March 1958, Stuart R. Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books, 1974, p. 102. 9 For detailed analytical narrative see Lorenz M. Luthi, The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2008, pp. 56–8.

200  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations 10 Mao Zedong, “Summary of a Talk with the Representatives of Press and Publishing Circles,” (10 March 1957), Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek, and Eugene Wu, eds., The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao: From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward, Mass.: Harvard University Press, p. 265. 11 “Statement by the Government of the People’s Republic of China on the Declaration Issued by the Government of the Soviet Union on 30 October 1956,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, Appendix E, pp. 305–6. 12 Mao Tse-tung, “Correct Handling of Contradictions among the People,” SWMTTV, p. 416. 13 For more detailed analysis see Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, pp. 93–7. 14 Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 47. 15 Deng Xiaoping, “Let Us Put the Past behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” (16 May 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 284. 16 Deng, “Let Us Put the Past behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” p. 284. 17 Xue Qingchao, Zhuangli rensheng ([Deng Xiaoping’s] glorious life), vol. iv, Beijing: Huawen chubanshe, 2014, p. 228. 18 “On the Question of Stalin – Comment on the Open Letter of the Central Committee of the CPSU (2), People’s Daily, 13 September 1963, as cited in John Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 41. 19 Mao claimed this in an 18 December 1949 telegram to Liu Shaoqi. The text of the telegram is included with Arnhe Westad’s article, “Fighting for Friendship: Mao, Stalin and the Sino-Soviet Treaty of 1950,” Cold War International History Project Bulletin, www. wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/CWIHOBulletin8-9_p4.pdf. Accessed 10 May 2016. 20 Mao Tse-tung, “Speech at the Tenth Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee,” (24 September 1967), Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 191. 21 Mao, “Speech at the Tenth Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee,” pp. 190–1. 22 Publisher’s preface to Statements by Khruschov, vol. v, Peking: World Culture Press, 1965, as in Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 63. 23 “The Moscow Meeting, November 1957,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 73. 24 Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek, and Eugene Wu, eds., The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao, p. 446. 25 MacFarquhar, Cheek, and Wu, eds., The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao, pp. 461–2. 26 Keith, Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, p. 92. 27 See 1 September 1963 document in Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 108. 28 “Chinese Government Statement on Soviet Abrogation of 1957 Defence Agreement,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 105. 29 “Memorandum for the Record,” 15 September 1964, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library. 30 Lorenz M. Luthi, The Sino-Soviet Split, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008, pp. 263, 271. 31 David Goodman, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution: A Political Biography, London and New York, Routledge, 1994, p. 73. 32 Goodman, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution, p. 71. Professor Goodman is not sure whether this was merely to keep in step with Mao or not. 33 See “Khrushchev’s Visit to USA,” Peter Jones & Sian Kevill, comp., China and the Soviet Union 1949–84, New York: Facts on File Publications, 1985, p. 14. 34 Zbigniew Bzrezinski, The Sino-Soviet Bloc: Unity and Conflict, rev. & enl., Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967, p. 410. 35 Carl Linden, Khrushchev and the Soviet Leadership 1957–1964, Baltimore & London: The John Hopkins University Press, 1966, p. 85. 36 “The Moscow Conference,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, pp. 21–2. 37 Gittings, ed., The Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, pp. 145–6. 38 “Long Live Leninism,” 16 April 1960, Editorial Department of “Red Flag,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, Appendix L, p. 342.

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  201 39 “Suslov Claims that Chinese Splittism Dates from the Moscow Conference,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 151. 40 “‘Kommunist’ on Proceedings of Drafting Committee and Conference,” Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 147. 41 “Chinese Party’s ‘25 Points’”, (June 1963), Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 36. 42 “Pravda Attacks Chinese Party’s ‘Philosophy of Dissension,’” (10–12 May 1964), Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 206. 43 “Pravda on China’s Risky Game,” (21 June 1964) Gittings, ed., Survey of the SinoSoviet Dispute, p. 50. 44 Letter of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in Reply to the Letter of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Dated June 15, 1964, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1964, p. 30–1. 45 “People’s Daily Calls for the Overthrow of the ‘Kremlin Tzars,’” (14 February 1967), Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p. 51. 46 Gittings, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute, p.278. 47 N. Kapchenko, “The ‘Cultural Revolution’ and the Mao Group’s Foreign Policy,” International Affairs, Moscow, no. 2, 1968, p. 21. 48 Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, p. 87. 49 Evans, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China, rev. ed., London: Penguin Books, p. 206. 50 Evans, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China, p. 238. 51 Huang, Memoirs, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2008, p. 362. 52 Verman F. Achminow, “Crisis in Mao’s Realm and Moscow’s China Policy,” Orbis, p. 1187. Also see A. James Melnick, “Soviet Perceptions of the Maoist Cult of Personality,” Studies in Comparative Communism, Spring/Summer, vol. ix, no. 1 & 2, 1976. pp. 134–5. 53 Ronald C. Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s Independent Foreign Policy,” International Journal, vol. xli, Winter, 1985–86, pp. 120–1. 54 Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s Independent Foreign Policy,” pp. 111–2. 55 Huang, Memoirs, p. 496. 56 Qian Qichen, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, New York: Harper Collins, 2005, p. 3. 57 Liu Jintian and Zhang Airu, Jingxiang shijie gaibian Zhonguode Deng Xiaoping, (China’s Deng Xiaoping influences the world). Beijing: Taihai chubanshe, 2013, pp. 326–7. 58 Huang Hua’s authoritative summary of Chinese analysis at the time, Huang, Memoirs, pp. 498–9. 59 Huang, Memoirs, p. 500. 60 Keith, “The Origins and Strategic Implications of China’s Independent Foreign Policy,” pp. 125–6. 61 “China-Union of Soviet Socialist Republics: Agreement on Economic and Technical Cooperation,” 28 December 1984, International Legal Materials, vol. xxiv, no. 4, July 1985, pp. 1100–3. 62 Pan Jingguo, Gongheguo waijiao fengyunzhongde Deng Xiaoping (The Charisma of Deng Xiaoping as Republic Diplomat), Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe, 2004, pp. 316–7. 63 Huang, Memoirs, p. 510. 64 Huang, Memoirs, p. 514. 65 Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Speed up Reform,” (12 June 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 234. 66 “The Political Report of the CPSU Central Committee to the Twenty-Seventh Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,” 25 February 1986, The Current Digest of the Soviet Press, vol. xxxviii, no. 8, p. 5. 67 “The Political Report of the CPSU Central Committee to the Twenty-Seventh Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,” p. 27.

202  Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations 68 Robert Service, The End of the Cold War 1985–1991, London: Pan Books, 2016, p. 329. 69 “The Political Report of the CPSU Central Committee to the Twenty-Seventh Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,” p. 29, 70 Service, The End of the Cold War, p. 320. 71 Paul Marantz, “Moscow and East Asia: New Realities and New Policies,” in Sheldon Simon, ed., East Asian Security in the Post-Cold War Era, Armonk, New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1993, p. 29. 72 Deng Xiaoping, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Make Wallace,” (2 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 170. 73 Deng Xiaoping, “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves,” (28 March 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 159. 74 Deng, “Replies to the American TV Correspondent Make Wallace,” p. 171. Qian Qichen, China’s Foreign Minister, 1988–97, acknowledged that the formal publication of this interview with Mike Wallace represented a reply directed to Gorbachev. Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 25. 75 Service, The End of the Cold War, p. 382. 76 Deng, “Let Us Put the Past Behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” (16 May 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 285. 77 Deng, “Let Us Put the Past Behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” p. 286. 78 Deng, “Let Us Put the Past Behind Us and Open Up a New Era,” p. 287. 79 Gorbachev’s Political Report, 25 February 1986, Current Digest of the Soviet Press, vol. 38, no. 8, 1986, pp. 10–1, and Gorbachev interview, 28 December 1987, FBISCHI-87-246, pp. 1–2. 80 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 31. 81 Michael Yahuda reviews inner-Party debate that regarded the coup as good for both the PRC and the USSR in Michael Yahuda, “Chinese Foreign Policy and the Collapse of the Soviet Union,” SAIS Review 12, Winter-Spring, 1992, p. 126. Lowell Dittmer analyses the gap between the “public” and the “inner” CCP reactions to the coup. Lowell Dittmer, “China and Russia, New Beginnings,” in Samuel Kim, ed., China and the World, pp. 102–6. Dittmer discussed the Sino-Soviet triangular system applying Western systems theory. Lowell Dittmer, Sino-Soviet Normalization and its International Implications, Seattle & London: University of Washington Press, 1992. 82 Ronald C. Keith, “The Post-Cold War Political Symmetry of Russo-Chinese Bilateralism,” International Journal, vol. xlix, no. 4, Autumn, 1994, p. 773. 83 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 169. 84 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p.175. 85 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p.176. 86 Huang, Memoirs, p. 519. 87 Andrei Kozyrev, “Russia: A Chance for Survival,” Foreign Affairs, no. 71, Spring 1992, p. 5. 88 Keith, “The Post-Cold War Political Symmetry of Russo-Chinese bilateralism,” p. 764. 89 Keith, “The Post-Cold War Political Symmetry of Russo-Chinese bilateralism,” p. 758. 90 Yeltsin’s speech to the United States Congress, 17 June 1992, Rossiskaya gazeta, 19 June 1992, CDP_SP 44 (no. 24, 1992), pp. 5–6, as cited in Keith, “The Post-Cold War Political Symmetry of Russo-Chinese Bilateralism,” p. 774. 91 Service, The End of the Cold War, p. 488. 92 A. Kortunov, head of general problems of foreign policy at the USSR Academy of Sciences, has described divisions between “conservatives” who wanted stronger relations in, if not control of, the states in the near abroad, “pragmatists,” who would extend further Gorbachev’s shift making foreign policy a matter of “economic accountability” and “Westernizers,” who wanted to return the country “to the bosom of European civilization.” A. Kortunov & A. Izyumov, (Senior Researcher, Literaturnaya gazeta), “What Is Meant by State Interests in Foreign Policy,” 11 July 1990, under “Revising

Sino-Soviet & Sino-Russian normalizations  203 Soviet Foreign Policy Goals,” The Current Digest of the Soviet Press, vol. xlii, no. 30, 1990, p. 9. 93 Mark Webber, “The Emergence of the Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation,” Communist and Post-Communist Studies, vol. 26, no. 3, September 1993, p. 258. 94 Bruce Shu, “Defense Ministries Work on Pact,” FBIS-CHI-92-245, 21 December 1992, p. 9. 95 Service, The End of the Cold War, pp. 388–9. 96 “Russian President Boris Yeltsin Said Friday There Would Be No Sino-Russian Military Pact,” in FBIS/CHI, 92–144, 18 December 1992, p. 6. 97 Keith, “The Post-Cold War Political Symmetry of Russo-Chinese bilateralism,” p. 777. 98 Vasily Konenenko and Valdimir Skosyrev, “Russia-Chinese Declaration Is Essentially Tantamount to a Non-Aggression Pact,” Izvestia, 21 December 1992, The Current Digest, vol. xliv, no. 51, 1992, p. 14. 99 “Sevodnya Commentary,” The Current Digest, vol. xlvi, no. 4, 1994, p. 29. 100 Qian, Ten Episodes in China’s Diplomacy, p. 182. 101 Sun Zhuangzhi, “New and Old Regionalism: The Shanghai Cooperation Organization and Sino-Central Relations,” in Keith, ed., China as a Rising Power and its Response to “Globalization,” pp. 94–106. 102 Pan Guang, “Shanghai hezuo zuzhi yu ‘Shanghai jingshen’,” (The Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the ‘Shanghai Spirit’”), in Zhongguo guoji wenti yanjiusuo (China centre for the research of international problems), Lun heping gongchu wuxiang yuanze (On the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence), Beijing: Shijie chubanshe, 2004, p. 107. This “spirit” is summed up in twenty characters, “mutual trust,” “mutual benefit,” “equality,” “cooperation,” “respect for diverse civilizations” and “seeking common development,” 互信, 互利, 平等, 协作, 遵重多样文明, 谋求共同发展.

5 Deng’s “independent foreign policy” and “independent globalization”

Deng Xiaoping once commented: “Today’s world is an open world” 现在世界是 开放的世界.1 He was also right on the mark when he said: “Opening to the outside world is no easy matter.”2 Indeed, it is not every day that a self-proclaimed socialist state of the size of China with a national population of over 1.3 billion enters the competitive world marketplace. As a “son of the Chinese people,” Deng probably did more than any other Chinese leader to establish the policy framework by which China has engaged the world economy. Such engagement involved negotiating tough contradictions. Deng wanted to learn from the outside world and to participate in the international division of labor so as to support China’s economic development, but he also wanted to control for the spread of “bourgeois liberalism” through China’s “open door.” He worried lest, as the result of the “open door,” “undesirable foreign things” would become “a battering ram used against our socialist modernization programme.”3 Deng stood ready to manage “interdependence” 相互依赖, particularly as it supported the growth and intensification of economic relations across state borders, but he was opposed to Western-sponsored “peaceful evolution” and “disintegration.” Deng’s learning from the outside, therefore, assumed the continuation of his Party state so as to guarantee “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Deng remained both “Marxist” and “Leninist.” Deng’s “pragmatism” underwrote a continuous challenge to Western “realism” in its focus on the key importance of national economic development to national security and political independence. Professor David Shambaugh, in his review of Chinese foreign policy, has, for example, identified the centrality of economic motivation in Chinese policy: China is not unique in this regard, but it is perhaps so in terms of the overriding priority attached to facilitating commercial opportunities. Other powers, such as the United States and Europe, do not devote diplomatic resources in pursuit of economic ends anywhere near the extent that China does, and they better balance national security and normative interests with the commercial dimension.4 The assumption of a “better balance” in the American and European cases reveals a problem of comparison. Should the “world’s largest developing country” adopt

“Independent globalization”  205 the same balance as the US? Would China entertain the same quality and scope of international security commitments as the US? In Deng’s unity of domestic and foreign policy, “peace and development” were the external aspect of “socialism with Chinese characteristics” and Party leaders subsequently referred to China’s “independent foreign policy of peace.” Deng was open to foreign technology and investment, particularly as it supported a sustainable core of development with China itself. This chapter analyzes Deng’s embryonic but nevertheless critical contribution to China’s foreign policy regarding “economic globalization” 经济全球化. Chinese viewpoint is well known for its emphasis on state sovereignty, and it does not like seemingly woolly notions that diminish the contemporary role of the sovereign state in world affairs such as James Rosenau’s “post-international politics” 后国际政治, or “complex governance” 全球治理. The inexorable push of the technological revolution and the changing terms of international investment have pushed up against state borders in China as elsewhere. Such globalization was articulated in 1990s Chinese thinking as a powerful phenomenon that offered both opportunities and dangers. For the Chinese, adaptation to “globalization” was necessary, but adaptation was not construed as a capitulation to the neo-liberal terms of trade and investment. Christopher Hughes’ review of related Chinese theory in fact concluded: “The resulting [Chinese] theory is ingenious insofar as it turns the globalisation of liberalism thesis on its head by proposing that globalisation can actually exist in a virtuous relationship with nationalism and party dictatorship.”5 To the Chinese way of thinking, globalization could not be ignored. For one thing, the benefits were much too attractive. Chinese foreign policy recommended to Third World countries that developing states would have to manage globalization so as to secure significant foreign investment and technological transfer.6 Chinese foreign policy was still aware of the extent of American influence over globalization’s spreading terms of reference. Related policy has focused on what to do about globalization from within the state system. The decline of states was not assumed, but competition over international terms of “globalization” was assumed. Foreign policy has been predicated on nuanced dialectics recognizing both the positive and the negative dimensions of globalization. China’s foreign policy has sought to acquire for the sovereign state the benefits of globalization while controlling for its liabilities. This approach is described in this chapter as a strategy of “independent globalization.” Is China’s strategy of “independent globalization” appropriately rational in China’s circumstances? Although Deng was not going to part with China’s sovereignty for which he worked so hard to achieve, one could also argue that the Chinese were ahead of both the US and the USSR in stressing the new contemporary correlation of security and economy. While the Americans were in a spiralling arms race, Deng had already established a low-posture foreign policy that focused on progressing domestic economic development and on the subordination of military modernization to the priorities of agriculture, industry, science and technology. Deng focused on taking advantage of the opportunities of global

206  “Independent globalization” interdependence while controlling for related cultural and political phenomena affecting China’s national integrity. Deng’s low posture to some extent blunted hostile anti-China sentiment and made it easier to adapt to interdependence. The degree to which “economic globalization” legitimately challenged the state system is an open political question. At least until the recent election of Donald Trump, American scholars often looked upon the US as the leading exponent of inevitable globalization, some suggesting that the US was a “globalizing state” that looked to deepening the trend of economic cooperation between states. The authors of The Globalization of World Politics, John Baylis and Steve Smith, likely had the US in mind when they heralded the appearance of the “globalized state,” defined as “a particular kind of state that helps sustain globalization, as well as responding to its pressures. . . .”7 While many observers believed that in the face of globalization many states were in decline, some suggested that the state qua “state” is not in retreat, but is “simply behaving differently.” Zbigniew Brzezinski once referred to “globalization” as “globabaloney.” This is a sentiment that Deng likely shared. It was heavily prescriptive, but it was not “empty talk.” It perhaps reached its zenith as a self-evident “truth” during the Clinton presidential administration, which claimed a “triple play” with the completion of the Uruguay Round, the establishment of NAFTA and APEC.8 Certainly, Chinese foreign policy has treated the concept in all of its prescriptive dimensions. Although the final conflagration between capitalism and socialism was allowed to disappear into history, the political suspicion of globalization as a process dominated by American terms of reference has continued on into the present. Deng believed that independent foreign policy based on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence would continue to apply to the relations between states even in the new era of extraordinary economic interdependence. Deng paid close attention to China’s specific conditions and stage of development. He still approached new issues on the basis of China’s aspirations as a developing rather than a developed state. China’s sovereign state was not going anywhere! David Goodman and Gerald Segal’s 1997 eulogy for Deng Xiaoping, however, faulted Deng for failing to keep up with the inevitable trend of modern globalization: “[Deng’s] rough and unsatisfied nationalism was unable to fathom the ‘post-modern’ world of limited sovereignty of states and increasing interdependence.”9 Many Chinese scholars have disagreed with such zero-sum terms of reference. This chapter provides the opportunity to review Chinese claims that subsequent generations of Chinese leaders drew on Deng’s foreign policy and theory to manage economic globalization, in particular through an enhanced strategy of peace and development and an independent foreign policy approach to the economic and political requirements of globalization based on “self-reliance and independence.” Professors Song Shichang and Li Ronghai, for example, claimed that Deng Xiaoping theory had legitimately highlighted both the protection of Chinese sovereignty and improving China’s standard of living through the use of foreign investment in technology in the context of economic globalization. China’s scholars

“Independent globalization”  207 have credited him with the underlying theoretical approach to Chinese foreign policy as it concerns “globalization,” particularly as it implies the enhanced flow of goods, services and capital across state borders. Keeping in mind that “globalization” is both a descriptive and prescriptive term, the Chinese view of Deng’s contribution to China’s response to globalization might actually be seriously entertained. Throughout reform, Deng personally focused on the importance of science and technology to development. He did not refer to “globalization” per se, but he advocated China’s adaptation to the “worldwide technological revolution” 世界技术`革命. His “independent foreign policy” placed “self-reliance” in synthesis with the “open door” so that China could participate in this new technological revolution. Deng was so flexible in this regard that he could oppose hegemonism and peaceful evolution while at the same time dealing with imperialism to augment China’s development through the transference of foreign investment and technology. This flexibility was apparent even in the context of Western support for post-Tiananmen Square sanctions. While Deng may have wanted the Americans to “untie the knot,” he was obviously interested in continuing to pursue the “reform and open door” strategy. Deng applied dialectics to the contradictions of sovereignty and foreign engagement. He had very good reason to want to protect China’s sovereignty, but he argued that development in China could not happen in isolation. It required a qualified degree of adaptation to advanced technology that would raise the people’s standard of living. On the other hand, China needed its own sustainable position. It needed genuinely to participate in the development of its own manufacturing base. A core of technological innovation at home would more genuinely facilitate China’s modernization and enhance China’s opportunity to participate within the worldwide technological revolution. Resulting Chinese economic development would ultimately contribute to the regional and the world economy. All of this was to happen within the changing state system that would still need the disciplines and the coping strategies featured in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and their companion operational principle, “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” Deng may have introduced the market, but he still expected the Chinese state to manage economic change. He placed China’s development within the NorthSouth context of the New International Economic and New International Political Orders and suggested that with his open door, China would change the world and the world would change China. On the other hand, as discussed earlier, Deng modified the emphases of Mao’s Three Worlds Theory to reduce the emphasis on inter-world conflict and to create new opportunities for First World foreign investment in and technological transfer to China. The lessons of “self-reliance” were not forgotten, but he further opened China’s door to accelerate domestic economic reform within the new context of a single world economy. Chinese foreign policy commentary had to come to terms with the demons associated with Lenin’s theory of “imperialism” as the highest stage of capitalism.” The latter had required a final conflagration between capitalism and socialism. This conflagration prematurely assumed the triumph of socialism and

208  “Independent globalization” the death of capitalism. During Dengist reform years, however, class struggle, especially large-scale class struggle, was debunked in favour of a focus on the growing of China’s “productive forces.” Party General Secretary Jiang Zemin put it quite succinctly in 1992: “. . . class struggle is no longer the principal problem in our society, and economic development has become our central task.” In this light, it was easier to deal with “economic globalization.”10 Increasing interdependence foreclosed the final conflagration between capitalism and socialism that conveniently disappeared down history’s rabbit hole. Still, the Party needed the “four cardinal principles” to deal with any flies that attempted to enter through China’s “open door.” Under Deng, Chinese foreign policy came to accept Chinese participation in a single world economy.11 China had to participate in globalization, but it would do so warily lest economic globalization turn into “global Americanization.”12 In the early 1950s, Premier Zhou Enlai had already associated US imperialism with a specious “globalism” 世界主义 that was designed to reinforce the dependence of small countries on the US. Zhou had recommended to those states adaptation to the elements of equality and reciprocity that informed the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence: . . . we oppose globalism, which makes people lose national confidence and seek protection from big powers. The United States advocates globalism and leadership by the big powers in the hope of persuading the small countries to follow them forever and of keeping them subjugated and exploited.13 Once “economic globalization” entered the Chinese lexicon of international affairs in the 1990s, it was treated as a “double-edged sword.” It encompassed the dialectics of “good” and “bad.” General Secretary Jiang Zemin explained to APEC business leaders as follows: “Like a double-edged sword, [economic globalization] poses to all countries, the developing countries in particular, the new problem of how to safeguard their economic security while accelerating market opening, intensifying competition and improving efficiency.”14 On the one hand, the opportunities for trade, investment and technological transfer had to be seized in the cause of development, but the terms of such transfer had to be qualified to safeguard the sovereignty, particularly but not exclusively of the developing states. “Global Americanization” threatened unevenness in the distribution of interdependence such that various states were more of less vulnerable to the negative aspects of globalization. Those states that came late to the game of development were more likely to face unacceptable terms of reference over which they had practically no control.15 This meant no more time could be wasted in learning about the international rules of investment and trade so as in future to participate in the benefits of interdependence and in the fashioning of related international rules. Deng had a significant basis in history and personal experience upon which to build his policy dialectic of “self-reliance and the open door.” This dialectic drew on the emphasis on China’s “independence and self-reliance” in China’s foreign policy, and it set out the terms under which foreign technology and investment

“Independent globalization”  209 would be introduced to China’s economy. The same terms of reference were highlighted in China’s response to the “world technological revolution” and the growing pattern of “interdependence.” Indeed, making the transition to participation in the single world economy was no easy matter. There were significant ideological and organizational hurdles in China, where bureaucracy had become accustomed for such a long time to state mercantilism. Deng’s was a staged process that focused on key points in the economy.16 “Seeking the truth from the facts” justified a bold experiment, but politically economic success was needed to justify further momentum and expansion of related reform. The initial years of experiment reflected an uneven pattern of stop and start.

The changing dimensions of China’s “self-reliance” From 1978 to the present, Deng’s particular synthesis of “self-reliance and open door” has continuously informed the substance of China’s foreign policy. During Jiang Zemin’s “third leadership generation,” “globalization” has been described as inevitable but manageable, and not exclusively incompatible with China’s state sovereignty and national economic development. Party General Secretary Hu Jintao subsequently likened “economic reform and the open door” to China’s “third great revolution,” after the first led by Sun Yatsen and the second by Mao.17 This policy was extended cautiously to different parts of China, and it was flexibly changed with changing conditions. It, for example, allowed for reconsidered levels of indebtedness and importing technology while managing foreign investment in the national interest. One could argue that the Chinese economy performed well during the general financial crisis in light of the state’s ability to control the national economy and China’s new market. There is no definitively objective line for determining the best foreign policy response to globalization; however, Chinese analysis has never assumed that the rise of globalization should be placed in inverse proportion to the decline of state system, and this reserved, if not conservative, attitude has served well China’s development. There is ongoing and lately renewed disagreement as to what is the most appropriate measure of interdependence within a world where state sovereignty is still critical, even given the appearance of a new range of transnational actors promoting interdependence. Deng prepared the way for China’s adaptation to globalization by elaborating on the changing synthesis of “self-reliance” and the “open door.” These terms are still used in contemporary foreign policy, but their specific policy implications have been subject to new explanation and change over time. Original connotations of “self-reliance” As discussed in Chapter Two, “self-reliance” 自力更生 was an extraordinary term that bridged nationalism and socialism in the elaboration of one of the most important lessons of China’s revolution. Literally, “self-empowerment”

210  “Independent globalization” 自力 and “change over to a new life” 更生 evoked this lesson. During border region history of the late 1930s and early 1940s when the CCP had very little opportunity to acquire aid from Stalin and the Comintern, and especially during the Guomindang’s economic blockade, Mao’s Party sustained the local economies under its control through a programme of “centralized leadership and decentralized management” that was designed to facilitate production increases without resort to outside help. By the early 1940s, these economies were largely self-sustaining on the basis of policies such as “doing it yourself to achieve selfsupply” 自己动手生产自己, and “develop the economy and ensure supplies” 发 展经济, 保障供给.18 All cadres in all military and civilian institutions and social organizations were expected to contribute to production. This was the era when the leaders of the Party could be seen “self-reliantly” tending their own small vegetable plots. However, it is very important to sort out the Party’s long-term perspective on this experience. At the time, the development of local self-supporting economies through mass movements of production increase was specifically regarded as only a temporary response to border region containment. Mao, himself, affirmed that such a related lack of division of labour would be “unreasonable and incomprehensible in other historical conditions.” Self-sufficiency was necessary in relation to the specific war time conditions of the border region governments, and it demonstrated the Party’s persevering commitment to Chinese nationalism in a context of extreme economic adversity. Mao, however, made it very clear that “self-reliance” was not to be placed in opposition to foreign economic aid. Mao and Zhou had gone so far as to send General Albert Wedemeyer a message indicating that they would like to meet solely or together with President Franklin Roosevelt in Washington, D.C. to discuss, among other things, future economic cooperation. Their proposal was suppressed by General Hurley whom the CCP distrusted as too close to Chiang Kai-shek. Barbara Tuchman described the attempt to reach Roosevelt as an example of Chinese Communist “pragmatism”: Before everything else the Chinese Communists were pragmatic. Ideological purity having proved nearly fatal in the 1920s, they had learned to adapt political action to present fact, and were ready to deal, for survival or advantage, with whatever ideological opponent the situation required.19 Mao was interested in everything American. Mao had told John Service, the Dixie Mission’s political officer and future US ambassador, “We can risk no conflict with the United States.”20 He was unconcerned that the US might pose an ideological challenge to his cause, as he was confident in the CCP’s ultimate victory. In 1945 Mao simply stated: “We stand for self-reliance. We hope for foreign aid but cannot depend upon it; we depend on our own efforts. . . .21 In other words, “self-reliance” is very important, but it is also a matter of dialectics and should not be placed in exclusive opposition to a rational division of labour at home and abroad.

“Independent globalization”  211 The border region experience of “self-reliance” at the local level became less relevant as the Party focused in 1947-8 on a “shift in the centre of gravity.”22 There was modification of the “countryside surrounding the cities” as the CCP acquired control of large cities. The Party re-focused on supporting these urban centres so as to turn “consumer cities” into future “producer cities.” Policy was responding to a different set of priorities in the relation between countryside and cities. The CCP’s rural rank and file had to be taught not to run away with all the machinery in the cities, not to rip up railway ties for firewood, and not to use the valuable metal parts of electrical equipment for makeshift pisspots. However, as the CCP began to think of its new national responsibilities, it deployed “selfreliance” in its celebration of China’s “independence” in foreign affairs. Essentially Premier Zhou reiterated this point in his famous speech of April 1949, but in 1950 the option of American trade and investment was foreclosed with the advent of the US containment of China. In short, China was contained. It leaned while hoping to “learn” from all countries. Foreign policy sought to break down the rigidities of East versus West. Policy derived from Party dialectics that aimed for a diversity of relationships with all countries even while “leaning” to the Soviet Union within a hoped-for context of “peaceful coexistence” and “opposing” US imperialism. In September 1949, Zhou Enlai, highlighted this complexity as it had been advanced in the Draft Common Program of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference: The seventh section . . . explicitly states what is to be guaranteed. . . . We must guarantee national independence, freedom, sovereignty and territorial integrity, between the peoples of all countries and oppose the imperialist policies of aggression and war. The programme explicitly endorses Comrade Mao Zedong’s policy . . . concerning the siding with the Soviet Union and the New Democracies. This is our basic stand on the question of foreign policy.23 Zhou criticized those who had for the last hundred years displayed the habit of “relying on imperialism.” He argued that despite containment, China could still do business with imperialist countries if the terms are fair; hence, he said, “. . . we shall neither rely on imperialism nor be afraid of it; thus, self-reliance will be placed on solid ground.”24 Deng would say later that the initial opportunities for China to participate in the international division of labour so as to support the national economy were limited by circumstances. The desire for trade was there, but international reality was not obliging. With “leaning,” there was a modicum of assistance that was nonetheless important in ameliorating the backwardness of the scientific situation in China. After the withdrawal of Soviet experts from 250 Chinese enterprises in 1960 and the traumatic descent into the Sino-Soviet dispute, the Soviet option was more or less foreclosed.

212  “Independent globalization” “Let the foreign serve China” As discussed in Chapter Two, even in the confrontational context of the Cold War, Mao and Zhou stated a foreign policy preference that avoided both extremes of “national nihilism” and “left-wing closed doorism.”25 Mao returned to his 1930s admonition to “let the foreign serve China” 以洋为中. He argued that dialectics would prevent “slavishly copying” the Soviet experience. He supported “learning the strong points of all nations” in a rigorous critical manner that would not tolerate absorption of decadent bourgeois ideology. In the Great Leap Forward context of heated Sino-Soviet dispute, “self-reliance” was much celebrated in the wake of the withdrawal of the Soviet foreign experts and a new national campaign to learn from the oilfields of Daqing. Stalin was rebuked for thinking that technology solves everything, but still Chinese policy wanted economic progress on all fronts, thus were calls for a multidimensional strategy of simultaneous development of “large and foreign” as well as “small and native technologies.”26 In his review of Sino-Soviet relations in 1958, Mao noted with frustration that during the early to mid-1950s, China, having “no experience in economic construction . . . had no alternative but to copy the Soviet Union.” This was particularly the case with heavy industrialization, but Mao claimed that while at the time copying was necessary, it was also a “weakness” that revealed a “lack of creativity” and a “long-term strategy.” As early as April 1956, Mao argued that the Soviets had made “mistakes of principle” in their handling of the contradictions of heavy and light industry and agriculture.27 Mao parsed the primary and secondary aspects of this contradiction and asserted: “From 1958 we decided to make self-reliance our major policy and striving for foreign aid a secondary aim.”28 Even when the CPSU offered to start up negotiations that were to suspend open polemics and return the Soviet experts to China, Mao was lukewarm. Speaking from bitter experience, he said on 13 February 1964, “We can do a little business, but we can’t do too much, for the Soviet products are heavy, crude, high-priced, and they always keep something back.”29 The Great Leap Forward was not declared in the name of autarchy, but it might as well have been, as the frenetic mass movements of the time substituted human will and revolutionary asceticism for technology in the economy. Frenzied comrades planted rice in forests, deep ploughed everywhere including areas with thin top soil and . . . mountains. There was no redress in the subsequent Cultural Revolution, which witnessed the same inability to apply “seeking the truth from the facts.” Radical leftist ideology conspired to close China’s door. Deng had not directly opposed the Great Leap Forward, but this was when the “son of the Chinese people” was exposed to stinging attacks claiming that he had practiced “slavish comprador philosophy” that undermined Chairman Mao’s principle of “self-reliance” so as to turn China into a “raw material base, a repair and assembly workshop, and an investment center.”30

“Independent globalization”  213 “Self-reliance” is not autarchy! The most important opportunity to clear up all of the political confusion surrounding China’s place in the world and the modern relevance of “self-reliance” came with Deng’s April 1974 speech to the UN General Assembly. Deng advised the Third World that exchange could be very beneficial if handled well and that China’s notion of “self-reliance” never implied “self-seclusion” or “foreign aid.” Implicitly, Deng drew on the 1956 Party debate that had rejected “isolationism” and the notion that China could develop itself without reference to the technological achievements in the outside world. Deng, however, never lost sight of the implications for China’s sovereignty. Sovereignty was in fact integral to UN debate at the time in 1974 when there was fierce debate over Third World country control over their own resources vis-à-vis dictation by the superpowers and transnational corporations; hence, Deng referred to peoples struggling to control their “own economic lifelines” and making “full use” of their own resources. Dialectics tend to modify policy exclusivity. “Self-reliance,” according to the MaoDeng UN definition, was not “autarchy,” but it still had to be qualified. Engagement with the world economy had to be careful and deliberate. The PRC continued to oppose “hegemonism” and its agenda to control the economies of the developing world. Deng had told the UN General Assembly: “By self-reliance we mean that a country should mainly rely on the strength and wisdom of its own people, control its own economic resources, strive hard to increase food production and develop its national economy step by step in a planned way.”31 The Leninist thesis on “imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism” was still relevant to Chinese foreign policy insofar as it cast a spotlight on superpower exploitation of China and the Third World. The Chinese position was quite influential in the UN General Assembly debates, and Chinese perspectives and formulations such as “collective selfreliance” were reflected in the subsequent Declaration on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order and the Programme of Action on the Establishment of the New International Economic Order. The same documents also strongly emphasized the “reality of interdependence” that was increasingly informing the relationships between the developing and developed economies. When Mao died in 1976, some Western scholarly observers predicted an inevitable “shift away from self-reliance,” as they regarded it as part of Mao’s radical politics of class struggle. Apparently, Deng’s “four modernizations” would make self-reliance irrelevant.32 As a Marxist-Leninist and a Chinese nationalist, Deng believed that modernization must include a complex domestic and international division of labour. At the Third Plenum, Deng campaigned to discredit the Cultural Revolutionary corruption of Mao’s self-reliance that equated it with the autarchy that characterizes natural economy. One of the key examples of a reiterated focus on “seeking the truth from the facts” was Deng’s development of the dialectic of “self-reliance and the open door.” The CCPCC Resolution on Party History on 27 June 1981 raised “independence and self-reliance” together with the mass line and “seeking the truth from the facts” to the highest level of ideological confirmation. These three were pronounced integral to “Mao’s viewpoint and methods.”33

214  “Independent globalization”

“Self-reliance” and the “open door” Even after Mao died and Deng returned to power, he still had to coax and cajole his Party into acceptance of his timeframe for implementing a “policy of selfreliance and the open door” 改革和开放政策. The latter achieved some palatable degree of legitimate policy space in light of this dialectic. Deng’s 1974 definition of “self-reliance” was carried forward into the requirements of 1978 “Thirty Points of Industry.” Some Chinese analysis was prepared to push the envelope. The president of the Academy of Social Sciences, for example, argued that “selfreliance” required “learning advanced things from foreign countries” and that it looked forward to merging “the superiority of the socialist system with the advanced science and technology of the developed capitalist countries.”34 In determining his reform strategy, Deng began to argue that in order to raise China’s scientific and technological level, “. . . we must rely on our own efforts, develop our own creativity and persist in the policy of independence and selfreliance.” China needed its own stake in the global technological revolution, but Deng in 1978 squared this with the “open door” that allowed China selectively to tap external science and technology that was ultimately “part of the wealth created in common by mankind.” 35 To be sure, Deng continued to oppose “hegemonism” and “imperialism.” He had insisted that capitalism as distinct from socialism would lead China nowhere. At the same time, his “independent foreign policy” transcended differences of social system and the “export of revolution.” His reference to “wealth created in common by mankind” appeared to envisage significant economic cooperation between states with different social systems. His dialectic of “self-reliance” and the “open door” did not neatly square with the original expectations of Leninist theory as to the final triumph of socialism over capitalism. In May 1979, when the author attended discussions with the researchers of the National Council for the Promotion of International Trade, Council staff stressed “self-reliance” but acknowledged that foreign companies would profit from cheap Chinese labour and raw materials. This was apparently only a “temporary exploitation” that was compensated for in the resultant increases in Chinese production. Such expediency was not to result in foreign exploitation of China as an “assembly workshop” for foreign capital.36 In the context of legislative discussion on the Statutes of the China International Trust and Investment Corporation and the new Law on Joint Ventures, Gu Ming, Deputy Minister of the State Planning Commission called for dialectical balancing of the maximization of domestic resources and the studied correlation of the usage of foreign funds with China’s capacity to absorb new equipment and technology and to repay foreign loans. There were already imbalances in the economy, and Gu’s policy dialectics affirmed Zhou Enlai’s original “four points” with respect to the import of technology, “first use, second criticize, third improve, and fourth make it our own” 一用, 而批, 三钙, 四创. Gu called for three balances: a rough balance in the values of imports and exports, a balance between imported technologies and China’s capacity to assimilate such technology in terms of existing economic infrastructure,

“Independent globalization”  215 and the balance between imported projects and the domestic capacity to produce ancillary equipment for such projects.37 The “open door” encompassed a carefully structured set of policy priorities and related qualifications as set out in the 23 August 1980 “On the Use of Foreign Funds.” The import of technology had to be commensurate with China’s ability to repay foreign loans to provide supporting ancillary equipment. Emphasis was placed on importing advanced technology that could be readily deployed to renovate existing enterprise rather than importing complete sets of equipment. And as consistent with Premier Zhou Enlai’s original “four points,” funding was to be allocated to acquire technology and equipment that easily combined with domestic scientific research and manufacturing. The early 1980s parameters of “self-reliance” were flexible but qualified in relation to the recent history of imperialism and neo-colonialism; hence Deng, confided to the Liberian Head of State Samuel Kanyon Doe: Our country is now implementing an economic policy of opening to the outside world. . . . However, it isn’t easy to get funds and advanced technology from the developed countries. There are still some people around who are wedded to the ideas of the old-line colonialists; they are reluctant to see the poor countries develop. . . . Therefore, while pursuing the policy of opening . . . we must stick to the principle of relying mainly on our own efforts, a principle consistently advocated by Chairman Mao Zedong since the founding of our People’s Republic.38 Deng made a point of emphasizing industrial undertakings should not be too large, and he cautioned: “As long as the people are well fed, everything else is easy, no matter what may happen in the world.”39 During 1984 through early 1985, the senior CCP leader, Chen Yun, led the charge in the Politbureau against increasing budget deficits, the overspend of foreign currency reserves and overly relaxed control of state spending. There was anxiety over inflation and the overheating of the economy, and Deng paused his efforts supporting faster growth.40

The politics of the special economic zones Deng was politically cautious. Jiang Zemin, when he was Vice-Chairman of the State Administrative Commission on Import and Export Affairs, referred to the tense atmosphere that informed debates about creating “new economic zones” 新经济特区 in 1980: “Creating SEZs involves a fierce economic and ideological struggle for which we lack experience, and at the same time, our domestic material and financial strength is currently limited. We need to adopt an active yet prudent policy.”41 Deng opened China’s door in stages. Openness originally included selective “experimentation” in four “special economic zones.” Deng had insisted on the term “economic” rather than “political zones.” Chinese sovereignty and basic law

216  “Independent globalization” would still prevail in these zones. In Shenzhen, there was socialism. In Hong Kong, there was capitalism. The SEZ represented a staged process of engagement with the world economy that was initially rationalized as an experiment in the application of “seeking the truth from the facts.” The SEZ was a vital experiment just like the border region economies of the early 1940s. It was important before launching a general program to apply mass line discipline. Comrades would first study and empirically investigate local conditions in what might be called a controlled experiment. They would “squat at key points.” Their experience would then be reviewed to see if it could be generalized to other areas. The notion of the zones as experiments was politically clever in that it invoked the history of the mass line and “seeking the truth from the facts” as well as the success of the border regions in achieving their goals of economic productivity through “blazing new trails.” As explained by the economics editor of Beijing Review, the SEZ was a new thing. Lenin had supported the use of the funds and technologies of capitalist countries during the New Economic Policy, but there was “no thesis in Marxist-Leninist literature about the special economic zones, which are mainly composed of joint ventures and foreign-owned ventures and have close ties with the international market.” Nonetheless, such experiment can be dialectically reviewed on the basis of scientific investigation so that: “Things that prove suitable can be spread to all parts of China, while those which prove otherwise will not have much negative effects on the whole situation because their influence is limited within the SEZs.”42 Deng personally identified with the success of the Shenzhen SEZ and took personal charge of the expansion of the open door to include fourteen coastal cities, which he hoped would increase the levels of foreign investment. This was a qualitatively different picture than in 1976, when the Gang of Four went on the warpath due to Zhou Enlai’s approval of the purchase of a single large foreign ship when China could allegedly produce its own ships such as the Fengqing. Although Zhou was the intended target of “leftist” criticism, Deng took the full force of their attack as Zhou’s associate. Deng’s revisionism was manifest in the “Fengqing Steamship Event” 风庆轮事件, which allegedly propagated “building a ship is not as good as buying a ship, and buying a ship is not as good as renting a ship” 造船不如买船, 买船不如租船.43 Deng could hardly believe how badly informed the Gang was back then. The Gang of Four had trumpeted the China-built Fengqing, which was only a 10,000ton ship, when he had gone to France in 1920 in a foreign packet of 50,000 tons.44 The song lyrics on Deng’s 81st birthday joyously captured Deng’s open door in an exciting new world, “Ships grounded in the past today weigh anchor and sail.” Deng’s 1 September 1982 speech to the Twelfth Party Congress was more elaborate than his explanation before the UN General Assembly in 1974 as he attempted to undercut the criticisms of more hesitant unnamed Party leaders with “bound feet.” He discussed the qualified relation between “persevering in selfreliance” and “expanding economic and technological ties with foreign countries”:

“Independent globalization”  217 It is our first principle to carry out the policy of opening to the outside world and expand economic and technological exchanges with foreign countries in accordance with the principles of equality and mutual benefit. We must speed the entry of Chinese products into the world market. . . . We must . . . make more use of foreign funds for our national economic construction. . . . it is necessary to do all the required preparatory work well and make proper arrangements with regard to necessary domestic funds and supporting measures. We must actively import advanced technologies suited to our national conditions, particularly those helpful to the transformation of our own enterprises. . . .45 In short, local conditions needed to be ripe. Appropriate ancillary services had to be in place before new sets of technology were to be introduced. This was to be a financially controlled process that would respect the limits of China’s national budget. The central authorities could not presume that they could simply go abroad on wild shopping sprees for the latest technologies. Deng was a fiscally conservative dialectician who husbanded scarce resources for the acquisition of key technologies. He realistically responded to China’s specific national economic circumstances even as he called for bold experiments. Deng toured the three special economic zones in Guangdong and Fujian provinces and the Baoshan Iron and Steel Complex in Shanghai and returned to Beijing to report to the Central Committee. Underscoring the trend towards prosperity especially in Shenzhen, Deng explained the “special economic zone” and its importance: A special economic zone is a medium for introducing technology, management and knowledge. It is also a window for a foreign policy. Through the economic zones we can import foreign technology, obtain knowledge and learn management, which is also a kind of knowledge. As the base for our open policy, the three zones will not only benefit our economy and train people, but enhance our nation’s influence.46 Although the SEZs were represented as “socialist” and different in system from Hong Kong, they were only at the forefront of a long process. However, they were privileged in terms of their ability to offer foreign investors lower tax rates, longterm land leases and greater latitude in setting wages and discharging workers for poor performance.47 On 4 May 1984, the CCPCC and State Council endorsed Deng’s open door policy to include the fourteen coastal ports. If Deng wanted to “open” the door further, he was merely aiming “for a fairly comfortable life by the end of this century, neither rich nor poor.” “To approach the level of the developed countries would take another three to four decades” after that.48 Deng was more expansive even if somewhat qualified on the importance of the open door than he had been at the UN in 1974. The synthesis of the open door with

218  “Independent globalization” reform reflected a more full dimensional dialectic of domestic and international developments; hence, he offered the following advice to Vice President Ali Hassan Mwinyi of Tanzania on 15 April 1985: Follow an open policy both international and domestically. It is very important to open to the outside world. No country can develop in isolation, with its doors closed; it must increase international contacts, introduce advanced methods, science and technology from developed countries and use their capital. Pursuing an open policy domestically means carrying out reform. The reform we are undertaking is a comprehensive one, including not only the economic and political spheres but also science, technology, education and all other fields of endeavour.49 Deng was busy trying to moderate foreign concerns, telling visitors that they need not worry about the life of his policies. He sought to reassure a Japanese delegation concerned that the casting of the Shenzhen SEZ as an “experiment” reflected a lack of commitment to the “open door” policy. Deng came right to the point: . . . some people abroad wonder . . . if I had reversed my previous judgement about special economic zones. So, I want to confirm two things here and now. First, the policy . . . is correct; and second, the special economic zones are an experiment. There is no contradiction here. Our entire policy of opening to the outside is an experiment too, and a big one from the world view. In short, China’s open policy will remain unchanged, but in pursuing it we must proceed with caution. We have achieved some successes, but we must stay modest.50 Some of the misunderstanding may have emerged in Deng’s Party rationalization of the development of the SEZ as a mass line strategy that theoretically required “squatting at key points” to establish real local conditions and critically to respond and to adjust to these conditions. The goal of such a process is to remain firm, but the operationalization of the goal requires experiment before generalizing correct experience through aligning all the points of the experiment as in the organizational history of the mass line connecting “points to the surface, linking points and surface” 由点到面, 点面结合. Deng presented the “open door” as a policy that would last for generations because it enjoyed a widespread political consensus and because it had been proven “correct.” Internally, however, Deng often had to deal with foot-dragging Party critics. In Spring 1987, Deng waded into the internal Party debate over the effectiveness and pace of open door reforms. Deng dismissed the “doubts” of “some people in the Party” and also of “some of the people in Hong Kong” who believed his policy was incorrect. Any “mistakes,” Deng said, were minor: “The zone is an entirely new thing, and it is not fair for the people who run it not to be allowed to make mistakes.” Noting that fifty percent of Shenzhen’s products were exported, he focused on

“Independent globalization”  219 the key shift in Shenzhen from a “domestic orientation to an external orientation, which meant that Shenzhen would become an industrial base and offer its products to the world market.” Success called for an accelerated opening to the outside world and justified the planning then of a special economic zone in Hainan Island.51 The open door gained policy significance in light of Deng’s views on national security and peace and development. The prospect for general war had all but been abandoned in light of nuclear stalemate between the superpowers and the rise of the Third World. Deng required military modernization to subordinate itself to economic modernization. Security was increasingly defined in economic terms, and Deng’s revision to Mao’s “one line” paved the way for Deng’s emphasis on “peace and development.” For example, Chen Qiman, writing in the Party’s chief theoretical journal, The Red Flag, challenged the assumptions of Lenin and Stalin as to the inevitability of war and discussed the increasing pattern of interdependence and even economic integration among capitalist states. “Competition” was becoming less a matter of military force and more a question of how to survive interdependence.52 The contradictions of the new international political order would be driven by technological development rather than by military blocs and social systems. During the reform years, Deng was at the centre of the Party dispute as to how far to open the “door.” He was always looking for the right policy balance. His own synthesis of the open door with self-reliance suggested a cautious approach to China’s entry into the world economy and the resolute, but qualified incorporation of foreign technology and investment into China’s programme of national economic development. Deng preferred to experiment before taking great leaps. For the most part, his “pragmatic” approach was inherently evolutionary. On the other hand, he wanted to experiment and was not prepared to tolerate the deliberate procrastination of what he regarded as reactionary political forces. Deng in this context claimed that he was not the head of either a conservative or reform faction, but might be seen in his pursuit of the policies of reform and opening as the head of “seeking the truth from the facts” faction.53

“Self-reliance and the open door” to establish a “moderately prosperous society” Deng’s vision for China’s future was perhaps best invoked in his notion of a “moderately prosperous society” 小康社会. His evolutionary approach sought meaningful reform that was consistent with a realistic interpretation of China’s circumstances. Revitalizing the national economy and opening to the outside world would take time, particularly in light of China’s past backwardness. The open door had proven to be a success, but affluence was still a long way away. It was presently more important that the people in such a large developing state are “well fed.” As early as December 1979, during former Prime Minister Ohira’s visit, Deng talked about his goals for China. By 2000, he hoped that the per capita GDP would rise to a “comparatively comfortable

220  “Independent globalization” standard” 小康水平 of US $800. He told Ohira: “This is a low level for you, but it is really an ambitious goal for us.”54 The 2012 Deng Xiaoping lilun zedian (Dictionary of Deng Xiaoping theory) cites the same source relating to Ohira’s visit, but goes on to claim that (a) a “moderately prosperous society,” like a “great harmony society” 大同社会, has its origins in an ancient formulation set out in the Book of Rites. The 康 character seemingly conveys a warm brick bed. And (b) this formulation reinforces Deng’s understanding of the “primary stage of socialism” as outlined in his thinking on “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Reaching a comfortable standard of living by 2000 was originally referred to as the second of three steps 三步 on 29 August 1987, and in English translation as “three objectives” on 13 October 1987: Our first objective was to solve the problem of food and clothing, which we have now done. The second objective is to secure a relatively comfortable life for our people by the end of the century, and the third is to reach the level of moderately developed countries in the first fifty years of the next century.55 Addressing the International Conference on China and the World in the Nineties on 3 June 1988, Deng dropped the “three objectives” 三目标 in favour of the “three stages” 三步 of development. With prudence and good timing, he hoped that the moderately prosperous society would emerge in 2000. Just days after the Tiananmen Square crisis, on 9 June 1989, Deng, meeting the senior PLA officer corps, asked: “Is our goal a ‘left’ one? Will it [the ‘three-stage development strategy’] remain our goal in future?” Deng answered: “Clear-cut, positive replies must be given to these important questions.”56 Deng would not allow China to go “left” at the expense of his reform and open door policies. He reminded one and all that Cultural Revolution “isolationism” had wasted ten years of development. The struggle against the “left” still remained primary even after the appearance of counterrevolution and martial law in Beijing in 1989. Deng addressed those who would take advantage of the “revolutionary turmoil” to turn back the clock and suspend the open door and economic reform. He forcefully demanded China’s door be opened wider, or the economy will fail; hence, he said, “. . . without these policies [i.e., reform and opening up] we could not continue to make progress and our economy would go downhill.”57 The primary struggle against the “left,” however, did not preclude struggle against the “right’s” tendency to “bourgeois liberalism.” Indeed, Deng had dismissed General Secretary Hu Yaobang in 1986, and then General Secretary Zhao Ziyang in 1989, for not insuring China’s political stability against the inroads of “bourgeois liberalism.” The Party had to steel itself against the latter’s “sugar bullets.” And “peaceful evolution” was increasingly emphasized in relation to the West’s attempt to disintegrate Chinese socialism through engagement. Certainly, when Jiang Zemin took over from Zhao Ziyang as Party General Secretary, he was very conscious of the need to deal with both “left” and “right.”

“Independent globalization”  221 To use the Chinese idiom, he could see “the overturned cart ahead” 前车之鉴! Deng’s Party critics were not in tune with the complexity of Deng’s “stress on politics.” Simply, they were not made of the same stern stuff and were very afraid of spreading capitalism. Jiang later reminded the Party of Deng’s Tianjin remarks of 1986: “We attach importance not only to reform and to modern science and technology, but also to politics. This makes us much stronger. We have to lay great stress on politics at all times.”58 As for reform and the open door, Deng thought that Japanese advice on the importance of communications, transport and energy to modernization was very useful, and he placed greater emphasis in this regard on borrowing foreign funding: We should increase our investment in basic industries – raw and semi-finished materials, transportation and energy. We should keep on doing that for ten to twenty years. We should increase our investment . . . even if it means going into debt. Borrowing money is also a way of opening to the outside. In this regard we should display more courage. . . .59 Deng was just as capable as Mao in turning a “bad thing” into a “good thing.” He commented in a 16 June 1989 talk with leading members of the CCPCC that while China’s absorption of more foreign capital would benefit foreign businessmen, it would also benefit China with the collection of related taxes, the introduction of professional services in China and subsequent related Chinese enterprise development.60 In 1987, Deng had resigned most of his posts as member of the Politbureau Standing Committee, Politbureau member, and chairman of the Central Advisory Committee. In early September, he resigned the extremely powerful post as chair of the Party’s Military Affairs Committee. Deng installed the new third generation of Party leadership under Jiang Zemin. Deng was a private citizen, but he was still the “helmsman” whose advice had to be heeded in important matters of state. This was, for example, readily apparent in Deng’s handling of Sino-US relations in the aftermath of Tiananmen Square and the Group of Seven’s attempt to sanction China and in his efforts to counter another round of containment on the proven basis of “peace and development.” Without office, Deng used his power to accelerate market reform in the context of his 1991 “Southern Tour” of SEZs and Shanghai. His ideological position was greatly consolidated in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth National Party Congresses, which immortalized his theory on “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”

“Self-reliance” and General Secretary Jiang’s policies under Deng’s helmsmanship In the mid- and late-1970s, Deng’s understanding of self-reliance represented an important break with previous “closed door policy.” Self-reliance was dialectically placed within a synthesis with the “open door.” This synthesis was still an evolutionary

222  “Independent globalization” strategy that came with significant reservations about the need to keep the budget balanced, to avoid foreign debt and to screen foreign projects in relations to careful consideration of China’s economic needs under prevailing circumstances. At least since 1986, before the traumatic 1989 Tiananmen event, Deng was talking about the need to open the door wider, not just in terms of its regional spread to more areas, but in terms of increased foreign borrowing in order to finance critical new infrastructure. “Self-reliance” increasingly became a matter of ensuring that borrowed funding would definitely facilitate domestic productive forces. During discussion with leading CCPCC members over the national economy and future directions, Deng indicated his views on borrowing: As for foreign loans, we should make a concrete analysis of the question. Some countries have borrowed large amounts of foreign funds. This cannot be regarded solely as a loss; they have gained from it too, rapidly growing from economically backward countries into moderately developed ones. There are two things we can learn from them. First, we should not be afraid of borrowing money abroad; and second, we should not borrow too much. . . . The most important thing is to use them to develop production; it would be wrong to use them to reduce the deficit.61 Addressing the Shanghai leadership, Deng in early February 1991 said: “If I am the only one to speak in favour of reform and opening up, it won’t be enough. The entire Party leadership should do so too, and for decades.” Deng was duly laconic: “If we hadn’t opened up, we would still be hammering out auto parts. . . .”62 And, of course, Deng did not want to travel “in someone else’s car.” He chastised anxious critics who were locked in the past natural economy. He also told the Party not to be afraid of a little competition from newly emerging economies in Southeast Asia, claiming that the competition was a good thing that would rebound to China’s advantage. In a compelling insight into the changing regional economic and political realities, he told leading members of the CCPCC that the newly emerging economies of Southeast Asia have encouraged China’s development through “friendly pressure”: People are talking about the “Asia-Pacific century.” Where do we stand? In the past China lagged behind the developed countries, but was more advanced than the poor ones. This last is no longer always the case. Some countries in Southeast Asia are full of enthusiasm for development and may move ahead of us. China is developing too, but compared with them we have a large population, and the world market is already dominated by other countries. So we find ourselves under pressure – we consider it friendly pressure.63 Deng rebutted colleagues who feared foreign capital and told them they would have to “blaze new trails” and “liberate” China’s productive forces:

“Independent globalization”  223 Some people say that the three forms of ventures involving foreign investment . . . are not part of the national economy, and they are afraid to see them develop. This is not good. It is hard to develop the economy without opening up. Countries all over the world have to open up for economic development, and the Western countries encourage the flow of funds and technology.64 The requirements of “self-reliance” relating to the east coast using foreignsourced raw materials generated policy controversy. Initially, “self-reliance” had looked forward to growing the economic connections between the coast and the interior. The interior was to share in the benefits of reform by providing more raw materials to the coast and the coast would rotate trained personnel to the interior. General Party Secretary Zhao Ziyang possibly went farther than his colleagues in arguing that the open door requires China’s participation in “the great international circle” 国际大循环 and acceptance of “two ends of production on the outside” 两头在外.65 Superpower decline and new emphasis on the economic dimensions of security apparently justified a stronger pattern of economic internationalization whereby there would be less emphasis on mass-line training and exchange between coastal and interior industry and more opportunity for unfettered coastal access to foreign raw materials and markets. The “outward-looking” SEZs would achieve a greater export orientation and labour-intensive industry would be shifted to the interior. The result would be the creation of a “Fifth Dragon” all along China’s east coast. Shanghai Municipal Party Committee Secretary Jiang Zemin may have been more attuned to the importance of the domestic market, but he too discussed the need for more policy qualification on the question of “self-reliance.” The earlier emphasis on coast-interior linkages was still emphasized but in conjunction with new opportunities for Shanghai and the zones to acquire cheaper and higher quality raw materials abroad in a strategy called “both ends reach outward.”66 Once Deng showed his political hand during his famous Southern Tour, his protege and new General Party Secretary Jiang Zemin leaped to his defence and tackled the problems on both the left and the right. In keeping with the post-Tiananmen context, Jiang insisted that China would continue with the open door but would stand firm against the ideological inroads of “peaceful evolution”: Externally, we need to handle our state-to-state relations well and take note of how ideology affects them and how it does not. In our relations with other countries, we need to uphold the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and stress dialectics. To maintain domestic stability, we need to watch out for infiltration by international hostile forces.67 At the Seventh Plenum of the Thirteenth CCPCC on 30 December, the Party under its newly installed Secretary General Jiang Zemin had endorsed twelve principles. The fourth stressed “opening wider to the outside world” and the eleventh stressed maintaining Deng’s “independent foreign policy.” There was no

224  “Independent globalization” explicit reference to “self-reliance.” Referencing Deng’s Southern Tour, Jiang subsequently focused on further opening up China’s door. Jiang came up with a new elaborate formulation. Generally, China was to “open wider to the wider world and make more and better use of foreign funds, resources, technology and managerial expertise.” Expanded “opening” needed to include opening at “different levels, through multiple channels and by various means.” Jiang was also alive to the challenges of the “world technological revolution”; hence, he claimed that Chinese development would need some sustainable capacity for innovations in the internationalization of science and technology. Jiang observed: “without our own innovation, we will have no standing in the world’s sci-tech area.”68 Jiang had to establish possibly the final phase of geographical expansion of open door. While strengthening the original SEZs and coastal cities, he focused on opening more cities in the Yangtze Valley as well as the further opening of Pudong, Guangdong, Fujian, Hainan and the Bohai region. In retirement, in early 1992, Deng made one of his most famous interventions into Chinese politics when he embarked on his personal fact-finding tour of Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Wuchang and Shanghai. His talks referred to “some people” who were hesitating like “women with bound feet” – certainly a politically sensitive turn of phrase that Mao had used against his Politbureau enemies who sought to slow down the progress of mid-1950s collectivization.69 Deng confessed that he himself had been slow off the mark, and it was therefore necessary to give much more emphasis to Shanghai. He had committed “one of my biggest mistakes” when he failed to include Shanghai in with the original four SEZs.70 Deng’s admission was of course music to the ears of Jiang Zemin, whose Party base was in Shanghai. Deng admitted: “If Shanghai had been included, the situation with regard to reform and opening in the Yangtze Delta, the entire Yangtze River valley and, indeed, the whole country would be quite different.”71 Deng wanted deeper and faster reform, not only in terms of raising the technological levels of the economy, but his famous theoretical emphasis on “liberation of productive forces” required basic structural change in the organization of the economy such as the substitution of the socialist market for state planning. Those who hesitated were disparaged for “bookworship” of “big” Marxist texts rather than “seeking the truth from the facts.” General Secretary Jiang Zemin later quoted the following Deng argument in elaborating on the very same point: Ours is an entirely new endeavour, one that was never mentioned by Marx, nor undertaken by our predecessors and never attempted by any other socialist country. So there are no precedents for us to learn from. We can only practice, feeling our way as we go. That is to say, if we really want to build socialism in China, we should proceed in everything only from the actual situation of the primary stage of socialism and not from only desires, nor from this or that kind of foreign models, nor from the dogmatic interpretations of some theses in Marxist works, nor from certain erroneous viewpoints imposed on Marxism.72

“Independent globalization”  225 Of the three successor General Party secretaries handpicked by Deng, including Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, Jiang Zemin was possibly the most faithful to Deng’s policies and theory, and it was he who took the lead in responding to “globalization.” Deng’s theory of the primary stage of socialism was affirmed by the Fourteenth National Congress, and his theory “socialism with Chinese characteristics” was duly canonized for the long-term future at the Fifteenth Party Congress in February just after Deng’s death in January 1997. With Deng watching over his shoulder at the October 1992 Fourteenth Congress, Jiang had been expansive and ambitious. He wanted to “open wider to the outside world” making more targeted use of foreign funds, technology and managerial expertise: We need to open up more areas of our country, and open them up at different levels, through multiple channels and by various means. We need to continue to manage SEZs, open coastal cities and open coastal economic development areas well. We need to open more areas along our borders and accelerate the opening of interior provinces and autonomous regions. We also need to open up more cities along the Yangtze River, with the development and opening of Pudong. We also need to open up more cities along the Yangtze River, with the development and opening of Pudong Shanghai, spearheading this initiative.73 While Jiang followed through on the priority to increase foreign investment so as to increase productivity in China in strategic areas, he echoed Deng’s earlier cautions pointing to the need for “wise borrowing” and effective repayment in light of “new conflicts and “problems” that had popped up with foreign direct investment: New conflicts . . . have also appeared. . . . For example, some foreign corporations are seeking to control some important industries and the markets for key products is likely that foreign businesses will take the lion’s share of profits from highly profitable industries and markets for name brand products, and a small number of foreign businesses speculate in SOEs. If these situations are allowed to develop, it will create more difficulties for SOEs undergoing institutional transformation and possibly affect our ability to maintain our economic independence.74 At the Fifteenth Congress, Jiang affirmed the newly expanded “open door” formulation when he stated, “. . . we should take an even more active stance in the world by improving the pattern of opening up in all directions, or all levels, and in a wide range, developing an open economy, 积极推进全方位, 多层次, 宽领域的对外开放.”75 According to Jiang’s Fifteenth Congress explanation, this “widened open door” 扩大开放 would facilitate China’s effective response to “. . . globalization trends in economic, scientific and technological development.” Jiang believed that this would result in “enhancing our international

226  “Independent globalization” competitiveness, optimizing our economic structure and improving the quality of our national economy.”76 Also, at the Fifteenth Congress, Jiang, again relying on Deng’s theory, declared that China would be actively participating in the world economy on the basis of a number of key reforms that included participation in regional and global multilateral trading organization, the reduction of tariffs and the vigorous search to open up new markets: . . . we should expand external trade in commodities and services and optimize the import and export mix. We shall stick to the strategy of achieving success on the strength of quality and a multi-outlet market, and vigorously open up markets abroad. We shall further lower the general level of tariffs and encourage the import of advanced technologies and key equipment. We shall deepen the reform of the system of trade and economic relations with foreign countries, improving the proxy system and expanding the power of enterprises to handle their own foreign trade so as to create a policy environment for competition on an equal footing. We shall take an active part in regional economic cooperation and the global system of multilateral trade.77 Jiang’s “new pattern of multilevel, multichannel and comprehensive opening up” that would see the preferential policies that had been trialled in the SEZs extended to many areas in China’s interior. During his own inspection tour of Guangdong Province, Jiang had, however, to correct some comrades who had incorrectly concluded that the SEZs could be “reduced” or “gradually eliminated in light of China’s “comprehensive opening up.” Jiang insisted that the SEZs would not only keep operating, they would be called upon to improve their operations.78 Jiang closely followed Deng’s instructions, and the new emphasis on wider opening still came with the caveat of “self-reliance.” “Opening” was part of a dialectic that assumed that China would in opening “establish [its] own areas of superiority.”79

Conclusion: the changing relevance of “self-reliance” and the “open door” Chinese foreign policy has moved way beyond the original 1956 formulation, “learning the strong points of other countries!” Policy has steadily opened the door wider. But policy also required that China, the “world’s largest developing state” have a basic ability to feed its own people, to create its own manufacturing core and a self-sustaining capacity to promote technological innovation. By the time Deng died in early 1997, his foreign policy dialectics had been well entrenched. Engagement with the world economy was positively sought on the dialectical basis of “self-reliance” and the “open door.” “Independent foreign policy” engaged the “world technological revolution” and responded to interdependence, attempting to isolate its disadvantages while managing its advantages. Deng preferred a flexible dialectical position that gives qualified

“Independent globalization”  227 support to participation in interdependence. His theory and policy have been co-opted to support new regional free trade initiatives as well as bilateral free trade deals. Notwithstanding the American terms of reference embedded in “globalization,” and even if “globalization” filliped “peaceful evolution,” it was so supremely important for China’s development that it had to be engaged and managed. Adjusting the open door to self-reliance, China entered the World Trade Organization and “self-reliance and the open door” have accommodated free trade negotiation. Zbigniew Brzezinski has suggested that China’s WTO entry in 2001 “spurred the emergence of the so-called G20—a bloc of development states led by China, India, South Africa and Brazil.”80 Certainly, Deng believed that it was necessary to close the circle between ideals and power. This was not a unidimensional pragmatic expediency. Deng’s dialectics encouraged foreign policy flexibility while studiously avoiding casting any particular trend as exclusive and categorical. Deng’s foreign policy dialectics facilitated an accommodation between China’s self-reliance and its participation in the benefits of globalization. Deng recognized the primacy of the domestic market and “agriculture as the foundation of the economy” while at the same supporting a “coastal outward looking economy” 外向性经济. China’s participation in the commonwealth of human technological development is to become a testament to Deng’s foreign policy of “peace and development.” This participation will arguably support export growth as well as an expansion of China’s own domestic market and demand. On this basis, Chinese thinking ideally anticipates China’s own distinctive but positive contribution to world progress, common development and common security.81 Based on Deng’s theory, Jiang opened the door wider, “inviting in” 请进来 foreign firms at an accelerated rate while promoting “walking out” 周出区 of Chinese firms into global markets. China’s SOEs were asked to go where none had travelled before. Jiang’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation, Chen Jian, explained: . . . to accelerate implementing the “going out strategy” is urgently needed for participating in economic globalization and [to] expand the space for economic development; it is needed for deepening our country’s relations with the developing countries in order to attain join development; for exercising China’s rights in the WTO and raising the level of opening up; for spurring a restructuring of China’s economy; for safeguarding China’s economic security and realizing a sustainable development of the national economy; and bringing into shape [a] Chinese type of transnational corporation and increasing China’s competitiveness in the international community.82 While Jiang opened the door wide, he reflected on the wisdom underlying “peace and development” and was cautious in light of Western “peaceful evolution” and the need to avoid any overdependence on external markets when China had its own huge domestic market:

228  “Independent globalization” The broad domestic market is the best advantage of our country. In the face of ever growing fierce competition in the international market and complicated changes in the world economy, to have our feet firmly planted in domestic demand may provide a large space for manoeuvre for the Chinese economy . . . to withstand international economic risks. To uphold the principle of expansion of domestic demand is, in essence, to maintain the important thought that development is hard truth and to regard development as the principal theme.83 Under Jiang’s successor, Hu Jintao, there was a formal policy synthesis of Deng’s “peace and development” with “economic globalization.” In a Party speech commemorating the Party line set out at the famous Third Plenum of the Eleventh Central Committee, Hu affirmed: [The Party] must firmly grasp the connection between independence [独立自主] and “economic globalization” [经济全球化] as the key task for making good our country’s domestic and international plan and so that we can raise high the lofty goals of mankind and peace and development.84 Hu aligned Deng’s “peace and development” with the 2008 Olympic slogan, “one world, one dream” 同一个世界, 同一个梦想 in rebuttal to the “China Threat.”85 Also, Hu, while he insisted that “economic globalization” should respect the equality of sovereign states, characterized “economic globalization” as an “irresistible trend” that permeated economic, political and social life.86 Hu was interested in developing a future niche in high tech for China. From within a new policy emphasis on domestic and global harmony, Hu supported the creation of a core domestic program of high tech that would facilitate China’s wider participation in the highest stages of technological revolution. The December 2005 White Paper on China’s Peaceful Road to Development in December 2005 extended Deng Xiaoping’s theme of “peace and development.” Several arguments were reiterated such as China needed a “peaceful international environment to develop itself,” while “conforming to the trend of economic globalization” and “promoting world peace through its own development.” The latest dialectics of self-reliance and opening up have required that China would “rely on itself together with reform and innovation, while persisting in the policy of opening up.” At the same time, China would have to conform “to the trend of economic globalization” striving to achieve mutually beneficial common development with other countries. Hu Jintao’s successor as Party general secretary, Xi Jinping, was of more or less the same mind. Xi cited the contemporary relevance of the three basic elements of Mao Zedong Thought upholding “seeking the truth from the facts,” the mass line and “independence and self-reliance.”87 He recognized that economic globalization had developed rapidly and that it had seriously impacted China, requiring a “new and much greater development” and even more reliance on “reform and the open door,” but still 1.3 billion Chinese would have to struggle to

“Independent globalization”  229 pursue their own path of economic development and to realize the “China Dream” and “peace and development.”88 The Party’s study materials on Xi’s talks glossed the “open door” in the following terms: The open door is China’s basic policy. Once we moved from the closed to the open door, the real path for the world and China’s development was borne out. General Secretary Xi Jinping had pointed out many times that the open door is the essential path to China’s development and development is nothing less than our country’s first responsibility. . . . China’s open door will stay open for ever.89 China’s foreign policy has always understood the advantages and disadvantages of “economic globalization,” but it has actively presented China’s adaptation to high technological innovation as a matter of “common development” rather than a zero-sum game. “Win-win” and “common development” within a single world economy has replaced the final conflict between capitalism and socialism at the end of history. Deng’s original dialectics of “self-reliance” and the “open door” provided the conceptual matrix within which China has responded to the opportunities and liabilities of economic globalization. There is in this pursuit no narrow pursuit of exclusive old-style statism. While continuing to focus on “peace and development” and the gap between developing and developed states, Deng progressively moved away from the confrontational rhetoric of the “Three Worlds.” Western realism, however, sees in the developing strength of China’s economy not so much a contribution to the world economy as a growing security threat. Indeed, Deng had warned several times that this would be the case. Hu’s Premier Wen Jiabao optimistically asserted that Chinese policy on “peace and development” would act as reassurance to those constantly looking for a “China Threat.” He reasoned: Clearly proclaiming that China’s development depends mainly on its own efforts helps to fundamentally eliminate outsiders’ suspicions that having reached a certain stage of development, China will go in for external plunder and expansion. In fact, with China developed, it will make ever greater contributions . . . to world development.90 Deng’s foreign policy achieved extraordinary success in creating and applying foreign policy in support of domestic economic development. His policy engineered a progressive and rational adaptation to the world economy that respected China’s own national conditions. And this adaptation proceeded without significant military conflict. Ideology still sustains suspicion of “American globalization,” but foreign policy has adapted to the largely neo-liberal basis of the existing international order of trade and investment. “Independent foreign policy” has resulted in an independent approach rather than an existential challenge to globalization. However, regardless of Deng’s best intentions and efforts – and he often reminded foreign visitors that he meant what he said – his perspective and theory

230  “Independent globalization” does not seem to have altered the image of China particularly in the context of Western realism and its emphasis on the “China Threat.” An analysis of the Chinese response to “economic globalization” suggests that Chinese foreign policy in this regard was rationally and effectively rooted in Deng’s “independent foreign policy.” The logically progressive nature of Chinese foreign policy, its entire structure and underlying conceptual building blocks, are often disregarded by Western realism as some form of deception as China “bides its time.”

Notes 1 Deng Xiaoping, “Jianshe you Zhongguotesede shehuizhuyi,” (30 June 1984), (Establishing socialism with Chinese characteristics), Deng Xiaoping Wenxuan, vol iii, (Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, vol. iii), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2006, p. 64. 2 Deng Xiaoping, “We Have to Clear Away Obstacles and Continue to Advance,” (13 January 1987), Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, vol. iii, (SWDXPIII), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1994, p. 199. 3 Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks at the Sixth Plenary Session of the Party’s Central Committee,” (28 September 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 183. 4 David Shambaugh, China Goes Global: The Partial Power, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 55. 5 Christopher R. Hughes, “Globalisation and Nationalism: Squaring the Circle in Chinese International Relations Theory,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol.26, no. 1, 1997, pp. 103–24. 6 See discussion of sources and foreign policy thinking in the introductory chapter to Ronald C. Keith, ed., China as a Rising World Power and its Response to “Globalization,” London and New York: Routledge, 2005, pp. 6–7. 7 John Balyis and Steve Smith, The Globalization of World Politics, 3rd edit., Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002, p. 773. 8 Donald Barry & Ronald C. Keith, “Changing Perspectives on Regionalism and Multilateralism,” Barry and Keith., eds., Regionalism, Multilateralism and the Politics of Global Trade, Vancouver & Toronto: UBC Press, 1999, p. 15. 9 David S.G. Goodman and Gerald Segal, “China Without Deng,” (Part 5 of 6), CNDGlobal, No. GL97-033, 27 February 1997. 10 Jiang Zemin, “Accelerate Reform, Opening Up and Modernization and Achieve Greater Success in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” (12 October 1992), SWJZMI, p. 211. 11 John Gittings, The Changing Face of China: From Mao to Market, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 213–4. 12 See discussion in the introductory chapter of Keith, ed., China as a Rising World Power and China’s Response to “Globalization,” p. 7. 13 Zhou Enlai, Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. iii, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, p. 100. For further analysis, see Ronald C. Keith, China from the Inside Out: Fitting the People’s Republic into the World, London: Pluto Press, 2009, p. 20. 14 As cited and discussed in the introduction to Keith, ed., China as a Rising World Power and its Response to Globalization, p. 6. 15 See related Chinese scholars’ analyses such as that of Lu Yufan, “21 Shiji Woguo fuhe miandui jingji quanqiuhuade sikao,” (Thoughts on how China should face economic globalization in the twenty-first century), Dongbei shifan daxue xuebao (Northeast teacher’s college bulletin), no. 2, 2000, pp. 45–6, and Lu Changhu, “Jingji quanqiuhua yu shijie xingshi,” (Economic globalization and world conditions), Guoji wenti yanjiu (International studies, no. 2, 2002, pp. 26–7; and Zhang Yijun, “Economic Globalization and State Sovereignty,” Foreign Affairs Journal, no. 58, December, 2000, p. 16.

“Independent globalization”  231 16 David Zweig discusses a related process of “segmented deregulation” that supported internationalization as against state mercantilism. David Zweig, Internationalizing China: Domestic Interests and Global Linkages, Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 2002, pp. 33–4. 17 Hu Jintao, “Zai jinniandangde shiyijie sanzhong quanhui zhaokai sanshi zhounian dahuishangde jianghua,” (Speech commemorating the convening of the Eleventh Plenum of the Third Central Committee), (18 December 2008), Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. iii, (Selected works of Hu Jintao), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2016, p. 171. 18 For discussion of these policies and related policies, see Ronald C. Keith, “China’s Modernization and the Policy of ‘Self-Reliance,’” China Report (New Delhi), March– April 1983, p. 22. 19 Barbara W. Tuchman, Notes from China, New York: Macmillan, 1972, p. 87. 20 Tuchman, Notes from China, p. 89. 21 Mao Zedong, “We Must Learn to Do Economic Work,” (10 January 1945) SWMTTIII, p. 191. 22 See Ronald C. Keith, “The Relevance of Border-region Experience to Nation-Building in China, 1949–52,” The China Quarterly, pp. 279–82. 23 Zhou Enlai, “Characteristics of the Draft Common Programme of the People’s Political Conhsultative Conference,” 22 September 1949, Selected Works of Zhou Enlai, vol. 1, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1980, p. 409. 24 Zhou Enlai, “Dangqian caijing xingshi he xin Zhongguo jingjide jizhong guanxi” (The present financial and economic situation and the relations between different aspects of New China’s economy), 22–23 December 1949, Zhou Enlai Xuanji, vol. ii, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1984, pp. 10–1. For related analysis of “self-reliance” in this period, see Ronald C. Keith, “Plumbing the Relevance of ‘Independence and Self-Reliance’ in Chinese Foreign Policy,” Chan Lai-Ha, Gerald Chan, Kwan Fung, eds., China at 60: Global- Local Interactions, New Jersey, London: World Scientific, 2011, pp. 40–3. 25 Mao Tse-tung, “Chairman Mao Talks to the Music Workers,” Stuart R. Schram, Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, pp. 84–90. For a relevant Chinese gloss on this, see Lu Heting, “In Memory of Chairman Mao’s Talks to the Music Workers,” Hongqi (Red flag), 10 October 1978, p. 68–70 in Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS), 74680, 30 November 1979, pp. 118–21. 26 Keith, “China’s Modernization and the Policy of ‘Self-Reliance,’” China Report, vol. xix, no. 2, March-April 1983, p. 25. 27 Mao Tse-tung, “On the Ten Major Relationships,” (25 April 1956), SWMTTV, p. 285. 28 Mao Tse-tung, “Talk at an Enlarged Work Conference,” (30 January 1962), Schram, ed., Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed, p. 178. 29 Mao Tse-tung, “Remarks at the Spring Festival,” (13 February 1964), Schram, ed., Mao Unrehearsed, p. 198. 30 For example, see Fang Hai, “Criticize the Slavish Comprador Philosophy,” Hongqi (Red flag), no. 4, 1 April 1976 in US-Hong Kong Consulate General, Survey of the People’s Republic of China Magazines, no. 867–8, 20–26 April 1976, pp. 22–3. 31 Speech by the Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Deng Xiaoping at the Special Session of the UN General Assembly, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1974, p. 15. 32 John Starr wrote about this “shift” in “Discontinuing the Revolution: Recent Political Thought in China,” International Journal, xxxiv, no. 4, Autumn 1979, p. 556. Marshall Goldman made a similar argument in “China Rethinks the Soviet Model,” International Security, Fall 1980, vol. 5, no. 2, p. 54. Ross Terrill described three gradations of “selfreliance,” beginning with “complete uninvolvement or isolation.” It is argued herein that, except for a brief period in the Cultural Revolution, isolation has never been formal government policy. See Ross Terrill, “China and the World: Self-Reliance and Interdependence,” Foreign Affairs, January 1977, p. 299.

232  “Independent globalization” 33 CCP, Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1981, pp. 70–1. The Chinese text is under Zhongguo gongchandang zhongyang weiyuanhui guanyu jianguo yi lie dangde ruogan lishi wentide jueyi, Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1981, pp. 47–9. 34 “Observe Economic Laws, Speed Up Four Modernizations,” Beijing Review, no. 45, 10 March 1978, p. 11. 35 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at the Opening Ceremony of the National Conference of Science,” (18 March 1978), Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping (1975–1982), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984, pp. 106–7. 36 May 1979 author’s discussions with researchers at the National Council for the Promotion of International Trade in Beijing. 37 Keith, “China’s Modernization and the Policy of ‘Self-Reliance’,” p. 29. 38 Deng Xiaoping, “China’s Historical Experience in Economic Construction,” (6 May 1982), SWDXPIII, pp. 383–4. 39 Deng, “China’s Historical Experience in Economic Construction,” p. 384. 40 See Vogel’s discussion of inner Party tensions on this, Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of Modern China, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011, p. 467. 41 Jiang Zemin, “Create Special Economic Zones to Accelerate Economic Development,” (21 August 1980), Selected Works of Jiang Zemin, vol. I, (SWJZMI), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2010, p. 3. 42 Wang Dacheng, “SEZs: Why an Experiment,” Beijing Review, no. 39, September 1985, p. 4. 43 Gu Baosun, Zhou enlai zuihou 600 tian, (Zhou Enlai’s last 600 days), Beijing: Qingnian chubanshe, 2014, pp. 306–7. 44 Deng Xiaoping, “Remarks Made During an Inspection Tour of Shanghai,” (28 January–18 February 1991), SWDXPIII, p. 354. 45 Deng Xiaoping, “Opening Speech,” CCP, The Twelfth National Congress of the CPC (September 1982), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, p. 34. 46 Deng Xiaoping “Make a Success of Special Economic Zones and Open more Cities to the Outside World,” (24 February 1984), SWDXPIII, pp. 61–2. 47 Joseph Martellaro and Helen Baohua Sun, “The Special Economic Zones: A New Dimension in Chinese Socialism,” China Report, vol. 23, no. 1, January–March 1987, pp. 36–8. 48 Deng Xiaoping, “The Reform of the System for Managing Science and Technology is Designed to Liberate the Productive Forces,” (7 March 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 115. 49 Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Expand Political Democracy and Carry out Economic Reform,” (15 April 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 123. 50 Deng Xiaoping, “Special Economic Zones Should Shift their Economy from a Domestic Orientation to an External Orientation,” (1 August 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 137. 51 Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Speed up Reform,” (12 June 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 236. 52 Chen Qiman, “Tentative Discussion on Postwar Changes in International Relations and the Possibility of Winning Lasting World Peace,” Hongqi, (Red flag), no. 13, 1 July 1986, “China Report,” JPRS-CRF-86-016, 21 August 1986, p. 37. 53 Deng Xiaoping, “The Two Basic Elements in China’s Policies,” (4 July 1987), SWDXPIII, p. 245. 54 Deng Xiaoping, “Building Socialism with Specifically Chinese Character,” (30 June 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 74. 55 Deng Xiaoping, “We Are Undertaking an Entirely New Endeavour,” (13 October 1987) SWDXPIII, pp. 251–2. 56 Deng Xiaoping, “Address to Officers at the Rank of General and Above in Command of the Troops Enforcing Martial Law in Beijing,” 9 June 1989, SXDXPIII, p. 296. 57 Deng Xiaoping, “The United States Should Take the Initiative in Putting an End to the Strains in Sino-American Relations,” (31 October 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 322.

“Independent globalization”  233 58 Jiang Zemin, “Leading Cadres Must Stress Politics,” (27 September 1994), SWJZMI, p. 446. 59 Deng, “Address to Officers at the Rank of General and Above in Command of the Troops Enforcing Martial Law in Beijing,” p. 299. 60 Deng Xiaoping, “Urgent Tasks of China’s Third Generation of Collective Leadership,” (16 June 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 303. 61 Deng Xiaoping, “On the Reform of Enterprises and of the Banking System,” 19 December 1986, SWDXPIII, p. 193. 62 Deng, “Remarks Made during an Inspection Tour of Shanghai,” p. 354. 63 Deng Xiaoping, “Review your Experience and Use Professionally Trained People,” (20 August 1991), SWDXPIII, p. 357. 64 Deng, “Remarks Made during an Inspection Tour of Shanghai,” p. 354. 65 Zhao, perhaps as a matter of political protection, attempted to anchor the “great international circle” in Deng’s open door policy. See “Zhao Ziyang di sisanjie er zhong quanhuishang gongzuo baogao” (Zhao Ziyang’s political report to the 2nd session of the Thirteenth Congress), Renmin ribao, (People’s daily), 21 March 1988. Andrew Nathan suggests that Zhao’s position represented a departure from Deng’s position. See Andrew Nathan, “Politics: Reform at the Crossroad,” Anthony Kane, ed., China Briefing, 1989, Boulder: Westview Press, 1989, pp. 8–11. 66 Jiang Zemin, “Theoretical Work Needs to Be Oriented toward Reality,” (10 March 1988), Selected Works of Jiang Zemin, vol. 1, (SWJZMI), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, pp. 27–8. 67 Jiang Zemin, “Concerning our Military Strategic Principle and Issues of Defense Technology,” (8, 15, 25 June 1991), SWJZMI, p. 139. 68 Jiang Zemin, “Development Demands New Ways of Thinking,” (11 October 2000), Jiang Zemin, Jiang Zemin on the “Three Represents,” Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2001, p. 83. 69 Deng Xiaoping, “Excerpts from Talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” (18 January–21 February 1992), SWDXPIII, 2002, p. 360. 70 Deng, “Excerpts from Talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” p. 364. 71 Deng, “Excerpts from talks Given in Wuchang, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Shanghai,” p. 364. 72 Jiang Zemin, “Hold High the Great Banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory for an All-round Advancement of the Cause of the Building of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics into the 21st Century,” section on theory, (6–12 October 1997) Beijing Review, part v, section 7. 73 Jiang, “Accelerate Reform, Opening Up and Modernization and Achieve Greater Success in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” p. 219. 74 Jiang Zemin, “Effectively Guard against Risks in Economic Development,” (6 August 1996), SWJZMI, p. 528. 75 Jiang Zemin elaborated on this wider opening in several speeches between November 1990 and May 2001; see the entry, “努力提高开放水平”（Strive to raise the policy level on the open door) in Zhonggong zhongyong wenxian yanjiusuo (Party Central Committee Institute of Documentation), comp. Jiang Zemin, Lun you Zhongguo tese shehuizhuyi (Quanti zhaibian) (On socialism with Chinese characteristics, specialist extracts), Beijing: Zhongyong wenxian chubanshe, pp. 186–90. 76 Jiang, “Hold High the Banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory for an All-round Advancement of the Cause of Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics into the 21st Century,” Section Seven, “Strive to Do Better in Opening to the Outside World”, http//www.bjrview. com.cn/document/txt/2011-03/25/content_363499_3.htm.Accessed 12 September 2017. 77 Jiang, “Hold High the Banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory for an All-round Advancement of the Cause of Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics into the 21st Century,” Section Seven, “Strive to Do Better in Opening to the Outside Word.”

234  “Independent globalization” 78 Jiang Zemin, “Special Economic Zones Need to Create New Advantages and Rise to a New Level,” (20 June 1994), SWJZMI, p. 363. 79 Jiang Zemin, “Correctly Handle Certain Major Relationships in the Socialist Modernization Drive,” (28 September 1995), SWJZMI, p. 460. 80 Zbigniew Brezinzski, Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower, New York: Basic Books, 2007, p. 110. 81 See discussion in Keith, “Plumbing the Relevance of ‘Independence and Self-Reliance’ in Chinese Foreign Policy,” p. 609. 82 Gong Wen, “‘Bringing in’ and ‘Going out’ Are Two Approaches to Promote Opening Up,” 7 December 2002, Renmin ribao (People’s daily), FBIS, Daily Report, 7 December 2002. 83 This extract taken from Jiang Zemin on the “Three Represents” is discussed in Keith, “Plumbing the Relevance of ‘Independence and Self-Reliance’ in Chinese Foreign Policy,” p. 57. 84 Hu Jintao, “Zai jinian dangde shiyi jie sang chong quanhui chaokai sanshi zhounian dahuishangde jianghua” (Conference talk commemorating the thirtieth anniversary of the Third Plenum of the Eleventh Party Central Committee meeting), (18 December 2008), Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. iii, (Selected Works of Hu Jintao, vol. iii), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2016, p. 166 85 Hu Jintao, “Zai Beijing aoyunhui, canaohui zongjie biaozhang dahuishangde jianghua” (Talk on the remaining commendations of the Beijing Olympic Committee), (29 July 2008), Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. iii, pp. 109–11. 86 Hu Jintao., “Rang ershyiji chengwei heping, anquan, hezuo, fazhande xin shiji,” (See the new century as the twenty-first century realizing peace, security, cooperation and development), (5 November 2001), Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. iii, p. 518. 87 Xi Jinping, “Jinzhi he yunyung hao Mao Zedong sixianghuode linghuo” (Firmly grasping and putting to good use the spirit of Mao Zedong thought), (26 December 2013), Xi Jinping tanzhi guo lizheng (Xi Jinping discusses the country’s governance), Beijing: Waijiao chubanshe, 2014, p. 25. 88 Xi Jinping, “Gaige cai nan ye yao xiangqian tuijin,” (Reform is difficult and yet we must press on), (7 February 2014), Xi Jinping tanzhiguo lizheng, pp. 100–1. 89 General Propaganda Bureau, Central Committee, Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping zongshuji xilie zhongyao jianghua duben (A reader on a series of important talks by General Secretary Xi Jinping), Xuexi chubanshe, Remin chubanshe, 2016, p. 276. 90 Wen Jiabao, “Our Historical Tasks at the Primary Stage of Socialism and Several Issues concerning China’s Foreign Policy,” Xinhua, 26 February 2007, p. 3.

6 Deng and China’s contemporary foreign policy

The analysis herein obviously disagrees with Western interpretation that argues: “Deng Xiaoping was strikingly crude and relatively uninterested in international affairs. The rise of China owes little to what might be called Deng’s diplomacy, and nearly everything to his successful reforms at home.”1 Quite the contrary, Deng believed in the unity of foreign and domestic policies, and “successful reforms at home” required successful foreign policy abroad. Deng’s “independent foreign policy” was dialectically predicated on “seeking the truth from the facts” and it required above all “peace and development.” Deng’s foreign policy projected a mature logic focusing on a realistic understanding of China’s comparative stage of development and place in the world and the related optimal means of negotiating differences in international relations. Superpower status was not a Chinese goal. Deng’s foreign policy substantively disagreed with Western realism’s focus on balance of power politics and the analytical tendency to view such policy as the behavioural extension of mixed national inferiority and superiority. The CCP’s investment in Deng Xiaoping Theory and independent foreign policy has been and, for the most part, still is huge. Deng Xiaoping’s Chinese blend of foreign policy idealism and realism has been carried forward since his death in February 1997. However, Deng himself expected some level of adjustment to his low-posture foreign policy and to the extent and quality of China’s international contribution as China approached “developed” status. Deng mused: “By the middle of the next century, when we approach the level of the developed countries, then there will have been really great changes. At that time the strength of China and its role in the world will be quite different. We shall be able to make greater contributions to mankind.”2 Deng’s success helps explain the enduring influence of his foreign policy. Deng faced an existential crisis with strategic equanimity. He normalized relations with three hostile world powers, the US, Japan and the Soviet Union. His low-cost, low-posture foreign policy was exactly what was needed to support China’s development. The development of his “independent foreign policy” from the early 1980s to the present has demonstrated a rare consistency, coherence and rational flexibility whereby China has been able to focus on its developmental concerns while peacefully managing changes in international relations.

236  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy Professor David Shambaugh, Director of the China Policy Program at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University, provides the reader with a somewhat different reading. Shambaugh asserts that “. . . China is, in essence, a very narrow-minded, self-interested, realist state, seeking only to maximize its own national interests and power.”3 Reiterating the familiar Western theme concerning China’s “identity crisis,” or “pessoptimism,” he does not, as above, lay stress on “rare consistency,” focusing alternatively on China’s “odd combination of contradictory attitudes toward the world”: Underlying China’s inconsistent international behaviour are an odd combination of contradictory attitudes toward the world: confident (sometimes overly so) but insecure, assertive but hesitant, occasionally arrogant but usually modest, a sense of entitlement growing out of historical victimization, risk-averse but increasingly engaged, a cautious internationalism combined with strong nationalism and deeply embedded parochialism, truculence combined with pragmatism, a regional power with a global sense of itself, a China that wishes to be left alone but finds itself dependent on the world, and an increasingly modern and industrialized but still poor and developing country.4 In light of such deep ambivalence and such a list of unresolved contradictions, one might wonder how anyone gets out of the bed in the morning in Beijing. Shambaugh’s suggestion, however, that China is a “partial power” significantly agrees with Chinese dialectical analysis emphasizing China’s comparatively weak power. Not only does China not get ahead of itself, but China has never been in a hurry to claim “superpower status,” which it regards as a dubious distinction. Chinese leaders have often insisted: “China will never seek hegemony, nor will China bully others” 中国永远不会称霸永远不会欺负.5 “Hegemony” is not a goal of Chinese foreign policy. China neither thinks nor acts like a “superpower.” At the UN General Assembly, General Party Secretary Jiang Zemin explained the Chinese historical view on hegemonism and why it is a self-defeating status that any country would be wise to disclaim: Any country, overconfident of its power and mesmerized by is military strength, that adopts an expansionist policy and seeks hegemony is bound to fail. Any country that fabricates pretexts to infringe on another country’s sovereignty and interfere in its internal affairs will be ultimately forced to eat the bitter fruit of its actions. . . . Trying to run all the world’s affairs oneself and dictate the fate of people in other countries is becoming increasingly impossible. . . . In short, all actions that are contrary to the current of the times and violate the fundamental interests of people in other countries will inevitably meet with resistance and opposition.6 Deng revised Mao’s “one-line strategy” negating the trend towards general war. The decline of class struggle came with his focus on modernization and reform. The Marxist-Leninist expectation of a final confrontation between capitalism and

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  237 socialism and united front opposition to hegemonism was narrowed to spontaneous political alignments against specific instances of “hegemonism.” Mao would likely have abominated the new Party focus on “harmony” as integral to Deng’s “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Mao was already an impossible anachronism before he died. Deng broke the Monkey King’s cudgel when he abandoned large-scale class struggle. He then used Mao Zedong Thought to create Deng Xiaoping Theory and China’s “independent foreign policy.” These policies have supported the CCP’s economic goals with great success. “Self-reliance and independence,” for example, have been updated to include a new emphasis on developing a Chinese core of high technological innovation, and market reform has assumed not only the continuation of an open door in all directions, but also the creation of a new domestic consumption that will facilitate the expansion of China’s huge economy. Deng anticipated “economic globalization.” His open door strategy sought to insure China’s participation in the “world technological revolution.” His foreign policy preferred peace, but did not expect the elimination of war. Deng was not a Quaker. He was a seasoned Party general. Certainly, he was concerned that “hegemonism” would resent and misconstrue the implications of China’s development regarding as a threat rather than a contribution to the world economy. This final chapter reviews which of Deng’s formulations have lasted through time, considers the reasons for their persistence, revision or extension and shows how the original formulations have often been extended to meet changing international circumstances. In terms of change to Deng’s policy legacy, incrementalism rather than radical departure is more likely. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences” have been vigorously reiterated by all leaders since Deng’s death so as to promote China’s “peace and development.” China’s leaders have continuously subscribed to “independent foreign policy” on the practical basis of “seeking the truth from the facts.” Their position on the negative attributes of alliances and the balance of power has not changed. The original Westphalian notion of equal sovereignty was brought together with sinified Marxist-Leninist ideological emphases on contradiction and dialectics. And this synthesis has reflected increasingly conceptual acceptance of traditional Chinese concepts such as “harmony.” Within the unity of practice and theory, Deng prioritized the importance of Chinese praxis. He claimed that this was especially necessary in light of Marx not having provided clues as to how to proceed with economic reform and the open door under China’s discrete national conditions. Deng said: “Ours is an entirely new endeavour, one that was never mentioned by Marx, never undertaken by our predecessors and never attempted by another socialist country.”7 Deng also believed that if China turned capitalist, practiced hegemony and abandoned the policy of peace, it would be an unmitigated “disaster for the world.” He dubbed such a prospect as “the retrogression of history” 历史的倒退.8 Deng repeatedly told foreign visitors that his policies would outlast him and that his death would not matter, as his policies were highly regarded as “correct”

238  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy and would last one hundred years. The human memory may be more unreliable than what Deng anticipated. Deng’s correctness to some degree has rested uneasily on his full repudiation of the Cultural Revolution, but the real dangers of the latter seem somewhat lost to today’s generation. Deng’s policies, however, have demonstrated impressive stamina. They have lasted across the third, fourth and fifth “generations” of CCP leaders. Deng’s successors have embellished and added to Deng’s base new concepts, but these contributions are regularly traced back to Deng’s original thinking even as these same leaders have identified and recognized the substantive international changes that have occurred since Deng’s death on 16 February 1997. Deng had once emphasized: “The future of China is closely linked with that of the whole world.” His successors have all contributed to an internationalizing of Deng’s theme of “peace and development.” An alternative narrative based upon a dramatic revision to prevailing ideology is not likely given the strength of Deng’s policy as it connects with the modern history of China and the Party. This policy success has offered the Party some legitimacy in what otherwise is a sea of axiological angst. Any revision is more likely to be incremental rather than wholesale. Change in the size of the national economy need not imply the creation of a wide-ranging set of new foreign policy priorities. The enduring success of Deng’s foreign policy has been so extraordinary that it would be especially difficult to contemplate any radical conceptual departures in the political context of the Party’s ongoing search for legitimacy. Indeed, thus far, all succeeding CCP general secretaries have been at pains to underline the importance of Deng’s “independent foreign policy.”

Jiang Zemin beats Deng’s drum For the greater part of Jiang’s stewardship as Party general secretary (1982–2002) and PRC president, he lived with the certainty that Deng was, even if retired from all his posts, the “paramount” leader. In the aftermath of Tiananmen Square, Jiang swore fealty to Deng. Jiang emphasized Deng’s dialectical approach in meeting the challenges of domestic and world politics. In his 24 June 1989 speech to the Party, he canonized Deng’s contribution at the December 1978 Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee: . . . as Comrade Deng has told us time and time again, in going forward we must take the development of the economy as [our] core, firmly adhering to the four cardinal principles and firmly grasping reform and the open door. We must have faith in this as the centre of our work and unswervingly make it our foundation. The central leadership, in human affairs, must make adjustments but the Party’s Third Plenary Session, Eleventh Central Committee path and basic policies are not to be changed, these must be carried out resolutely. . . . there are two key wordings that we clearly keep in mind: firstly we are firm and are not for changing and shall not waver in the least; and secondly, we will carry out everything in a comprehensive manner. . . .9

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  239 In the aftermath of Tiananmen Square, the key policies, “reform and open door” 改革改革开放 were often conjoined with “stability” 稳定 – a goal that has been reiterated many times especially in the context of the dismissal of Party Secretaries General Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang in 1986 and 1989. Jiang, as CCP leaders before him, stressed that firm principle would be combined with flexibility. Jiang emphasized the need “to stress politics.” Jiang also referenced the 1981 position on Party history and Mao Zedong Thought. He intended to follow through on the “three basic points” of Mao Zedong Thought, namely “seeking the truth from the facts, the mass line and self-reliance.”10 Jiang proclaimed: “Deng Xiaoping Theory is contemporary Chinese Marxism.”11 Deng provided a model for the future in using the “ideological line of emancipating our minds and seeking the truth from the facts”: Comrade Deng Xiaoping set a glorious example for us by consummately applying scientific thinking and a scientific approach and constantly emancipating his mind and seeking truth from facts. We need to take as our model, adhere to the ideological line of emancipating our minds and seeking truth from the facts, be bold in breaking new ground while respecting scientific laws and building on the theories and experience of those who came before us, and continue to recognize and develop truth in practice.12 And in foreign policy, Jiang repeatedly subscribed to the “independent foreign policy of peace”; hence, he said to the Party: “The old world structure is disintegrating and a new one has yet to take shape, leaving the world in an uncertain period of transition between structures. Under these circumstances, we need to persevere in our independent foreign policy of peace and actively develop friendly relations with all countries.”13 In the face of the disintegrating “old structure,” Jiang advised Party members to stay calm and sit tight in their “fishing boat” as they pass through heavy seas. A low posture in foreign policy was still appropriate to China’s national conditions, including “a large population, a weak foundation, and limited per capita resources.”14 However, he reiterated the importance of Deng’s low-posture policy with emphasis on the difference “between far and near”: The relationship between far and near: From the perspective of geo-politics and geo-economics, we have little influence over major international problems and regional conflicts occurring far from us, so we should stand relatively aloof from them while championing justice. However, major problems occurring on our doorstep directly affect our security and economic interests and we should deal with them earnestly, exercise our influence and play our role fully. . . .15 Professor Vogel’s interpretation has emphasized that even though Jiang had “elevated Deng’s views into what would become “Deng Xiaoping theory” (Deng Xiaoping lilun) the informed public knew that Deng was a pragmatist, not an

240  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy ideologue. . . .”16 Deng was not an “ideologue” in a negative sense, but his policy science drew from ideology that focused on Mao’s theory of contradictions and the necessity of inductive reasoning through praxis. Deng does have a reputation for problem solving, but he was serious about the ideals that inspired “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” and a very important part of Deng’s job as paramount leader was to provide ideological guidance so as to further the unity of domestic and foreign policies. Jiang credited Deng with reformulating “international strategy, adjusting China’s relations with Japan, the United States and the Soviet Union, and developing friendly relations with neighbouring countries and other Third World countries, thereby creating a new situation in China’s external relations during the new period.”17 In the most trying circumstances of Western censure after Tiananman, discussed in Chapter Four, for example, President Jiang Zemin insisted on following Deng’s approach to Sino-US relations: “Whoever tied the bell around the tiger’s neck is the one who has to untie it.”18 Jiang reiterated Deng’s US policy on the basis of what might be called “reverse onus.” The US needed to take the initiative to fix the faltering Sino-US relationship given US strength and China’s weakness. Chinese foreign policy was often very serious in its insistence on the recognition of the equal standing of the Chinese state, but it was not eager to pursue international commitments and objectives at the expense of China’s internal economic development. China was not going to yield to “power politics.” In his 31 October 1989 discussion with former President Nixon, Jiang Zemin expressed his annoyance at American overreaction and interference with reference to the Tiananmen Square disturbances. Even though “world socialism was at a low ebb,” he reiterated that the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence could still provide the effective basis for US-China relations and that China would continue to maintain its “independent foreign policy” through actively friendly relations with all countries: Quelling the political disturbances in China this year is the country’s internal affair, so I do not know why the United States has reacted so strongly. As an old Chinese proverb goes, “it is only the dumbest person who looks for trouble when peace reigns in the land. . . .” . . . our appraisal of the international situation as a whole has not changed, but an adverse current has suddenly sprung up . . . seeking to criticize China and impose sanctions against China. . . . China is not the country responsible for [this foul atmosphere]. Whoever tied the bell around the tiger’s neck is the one who has to untie it. China has always sought to develop friendly relations with other countries, including the United States, on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.19 Even in his exasperation, Jiang Zemin recalled that China would determine its own terms of reference: “Even if the US is perverse, there is no reason why China should act as the US does.”20 Indeed, Einstein had once said that “politics is harder than physics,” and this might agree with Jiang’s observation that

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  241 there is no accounting for “the dumbest person who looks for trouble when peace reigns in the land.” At any rate, Jiang came up with his own 16-character policy to deal with Sino-US contradictions in a low-posture fashion of “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” Jiang raised this policy of “enhancing trust, reducing trouble, developing cooperation and avoiding controversy” during discussion with visiting US Congressmen in November 1992.21 Picking up on what Deng had learned, Jiang argued that, while it was necessary to stand up to the US so as to avoid any invitation to the American bullying of China, it was also necessary to maintain a studied equanimity responding to provocation on the basis of “observing calmly, responding coolly, never claiming leadership, and making some contributions.”22 Even though the well of Sino-US mutual trust was drying up, Chinese policy coolly sought to avoid costly confrontation. Jiang frankly described “the long-term strategic objective of some Americans” was to “promote peaceful evolution toward capitalism in China”: Basically, they are not willing to let China unite, develop and become strong, and they will continue to apply pressure to China. . . . The United States takes an imperious attitude and posture of hegemonism and power politics in its dealings with China. On the other hand . . . the United States is forced to seek our cooperation in dealing with various international affairs, and must maintain normal relations with China in order to develop economic and trade cooperation.23 Even after so many years of negotiating normalization, China had, therefore, to persist in peaceful “dual tactics” in its dealing with the contradictions underlying US China policy. Jiang cited Deng’s strategy of opening up while pursuing “independence and self-reliance” 独立自主自力更生. Deng had bequeathed to China “the basic state policy of opening up, open up in multiple directions and at different levels, absorb and apply advances made by many other countries, including advanced developed capitalist countries and actively participate in international economic and technological cooperation.” 24 The Seventh Plenary Session of the Thirteenth Central Committee on 30 December 1990 had affirmed the Party’s commitment to an expanded open door under the fourth of twelve points: “We must continue to open wider to the outside world in various ways such as developing economic and trade relations with other countries, utilizing foreign capital and introducing advanced foreign technology, establishing SEZs and open economic areas, and adopting necessary special policies and flexible measures.”25 China is no longer a “Middle Kingdom” surrounded by concentric circles of declining civilization. Under Jiang, Chinese civilization has been characterized as one of several civilizations that interact in supporting human civilization. Jiang Zemin further entrenched Deng’s “learning dialectic” that assumes all countries have their strong and weak points. He elaborated on “seeking common ground while reserving differences” in the developing context of “diversity of,” as distinct

242  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy from, Huntington’s “clash of civilizations.” Jiang updated the scope of “seeking common ground, reserving differences” 求同存异 that had been frequently used in the Cold War struggle to expiate the differences in ideologies and social systems in the international relations of both socialist and capitalist states. Jiang applied “seeking common ground while reserving differences” to civilizations as well as states. Consistent with the emphasis on “independence and self-reliance,” Chinese analysis specifically challenged the Huntington thesis on the inevitability of the “clash of civilizations.” Jiang claimed all civilizations support humanity in an ultimately progressive diversity. In discussion with US President Clinton, he had said: “The rich diversity in the world is a good thing, learn from other countries and cultures to compensate for their weaknesses and share the accomplishments of human civilization.”26 Diversity is celebrated as a human good that accords with common prosperity once countries, peoples and civilizations learn how to deal with differences as a strength rather than a weakness. “Seeking common ground while reserving differences” has been extended not only to cover the relations of all states, but also the diversity of civilizations and recent ethnic and religious differences that inform the post-Soviet world. Professor Hazel Smith at the University of Warwick has argued: “nothing has characterised post-Cold War international politics more than the push for democracy. . . .” Yet Professor Smith points out that the push for the “internalisation of democratisation” came without the support of a cogent “international democratic theory.”27 There is no such theoretical ambivalence on the Chinese side. Chinese leaders have drawn continuously on their own theory linking it to the principles of the UN. According to Jiang, such applications would support the new trend towards the “democratization” of international relations” 国际关系民主化 that asserts the equality of sovereign state national self-determination as well as the “diversity of civilizations.” Premier Zhou Enlai, back in 1955, was primarily concerned about equality in the relations between socialist states and the relations between capitalist and socialist states, but he had originally suggested that the Five Principles plus “seeking common ground while reserving differences” might also apply to conflict between religions and cultures. Jiang Zemin expanded on this emphasis in the contemporary context of new “non-traditional” security concerns relating to ethnic and religious conflict. Jiang Zemin reiterated that “peace and development” was the Party’s “great task” 大局 as China proceeded with “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” However, Jiang further hoped to turn “peace and development” into an international public policy that included China’s peace and development within world peace and “common development”; thus, he extended the international implications of China’s “independent foreign policy.” In a speech commemorating the Party’s eightieth birthday, Jiang said: The purposes of China’s foreign policy are to safeguard world peace and promote common development. We adhere to an independent foreign policy of peace. We have carried out friendly exchanges and mutually

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  243 beneficial cooperation with all countries and treated one another as equals on the basis of the Five Principles . . . in a ceaseless effort to advance the cause of human progress.28 Deng had already taken large-scale class struggle out of domestic politics and the related reference to ideology and social systems out of China’s relations with other states. Jiang extended this trend with his theory of the “three represents,” which allowed China’s new wealthy capitalists to join the CCP. He continued to place opposition to “hegemonism” on a case-by-case basis and clarified a new position on united front that limited China’s opposition to hegemonism to participation in, rather than leadership of Third World spontaneous alignments reacting to specific hegemonism. Jiang was candid about changes to “united front” strategy: It must be pointed out, however, that the way we use the term “united front” is a somewhat different sense now than in the past. Our current usage of the term does not imply that we will organize a united front, much less lead it. This united front opposes hegemonism and power politics. It is not organized by anyone; rather it is a collaborative activity that occurs naturally in certain international circumstances to deal with certain problems.29 In Moscow, in May 1991, President Jiang Zemin found a very receptive audience. In the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian leaders were also interested in endorsing the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, as the latter promised a measure of respect for the new Russian Federation. Jiang repeated lessons, learned. China would refrain from “entering into alliance or establishing strategic relations with any big powers.” Jiang reiterated this in his report to the Fourteenth National Party Congress and elaborated on China’s foreign policy, stressing that China’s “independent foreign policy of peace” opposes hegemonism and great power politics.30 Jiang’s reiteration of Deng’s foreign policy precluded “alliances with any country or group of countries and precluded joining any military blocs.” Jiang insisted that this “principled position . . . will never change.”31 Not only did it not change, it eventually resulted in Jiang’s “New Security Concept” 新安全观, which challenged “old” security predicated on realism, alliances and the balance of power leading to arms races and mutual confrontation. The concept had to deal with the increase in the pattern of multipolarity in the context of US single polarity. The concept was self-professedly “new,” but its reference to good neighbour policy still had old roots in the “Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence” and its operational corollary, “seeking common ground while reserving differences.”32 China’s 1998 and 2000 white papers on national defence highly recommended the “New Security Concept.”33 Apparently, China was seeking only “sufficiency,” or a natural and proportionately balanced military modernization, as distinguished from American expansionism that sought “absolute security” for the US.34 In his

244  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy 17 July 2001 speech at Moscow University, Jiang Zemin hailed the “new style of state-to-state relations” predicated on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences” and related his signing of the Sino-Russian Good-Neighbourly Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation to the “New Security Concept.”35 Indeed, there was continuous subscription to the Five Principles across the collapse of the Soviet Union and the formation of the new Russian Federation. Jiang aspired to a new style of international relations as well as to a new regionalism in the Asia-Pacific. His foreign policy stressed the “democratization of international relations” often in reply to what was regarded as single-superpower American unilateralism. This is another Chinese paean to the equality of all sovereign states. It is an obvious extension of past thinking and concepts concerning the equality of state sovereignty, the importance of making “friends everywhere” and respecting small states as equals. In a corollary to his instruction, “never to seek hegemony,” Mao had several times admonished his Party that in international relations it was important to get rid of “great-nation chauvinism” and to “treat as equals all small foreign countries without exception and never be arrogant.”36 Jiang had similarly in his Fourteenth National Party Congress discussion of China’s opening up and “independent foreign policy” reiterated the same point urging the increased application of “seeking common ground while reserving differences”: “All countries, whether big or small, strong or weak, rich or poor, should participate in international affairs as equal members of the international community.”37 In his political report to the Sixteenth Party Congress in 2002, Jiang elaborated on China’s “independent policy of peace, safeguarding world peace and promoting common development”: In handling international affairs, we should observe and cope with all situations cool-headedly, adhere to the principle of mutual respect, and seek common ground while shelving differences. We need to respect the diversity of the world, promote democracy in international relations, and strive for a peaceful international environment and a good climate in the areas around China.38 This “idealist” thinking resulted in the formulation of the “democratization of international relations” as predicated on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Jiang’s new reference to the “diversity of civilization” reflected the same theme of inclusiveness. The differences in international relations were multiplying and transforming. Deng’s “peace and development” was extended more explicitly to include world peace as the precondition for “common development.” In the changing international context of multi-polarization and economic globalization, according to Jiang, it was necessary to recognize the “diversity of civilizations” as “the basic feature of human society.” Jiang discussed what he regarded as a new “reality”: “Diversity of the world is a reality that should

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  245 be recognized. Different civilizations and social systems should enjoy long-term coexistence and draw upon and benefit from each other in the process of competition and comparison and achieve common development while seeking common ground and shelving differences.”39 The foreign policy leadership of Jiang Zemin genuflected before the approach and principles set out by his mentor and patron, Deng Xiaoping. Indeed, the world was undergoing significant change. Chinese analysis in this regard often paired the development of multipolarity and economic globalization. Such phenomena really did represent extraordinary change – Deng’s legacy, however, offered a great deal of proven flexibility in meeting the challenge of China’s changing international relations.

Hu Jintao further extends Deng’s foreign policy legacy Under Hu’s foreign policy leadership, 2002–12, China continues as a “large developing socialist country with an ancient civilization.”40 Hu started with deference to Jiang Zemin’s ideological contribution, “three represents” theory 三个代 表理论 as it not only dealt with domestic stability, Party building and economic development, but it provided an effective strategy against “peaceful evolution.” At least as early as May 2000, Hu summed up the international dimensions of the “three represents”: In today’s world there is so much change and new distinguishing features. Sudden change has become manifest in three ways: First, peace and development are the two great lessons in today’s world, the possibility of a new world war has become remote over a long time; but hegemonism and power politics are newly developing and everywhere things are not peaceful; the trend of world multipolarity cannot be reversed, and the contradictory struggle between unipolarity and multipolarity cannot be averted. . . . Secondly, the course of economic globalization led by the Western developed countries is increasing. . . . Thirdly, technology and science in today’s world is advancing by leaps and bounds.41 In the aggravated context Western tendencies to “divide” and to foster China’s “disintegration,” Hu believed that Jiang’s “three represents” would support economic reform and fortify China and the Chinese people against “peaceful evolution.” Hu, in explicating China’s “all-directional diplomacy” for dealing with the problems of the new century, credited Deng’s foresight in transcending the “oneline strategy” and his alternative focus on “peace and development.” Deng’s policies and perspectives had produced a “foreign affairs tradition with Chinese characteristics” 中国特色外交传统 and a “foreign affairs style” 外交风格.42 Like Jiang, Hu also stressed the importance of “common development” at the international level as it related to the “great rejuvenation of the Chinese people” 中华民族伟大复兴:

246  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy In the new stage of the new century the Party will bring together all of the peoples of the entire country to establish a moderately prosperous society and to realize three great historical tasks [namely] to push forward on the consolidating of modernization, and completing the unification of our mother country, firmly grasping world peace and advancing common development.43 Jiang Zemin had initiated the idea of “diversity of civilization.” Hu went further, focusing on “harmony” as a Chinese civilizational concept that supported the logic and organizational basis of the UN. In a major speech at celebration of the UN’s sixtieth anniversary on 15 September 2005, he claimed that the UN had since its founding maintained a focus on “peace and development” and that for sixty years the UN had tried to further “democratic international relations.” Without such effort, Hu feared the proliferation of international tensions and conflicts.44 According to some Chinese analysis, the latter had apparently become more likely as the US, as the world’s sole superpower, entered a “new round of strategic expansion” 战略扩张 reflected in the “unilateralist” preference of the single superpower for “new interventionism” 新干涉主义.45 During his September 2005 grand tour taking in New York, London, Ottawa and Mexico City, Hu heavily emphasized China’s peaceful foreign policy in reaction to the “China Threat.” Deng Xiaoping had optimistically claimed that China’s “image” 面额 had really changed with the founding of the PRC under the leadership of the CCP.46 He may have been overly sanguine. His successors had to deal with the pressing issue of peaceful evolution in light of the international backlash that attended Tiananmen Square and Soviet disintegration. Professors Sujian Guo and Marc Blanchard summed up Hu’s deliberate correlation of “peaceful development” with the creation of an “harmonious world”: “Peaceful development” is the concept of the new Chinese leadership to reassure the international community, particularly the United States and the existing major powers, that China’s rise would not be threatening to the existing world order and would not be a zero-sum game. China’s new leadership understands that is in its fundamental interest to maintain stable and peaceful relationships . . . since this allows China to focus its attention on domestic challenges and “building a well-off society” at home by the midtwenty-first century. “Harmonious World” is meant to demonstrate China’s commitment to “peaceful development” to maintain global peace and stability and to “building a harmonious society” at home to establish a more just and equitable China.47 The pro-China Hong Kong paper Da gong bao claimed that while Hu had “started the ball rolling” in New York, change to China’s “image” would require long years of “unremitting effort.” The paper gave Beijing its candid recommendation: As the United States is the country most suspicious and jealous of China’s peaceful development strategy, Hu Jintao needs to brief Bush in person on China’s national condition and, through US media remarks, make

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  247 Americans aware of the aim of China’s foreign policy, eliminate Americans’ suspicious . . . and improve China’s image in the minds of Americans. Americans often say, “Perception is everything.”48 Mao and Deng had used Chinese history in an illustrative way to underscore Party priorities. Hu, in his response to the American inspired “China Threat,” enlisted Chinese history and civilization in a much more expansive way than did his predecessors. He went farther by directly incorporating key concepts from China’s tradition within the explanation of contemporary governance and foreign policy. Some Western critics have regarded this trend as confirmation of the Chinese penchant for autocracy. Professor Ross Terrill, for example, has ruefully noted: “I have argued that the calculated link between Leninism and the imperial tradition is the key to the nature of the Chinese state: Leninism piggybacks on a selectively salvaged autocratic tradition.”49 Hu’s reading of dynastic history emphasized that “harmony” was a term that had been circulating for thousands of years in the human community across the historical boundaries, slave, feudal and capitalist societies in the context of attempts to counter social injustice and inequality. He claimed that “harmony” is more likely under “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”50 Not only has recent Party history been conscripted, but increasingly deep dynastic Chinese history and civilization has been conscripted in the development of China’s “independent foreign policy of peace.” Hu’s leadership, for example, focused on China’s Confucian heritage highlighting “harmony with differences” 和而不同 (or “harmony without uniformity”). Such a heritage reinforced China’s contemporary “independent foreign policy of peace.”51 It explicitly paralleled Zhou’s twentieth-century approach, “seeking common ground while reserving differences” 求同存异. China’s tradition has been eulogized as a “political intelligence” passed down through the centuries. Domestic and global “harmony” have been conscripted in a quintessential Chinese discourse that rejects the “China Threat” 中国威胁 as a distorted image propagated by Western “realism.” The relation between “harmony” and “differences” was designed to facilitate inclusiveness in both domestic and international affairs and, therefore, needs careful analytical attention. When referring to “harmony” Hu was referring to a long-term aspiration that would depend upon the appropriate dealing with differences. A few weeks after Hu’s UN keynote speech, the Renmin ribao (People’s daily) provided a lengthy discourse on “harmony.” The Renmin ribao glossed “harmony” as an ancient philosophical approach to dealing with differences.52 This gloss presumed that the moral man does not fear to disagree with others, but respects different viewpoints. The small, or “mean man” 小小人, on the other hand, opportunistically accepts the political necessity of lying and is likely to perpetuate an illusion of “harmony” so as to foster his own exclusive interest. Such opportunism is more likely to foster conflict, whereas genuine harmony is expected to underwrite peace. Apparently, “harmony” honestly responds to the “rational composition of different things,” whereas “uniformity” merely seeks “the simple duplication and coincidence of things of different natures.”

248  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy “Harmony” therefore requires “independence” rather than “hegemony.” Not only the differences between states, but the differences between civilizations are to be recognized so that they may become a matter of positive mutual learning in a future global harmony. The lesson according to the Renmin ribao (People’s daily), Beijing, was that “harmony” needed to be cultivated on a threefold basis that breaks down the inner connotations of “harmony” 和谐. First, the individual person, and by extrapolation the individual state, “ought to take his or her own initiative.” Second, persons or states should allow others to take the initiative. Third, “one must be good at engaging in friendly cooperation with others.” Such prescription supported the five principles and the new policy emphasis on the “democratization of international relations” 国际关系的民主化 as against a world dominated by great powers. Indeed, the term seemed to offer a potential dividend in the Chinese quest for the influence that comes with soft power. This Chinese reading on the importance of the “harmony” as distinct from the “clash of civilizations” recognized a difference in the Chinese, as opposed to the alleged American approach to non-traditional security as it concerns ethnic conflict and terrorism. The Chinese assertion claimed that terrorism did not originate in “civilization” per se and that differences between civilizations had to be recognized on the basis of “seeking common ground while reserving differences” so as to further human civilization. Hu explained this position at the 2007 Consultative Conference of Saudi Arabia. His “harmonious world” aspired to the “harmonious progress of different civilizations” based on an inclusive approach that built on the 1950s principle of “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” Civilization, nationality and religious difference were not to be blamed in unnecessary finger pointing, and such negativity was to be resisted in mutual cooperation and mutual learning.53 “Common prosperity” had originally been highlighted by Deng Xiaoping in his Southern Tour reference to following “three favourables” 三个有利 in domestic economic policy, namely enhance China’s productive forces, reduce polarization in society and promote common prosperity. During Hu’s years, just as domestic “harmony” was linked with global “harmony,” “common prosperity” was increasingly featured as an aspiration of the “harmonized world.” China’s 2008 white paper on national defence reiterated: “China cannot develop in isolation from the . . . world, nor can the world enjoy prosperity and stability without China.” This 2008 paper also reiterated: “The PLA subordinates its development to the overall national construction.” China’s national defence white paper of 2010 was prefaced by a statement concerning the importance of humanity achieving “common development” and “common prosperity.” Deng had originally placed development in a prioritized synthesis with military modernization. The white paper announced: “China is still in the period of important strategic opportunities for its development and the overall security environment for it remains favourable.”54

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  249

Xi Jinping and Deng’s legacy By the time Xi took over the leadership of the Party in November 2012, Deng’s “independent foreign policy” was well consolidated. General Secretaries Jiang, Hu and Xi have all referred to a “new style of international relations,” but this style rests upon a foundation of established concepts and themes. The themes of “peace and development” and of “reform and the open door” were doubly entrenched as facilitating both domestic and international “harmony.” Party policy statements and PRC treaty references clarified that even in the context of substantive change in international relations, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and its operational corollary, “seeking common ground while reserving differences” were essential to continued Chinese foreign policy development. Moreover, the basic assumptions of Deng Xiaoping were already complimented in policy extensions highlighting the “New Security Context,” “democratized international relations,” and “diversity of civilizations” as Chinese strategy evolved to deal with both traditional and non-traditional security problems. The Western media and some commentators have often suggested that Xi is a tougher Chinese leader who has a more assertive foreign policy.55 In some ways, he shares these attributes with Deng. Xi also has a no-nonsense style, is direct and tough and appears disinterested in titles and honorifics. However, he is more often associated with Mao in his style of strong leadership and the mass line approach to political problems. Deng of course very much emphasized the mass line as a policy science that would promote reform, but he had expressed general concerns about personality cult. Xi responded to the provocative Japanese purchase of private land in the contested East China Sea islands with an Air Defense Identification Zone in November 2013. At a Shanghai regional conference in 21 May 2014, he was dismissive of the American “strategic pivot,” declaring that Asian countries should solve Asian problems and this would do more to protect the security of Asians. At times, China’s leaders have firmly acted particularly in relation to key issues of sovereignty concerning, for example, Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang. Deng Xiaoping, for example, was very firm with leaders such as Mikhail Gorbachev and Margaret Thatcher. Deng could play the retired old Chinese leader with President George H. W. Bush but at the same time, as a “son of the Chinese people,” he told Bush in no uncertain terms that he had to make the first move on reinstating relations with Beijing. Moreover, while Xi’s tone may at times appear more assertive, it is not bellicose. His reference to “peace and development” has been extensive. Furthermore, like his predecessors, Xi has not threatened to use force as China’s first option. On the question of “independence,” Xi has been unequivocal; for example, he explained during his speech commemorating the one hundred twentieth birthday of Mao in December 2013: “As for firmly grasping independence 独立自主, we must firmly grasp [independence] as absolutely necessary to the Chinese people taking their own course of action and making things happen on their own.”56 Xi lauded the understandings of the November 2012 Eighteenth Party Congress:

250  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy “Peace and development is simply inevitable when it comes to socialism with Chinese characteristics; hence, we firmly grasp the confluence of open-door development, cooperative development, common development, and benefitting all sides pushing forward the establishing of a long peace and a commonly prosperous harmonious world.”57 In a 28 June 2014 speech occasioned by the sixtieth anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, Xi delivered a message of continuity of principle. Xi Jinping told Burma’s President U Thein Sein and India’s Vice President Mohammad Hamid Ansari that China, in pursuing peaceful development, had made a “strategic choice”: China will firmly pursue peaceful development. This is a strategic choice China has made in keeping with the trend of the times and based on its fundamental interests. We Chinese believe that “no one should do to others what he does not want others to do to himself.” China does not subscribe to the notion that a country is bound to seek hegemony when it grows in strength.58 Reviewing the last six decades of China’s international relations, Party leader Xi strongly endorsed the enduring relevance of the original Five Principles as they meet the demands of today’s world: “These Five Principles, as an integrated, interconnected and indivisible concept, capture the essence of today’s international relations among all countries regardless of their social system, stage of development or size.” Xi recounted the spirit of the early 1950s during which China, India and Burma had founded the Five Principles: “From the beginning, China focused on the region and world peace, advancing the balance of forces that forwarded common prosperity. China, India and Burma together introduced the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, gradually establishing these principles by which to guide the relations between states.”59 Xi again invoked the same principles in the European regional context. In 2014 at the College of Europe, Xi explained why China is following an “independent foreign policy of peace.” Perhaps in an implicit rebuke of Western realism’s failure to understand China’s history and policy, Xi stated: “Only when we know where a country has come from could we possibly understand why the country is what it is today.”60 In a 28 March 2014 speech, he concluded by referring to China’s “independent foreign policy of peace” and its support for peace and development. His language would surely have received Deng’s approval: “To sum up, China follows the road of peaceful development. This is not expediency, nor is it [nice] diplomatic language. It is the result of history and reality. . . .”61 The “memory of foreign invasions and bullying” had encouraged the Chinese interest in peace. Xi was also prone to using Chinese history and civilization to back up contemporary policy. He cited the “strong sense of national confidence of the Chinese people” that is backed up in China’s 5,000-year-old civilization. The latter had witnessed a flourishing of thought that celebrated “important ideas, such as the moral injunction of fidelity to one’s parents and brothers, and to the monarch and friends” as well as “the sense of propriety, justice, integrity and honour,”

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  251 “the emphasis on benevolence and kindness towards fellow human beings” and the belief that “men should be in harmony with nature.”62 Xi told his European audience that “a gentleman should constantly strive for self-perfection.” Relevant Confucian philosophy had focused the ruler’s attention on the contented repose of the people. It also insisted that the “superior man is not a utensil” and that he must cultivate his inner benevolence and extend it into the family and society through moral example and action. Such civilization had, according to Xi, fostered a belief in “peace, growth, reform and the progress of civilization,” itself. Therein is the basis for a common purpose in achieving peace, especially given the European people’s suffering in World War Two. Such cultivation of “common purpose” was extended to the Asia-Pacific region where it has more historical and cultural resonance. Xi, for example, played up the importance of family in the Asia Pacific; hence, in a 2013 APEC meeting, he lauded “economic reform and the open door” and connected this theme with “family”: “The Asia Pacific is a big family. China is a member of [this] big family. China cannot leave the Asia Pacific no more than the Asia Pacific can do without China.”63 Xi’s explanation of the “China dream” and the rejuvenation of the Chinese people was captured in the idiom, “family is the smallest country, and the country is like ten thousand families” 家是最小国, 国是于万家.64 At APEC in 2015, Xi also enlisted Chinese philosophy in his advocacy of multilateral economic cooperation that supports both developed and developing countries through “sharing base practices and transferring technologies” and advancing structural economic reform. Xi cited an ancient Chinese philosopher who had said: “The key to running a country is to make its people better-off.” Essentially, Mencean Confucianism had proclaimed the superior policy of 仁政, or “benevolent government,” as the basis for harmony inside and outside the Chinese empire. Also, the previous pattern of cooperation with the Russians and new governments of Central Asia has so far been extended by Xi who has declined to play the “great game.” In the Deng-Jiang years, China had followed principles of peace, development and cooperation in Central Asia during the post-Soviet transition of new states along its diverse borders. China did not play the hegemon. Instead, Jiang entered into multiple agreements on confidence building in border areas, which resulted in reductions of military forces in the border areas as well as new monitoring and verification of force levels. This pattern has been significantly expanded under Xi Jinping. Out of respect for Russian efforts to promote Putin’s project, the Eurasian Economic Union, Xi went to Moscow so as to offset any potential conflicts that might arise with his own initiative, the Silk Road Economic Belt. Xi and Putin signed the 8 May 2013 declaration that established the Shanghai Cooperation Council as the site for future negotiations based on “the principles of transparency, mutual respect, equality, and complementation of different integration mechanisms.”65 The establishment of the Shanghai Cooperation Council was quickly followed by one of Xi’s most important initiatives, namely, the re-creation of the “silk roads,” or the “Belt and Road” 一带一路. Xi first floated this idea in September

252  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy 2013 during a university speech in Kazakhstan. The following month, Xi, in a speech in India, proposed the creation of an Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and this bank has been featured in subsequent “Belt and Road” projects that have focused on the construction, logistics and transportation needs of developing economies in EuroAsia. Predictably, the language of Xi’s proposals has focused on mutual benefit, respect for sovereignty and different models of development. Pundits have now claimed that at the 2017 World Economic Forum in Davos, Xi, the supposedly hard-nosed leader of the CCP, had become the new champion of the “liberal international order.”66 Such assumption needs qualification in that Xi supported “economic globalization” insofar as it “served the Chinese people and more generally supported “common prosperity.” Lenin’s final confrontation between capitalism and socialism had of course been dropped, and the open door had been progressively extended, but the history of the gap between developed and developing countries still required caution. “Economic globalization” is still a “double-edged sword.” Xi, however, developed his argument claiming that economic globalization could not be blamed for the international financial economic crisis and the turbulence of contemporary right-wing politics. In Xi’s view, such negative phenomena originated in the “excessive chase of profit by financial capital and the grave failure of financial capital”67 Successor leaders of Deng have strongly endorsed the conceptual continuity of “independent foreign policy” that focuses on “peace and development,” even as they recognize the discontinuity manifest in international relations that calls for a new style or mode of international relations and security concept. Chinese policy still encompasses a blend of idealism and realism that responds to the need for harmony and the reserved use of force. Stronger emphasis on Chinese patriotism has come with new emphasis on the “diversity of civilization” and the peaceful characteristics of the Chinese people as confirmed in the Party’s specific reading of the ongoing importance “harmony” over the centuries of Chinese civilization. While opposition to hegemonism remains a stated goal, this is not a commitment to Chinese leadership in world affairs, as it has been confined to spontaneous political cooperation on the part of willing states. National policy continues to focus on military modernization as it relates to the primary importance of national economic development. The assumption that the latter needs a sustained period of peace has been carried forward even in the context of international crisis. All of this underscores Chinese disinterest in war and it challenges the assumptions of a “China Threat.” The realist view, however, exaggerates, if not misinterprets, “hiding capability while biding time,” ignoring China’s historically successful ASEAN policy and overemphasizing the smallest elements of force such as in the case of the great sand projects of the South China Sea. Apparently, China’s economic development is enough to represent a future threat. Moreover China has often been placed in exclusive opposition to the Laws of the Sea. The historical record of successful Chinese foreign policy and diplomacy during the reform years is then ignored as irrelevant strategic deception. A key example is the neglect in the analysis of China’s extraordinarily successful record of border negotiation in Asia over the decades since 1949.

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Deng’s legacy and the prospect for Chinese “leadership” in world affairs The conceptual basis of contemporary foreign policy still derives from the substantive and logical assumptions of Deng’s “independent foreign policy” stressing “peace and development.” The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and “seeking common ground while reserving differences” have achieved continuous support through changing Party leadership. The question still remains how long his legacy will last into the future. Xi has strongly endorsed “the comprehensive moderately prosperous society,” but will the size of China’s rising economy after 2020 require changes in foreign policy? Deng had insisted: “Do not claim leadership.” He believed that China had neither the power nor the moral inclination to carry it off. His foreign policy disavowed the injustice and inequity of superpower status, and it also cautiously projected the level and scope of China’s contribution to the world in relation to its own goals of development. China apparently would always “vote” with the Third World. Deng was not terribly specific, but he did believe that China would make more of a “contribution” in world affairs once it became “developed.” In his 2013 written analysis of China in the global context, Georgetown Professor David Shambaugh warned against the “hyped” China threat and rebutted the exaggeration of Martin Jacques: “. . . China has a very long way to go before it becomes – if ever it becomes – a true global power. And it will never “rule the world.”68 Much of this book’s discussion agrees with Shambaugh’s emphasis on the modest comparative position of China in world affairs. China may become more than the “world’s largest developing country” in the next decades, but it neither wants nor is practically capable of achieving extraordinary status as an “emerging superpower.” Even if in the next decades China reaches the bottom rung of the developed states category, the internal priorities of development will remain greatly relevant to China’s foreign policy. Much of the discussion in this book suggests that Dengist foreign policy resilience and flexibility has been seriously underestimated. A modest low posture that focuses on independence while learning abroad was precisely the right posture to adopt for foreign policy to facilitate the contemporary stage of China’s development. So much of the assumption that informs Chinese foreign policy is derived from Deng’s assessment of China as “the world’s largest developing country” 世界上最大的发展国家. Despite the elaboration since the mid-1980s of a foreign policy that focuses on the domestic priorities of economic development, Western realism persists in warnings against the “China threat” 中国威胁. This “threat” builds on an exogenous theoretical construct of power and anarchy that is largely premised in a reading of European history of balance of power politics and the rise and fall of great powers. Such a viewpoint either ignores or misrepresents the modern history of China’s national economic development in its relation to Chinese foreign policy. Deng was exactly right in his assumption that China’s development would attract negative criticism. On 4 September 1989, he had in the context

254  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy of unprecedented developments in Eastern Europe and the USSR urged his colleagues “to observe developments calmly” and advised yet again: “The more developed we are the more modest we should be. . . . [As we develop] that will put the developed countries more on guard against us. Notwithstanding, we should maintain friendly exchanges with them.”69 Barring major Party crisis, China is not likely to remain “the world’s largest developing country” in the long term. There is an expectation that China will soon attain the status of the world’s largest economy. Perhaps with the future achievement of a modestly construed “developed” status, China will want to use its muscles. However, this has been regularly challenged in Chinese arguments that China will then make an appropriate “contribution” commensurate with its economic status and positive correlation of China’s economy with the world economy. During Hu Jintao’s tenure as leader there was some preliminary debate about Party School Vice-President Zheng Bijian’s new formulation, China’s “peaceful rise” 和平崛起. This expression, however, raised concerns about any identification with the “rise and fall” of great powers, and the leadership gradually dropped reference to this term to focus on “peace and development.”70 Even a “peaceful” rising could be construed as a claim to leadership. More recently, speculation concerning Xi Jinping’s more robust style of foreign policy leadership has alluded to internal debates, suggesting a move away from Deng’s “low-posture strategy” towards Xi’s putative “theory of moral realism” that focuses more on a “strategy for striving for achievement” 奋发有为. Dean Yan Xuetong, Institute of Modern International Relations, Tsinghua University, for example, has suggested that while there is still widespread subscription to Deng’s low-posture strategy, Xi’s emphasis on “rejuvenation” requires a greater political emphasis on extending the international strength of China as a rising power, particularly in light of the great success of the 2008 Olympics and the need to counter Obama’s “pivot” to the Asia Pacific. Deng himself expected China to make a “greater contribution”; however, “strategy for striving for achievement” could be construed as making an appropriate and expected contribution to world affairs as China develops rather than a purposeful revision to the overall structure of Deng’s foreign policy and related theory.71 Most importantly, Yan’s suggestion looks tenuous, especially in its assumption that Deng’s strategy was focused on economics and Xi’s new strategy is based on politics. Deng had repeatedly argued that the Third World countries could not achieve development without achieving political independence. On the other hand, he had hoped that the SEZs and the economic reform and the open door would enhance China’s image and political influence in the world. The low-posture emphasis on internal development was in fact a matter of political and ideological influence. Xi’s “China Dream” includes emphasis on raising every Chinese out of poverty. His apparently new emphasis on a “new type of international relations” and its implications for Sino-US relations is not “new.”72 Furthermore, the legitimacy under Deng and Xi of the Party and its regime is focused on raising the standard of living of the people, and the language and conceptual structure of Xi’s

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  255 thinking and discussions has made extensive use of Deng’s formulations as well as of those formulations of Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao that represent further development of Deng’s ideas. Having said this, it would seem likely that there will have to be some adjustments once “the comprehensive moderately prosperous society” comes within the Party’s grasp in 2020. Subsequent to achieving this society, China is to take the next several decades to work towards becoming a less developed country by mid-century. Recent history suggests that the Party’ adaptation to change represents some kind of political play for time. Deng, for example, may have called for bold experiment, but when it came to China’s “developing status” he put back the clock of “communism.” Deng placed China in the “primary stage of socialism” and pushed “communism” away into the distant future. This facilitated the creation of “market socialism.” In Deng’s last years, it seemed as though the “moderately prosperous society” 小康社会 would roughly come about at the beginning of the new century. The Chinese people would be lifted out of poverty to enjoy a more comfortable life but would still be a long way from enjoying the standard of living in the Western developed countries. At the Seventeenth Party Congress in 2007, Hu Jintao frankly acknowledged continuing issues surrounding the achievement of a “moderately prosperous society”: A relatively comfortable standard of living has been achieved for the people as a whole, but the trend of a growing gap in income distribution has not been thoroughly reversed, there are still a considerable number of impoverished and low-income people in both urban and rural areas, and it has become more difficult to accommodate the interests of all sides.”73 According to the Eighteenth Party Congress and the new leadership thinking of Xi Jinping, the Chinese people will be more comfortable and they will enjoy a higher material and cultural standard, but it will still be a long time before they reach the high standards of Western development.74 Xi Jinping has placed a lot of emphasis on the importance of the two characters meaning “comprehensive” 全面 since the 2002 assertion of “comprehensive creation of a moderately prosperous society” 全面建成小康社会 by 2020, and the achievement of Xi’s “China Dream” may require another one hundred years.75 2020 has also been featured in Western calculations. By Professor John J. Mearsheimer’s calculations, as we get closer to 2020, China will have more “muscles” and will use them to push the US aside and to dominate the Asia Pacific. John J. Mearsheimer, Chicago’s R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science and a leading contributor to the American realist school of international relations, has argued that it is highly unlikely that China can rise “peacefully.” Placing his faith in realism, as a “good theory,” Mearsheimer warned in 2006 against well-intentioned, but hoodwinked pilgrims who make the trek to Beijing and fall victim to the sirens of “peaceful rise”:

256  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy Lots of folks like to say, “I was in Beijing last week and I was talking to person X, Y or Z, and he or she told me such and such and that leads me to believe that China can rise peacefully.” I would just say that is all utterly irrelevant. . . . As you know, when you grow muscular, you tend to behave differently than when you’re a weakling. So, for all those reasons, I think the only way to assess whether China can rise peacefully is with a good theory.76 Does this “good theory” transcend biological determinism? What about Chinese history and the Chinese brain? Mearsheimer’s theory of “offensive realism” assumes that “great powers want to be hegemonic.” This apparently is a natural muscular reaction; hence, China with continued economic growth will naturally have its own Monroe Doctrine in the Asian region.77 Referring to Mearsheimer by name, China’s former ambassador to France and President of China’s University of Foreign Affairs, Wu Jianmin, heavily criticized his misinterpretation of Deng’s focus on “peace and development” as part of a hidden great strategy cleverly based on “hiding our capacity and biding our time.” Wu referred to Deng’s April 1974 UN General Assembly speech that welcomed the peoples of the world to bring down China should it seek hegemony and concluded: [Mearsheimer] fails to understand the philosophy of China’s modernization. China’s modernization is a huge undertaking. We have a long way to go. There are two preconditions. . . . The first is peace, the second is international cooperation. Should China embark on expansionist behavior, what will happen? These two conditions, peace and international cooperation, would be wiped out. The whole process of China’s modernization will come to a halt.78 Mearsheimer, as late as 2014, wrote that “. . . China will attempt to dominate Asia the way the US dominates the Western hemisphere” and that US will “go to extraordinary lengths to prevent China from achieving regional hegemony” in Asia.79 In other words, Deng’s foreign policy emphasis on “peace and development” will become an anachronism. Chinese analysis has found such assumptions frustrating and has tried to push back. Just prior to the Chicago Wu-Mearsheimer exchange, China’s white paper on peaceful development, for example, commented positively on the essential continuity of Dengist theory in Chinese foreign policy conflating the past and present with the future: Looking back upon history, basing itself on the present reality and looking forward to the future, China will unswervingly follow the road of peaceful development, making great efforts to achieve a peaceful, open, cooperative and harmonious development.80 With minor exceptions, none of the succeeding leaderships have shown any substantive interest in radical departures from Deng Xiaoping Theory and the

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  257 “independent foreign policy of peace.” The shades of contemporary revisionism are very light grey! This is not just an uninspired matter of stasis. There is the matter of Deng’s extraordinary foreign policy success. By no means was Deng a “nasty little man.” He was a master dialectician who was quite prepared to juggle reality’s contradictions. Deng often successfully combined “true modesty” with realism. He was a realist’s idealist who used praxis to solve his problems as he “felt his way” to the other side of the river. His nationalism was robust but not xenophobic. He refused to endorse Chinese exceptionalism. Deng Xiaoping bequeathed the CCP a truly extraordinary foreign policy legacy. Deng insisted on modestly learning the “strong points of all countries.” His policy dialectics synthesized “self-reliance” with the “open door.” Open to “strong points” of all states and societies, he extolled modesty and learning, and his view that war is likely to become an unwelcome distraction to China’s peaceful development has greatly served the cause of regional peace and stability. Deng’s flexible foreign policy decisively moved away from the more vigorous assumptions of Mao’s Three Worlds’ conflict and facilitated greatly domestic economic development in a carefully staged elaboration of the open door policy. This policy has underwritten a constructive, if appropriately reserved, engagement with the liberal-based international trading order. New levels of Chinese-sponsored bilateralism and multilateralism resulted from the steady focus on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The same principles were applied in China’s response to non-traditional security threats and in the Chinese response to the “world technological revolution” and “economic globalization.” Deng advanced his goal of “making friends everywhere.” His rejection of alliance building has been an important if seldom acknowledged peace dividend that has supported security in the Asia-Pacific. Under pressure from Deng, the Vietnamese withdrew from Cambodia and Laos. Rather than building alliances, he pursued non-exclusive normalization with all three hostile world powers, the US, Japan and the Soviet Union. His approach to the Hong Kong settlement was strong and yet flexible. Hong Kong did not collapse. Deng stabilized China’s long borders even in the worst moments of Soviet collapse, ethnic tension and Western sanctions and post-Tiananmen censure. His foreign policy helped avoid the extremes of ethnic war in the former Soviet space and central Asia, which witnessed the sudden birth of a generation of new states. His policy also “calmly” and without need of “raw” nationalism responded to the Group of Seven attempt to punish China for Tiananmen Square human rights violations. Will China disregard Deng’s past admonitions to be modest and become “cocky” as it achieves new status as the world’s largest economy? Will China’s nationalism require a Chinese “Monroe Doctrine” and “Marshall Plan” in the Asia Pacific? The use of American terminology to describe the basics of Chinese foreign policy is less than helpful, especially when it distracts from the inner content of China’s foreign policy. There will be less reason to be modest, and China’s regional and international political influence will likely grow with its economy, but development will still

258  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy be a key, if not the main, issue in 2020. Significant change in Party leadership has placed a premium on the continuity of principle and the importance of peace and stability. Foreign and domestic policy will likely remain in unity. “Independence and self-reliance” will remain at the core of foreign policy. Any fundamental change in direction would likely require a tectonic shift in Party politics and ideology as well as a change in the direction of China’s national economic developmental strategy.

Notes 1 See David S.G. Goodman and Gerald Segal, “China Without Deng,” (Part 5 of 6), CND-Global, No. GL97-033, 27 February 1997. 2 Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at the National Conference of the Communist Party,” (23 September 1985), SWDXPIII, p. 146. 3 David Shambaugh, China Goes Global: The Partial Power, Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 310. Shambaugh similarly claimed that China’s international diplomacy has been extremely variegated. “On some occasions, it has been accommodating, pragmatic, confident, cooperative, constructive, decisive, friendly, proactive and globally oriented. On others it has been assertive, truculent, difficult, combative, hypernationalistic, narrowly self-interested, uncooperative, reactive and occasionally aggressive.” Shambaugh, China Goes Global, p. 72. 4 Shambaugh, China Goes Global, p. 316. 5 For example, see Deng Xiaoping, “We Must Safeguard World Peace and Ensure Domestic Development,” (24 May 1984), SWDXPIII, p. 66. 6 Jiang Zemin, “Let Us Create a Better World Together,” (24 October 1995), SWJZMI, p. 467. 7 Jiang Zemin, Political Report, 12 September 1997, “Hold High the Great Banner of Deng Xioaping Theory for an All-Round Advancement of the Cause of Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics into the 21st Century,” Beijing Review, 6–12 October 1997. 8 Deng Xiaoping, “Keeping to Socialism and the Policy of Peace,” (4 April 1986), SWDXPIII, p. 161. 9 Jiang Zemin, “Hold High the Banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory Speech at the Thirteenth Session of the Fourth Central Committee,” (24 June 1989), Central Committee Policy Studies Centre, Jiang Zemin, Lun jiaqiang he gaijin zhizhengdang jianshe, (On strengthening and improving construction of Party governance), Beijing: Zhongyong wenxian chubanshe, 2004, p. 77. 10 Jiang Zemin, “Speech at a Meeting to celebrate the Centenary of Comrade Mao Zedong’s Birth,” (26 December 1993), SWJZM1, p. 335. 11 Chinese Communist Party Central Committee Institute of Documentary Research, Jiang Zemin Lun you Zhongguo tese shehuizhuyi, (Jiang Zemin on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics), Beijing: Zhongyong xian chubanshe, 2002, p. 1. 12 Jiang Zemin, “Implement the Strategy of Reinvigorating China Through Science and Education,” (26 May 1995), SWJZMI, p. 428. 13 Jiang Zemin, “The Great Mission for Chinese Communists Today,” (1 July 1991), SWJZMI, p. 155. 14 These indicators were identified by Jiang Zemin, “Vigorously Foster the Spirit of Hard Struggle,” (29 January 1997), SWJZMI, p. 602. 15 Jiang Zemin, “Our Diplomatic Work Must Unswervingly Safeguard the Highest Interests of the State and the Nation,” (12 July 1993), SWJZMI, p. 305. 16 Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and China’s Transformation, Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011, p. 684.

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  259 17 Jiang Zemin, “Eulogy for Comrade Deng Xiaoping,” (25 February 1997), SWJZM1, p. 622. 18 Jiang Zemin, “We Chinese Have Always Cherished Our National Integrity,” (31 October 1989), SWJZM1, p. 67. 19 Jiang, “We Chinese Have Always Cherished Our National Integrity,” p. 67. 20 As discussed in Ronald C. Keith, ed., China as a Rising Power and its Response to Globalization, London & New York, Routledge, 2005 p. 3. 21 Tang Jiaxuan, Heavy Storm and Gentle Breeze: A Memoir of China’s Diplomat, New York: Harper Collins, 2011, pp. 362–3. 22 Jiang Zemin, “The International Situation and our Military Strategic Principle,” (13 January 1993), SWJZM1, p. 274. 23 Jiang, “Our Diplomatic Work Must Unswervingly Safeguard the Highest Interests of the State and the Nation,” p. 303. 24 Jiang, “Eulogy for Comrade Deng Xiaoping,” p. 621. According to Jiang, Deng’s open foreign policy apparently included four principles, namely “independence and selfreliance,” equality and reciprocity, the principle of uniting, and establishing socialist spiritual civilization while controlling for bourgeois liberalism. See Zhang Shunan, et al., Deng Xiaoping lilun gaishu, (General overview of Deng Xiaoping’s theory), Beijing: Jingguan jiaoyu chubanshe, 1999, pp. 124–5. 25 Jiang, “The Great Mission for Chinese Communists Today,” p. 156. 26 Jiang Zemin, “A Peaceful World in the 21st Century,” (19 November 1993), SWJZM1,” p. 322. 27 Hazel Smith, “Why Is There No International Democratic Theory?” in Hazel Smith, ed., Democracy and International Relations: Critical Theories/Problematic Practices, London: Macmillan, 2000, p. 1. 28 Jiang Zemin, “Speech at the Rally in Celebration of the 80th Anniversary of the Founding of the Communist Party of China,” (1 July 2001), Jiang Zemin on the “Three Represents,” Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2001, p. 217. 29 Jiang, “Our Diplomatic Work Must Unswervingly Safeguard the Highest Interests of the State and the Nation,” p. 304. 30 Jiang Zemin, “Accelerate Reform, Opening Up and Modernization and Achieve Greater Success in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” (12 October 1992), SWJZM1, p. 233. 31 Jiang, “Accelerate Reform, Opening Up and Modernization and Achieve Greater Success in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” p.234. 32 Certainly, Jiang championed the idea of a “New Security Concept,” but its content drew significantly from Deng’s viewpoint. H. Lyman Miller and Liu Xiaohong suggest that the concept was an example of Jiang giving his “own stamp” to foreign policy. See Miller and Liu, “The Foreign Policy Outlook of China’s Third Generation Elite” in David Lampton, ed., The Making of Chinese Foreign and Security Policy in the Era of Reform, 1978–2000, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001, p. 143. 33 “White Paper on China’s National Defence,” 27 July 1998, in FBIS-CHI-989-209, p. 4. 34 Ronald C. Keith, The Chinese “New Security Concept”: The Revolution in Military Affairs, Space Weaponization and Prospective Arms Control Cooperation, International Security Research and Outreach Programme, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Ottawa. Canada, 2002, p. 11. 35 Full Text of Jiang Zemin’s Moscow University Speech, (Part 1), Xinhua, 17 July 2001 in FBIS-CHI-2001-10717, 17 July 2001, p. 2. 36 Renmin ribao Editorial Department, Chairman Mao’s Theory of the Differentiation of the Three Worlds Is a Major Contribution to Marxism-Leninism, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1977, p. 52. 37 Jiang, “Accelerate Reform, Opening up and Modernization and Achieve Greater Success in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” p. 234. 38 Jiang Zemin, “Build a Well-Off Society in an All-Round Way and Create a New Situation in Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” (8 November 2002),

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Documents of the 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2002, p. 12. Jiang, “Speech at the Rally in Celebration of the 80th Anniversary of the Founding of the Communist Party of China,” pp. 217–8. Cited and analysed in Ronald C. Keith, “New History inside Hu Jintao’s Foreign Policy: ‘Harmony’ versus ‘Hegemony,’” in Joseph Y.S. Cheng, ed., China: A New State of Development for an Emerging Superpower, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong Press, 2012, p. 241. Hu Jintao, “Shenke lijie ‘sange daibiao’de kexue neihan,” (Deeply understanding the scientific connotations of the “Three Represents”), (31 May 2001), Hu Jintao, Hu Jintao Wenxuan, (Hu Jintao’s selected works), vol. 1, (hereinafter SWHJTI), Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2016, p. 424. Hu Jintao, “Kaichuang xin shiji xin jieduan waijiao gongzuo xinjumian,” (Making a breakthrough in creating new foreign affairs work in the new century), (25 August 2003), SWHJTII, pp. 88–9. Hu Jintao, “Wo jun zai xin shiji xinjieduande lishi,” (Our army’s historical mission in the new stage of the new century), (24 December 2004), SWHJTII, p. 257. Hu Jintao, “Nuli jianshe tejiu heping gongtong fanrong de hexie shijie,” (Exerting great efforts towards a harmonious world of common prosperity), Hu Jintao, Hu Jintao wenxuan, vol. 2, (hereinafter SWHJTII), pp. 350–1. “FYI—PRC Central Party School VP: US Entering a New Round of Strategic Expansion,” Liaowang, Beijing, 9 August 2004, no. 32, pp. 11–3, China Report: FBIS Document Number: FBIS-CHI-2004-0817. Deng Xiaoping, “We Shall Draw on Historical Experience and Guard against Wrong Tendencies,” (30 April 1978), SWDXPIII, p. 224–5. Sujian Guo and Jean-Marc Blanchard, eds., Harmonious World and China’s New Foreign Policy, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2010, p. 9. This article was by a US-based reporter and Chinese leadership opinion might object to the idea that it is up to China rather than Americans to correct bad American perception. Chang Shao-wei, “Hu Jintao Establishes a New Image for China,” Da gong bao, 18 September 2005, World News Connection, News Edge Document Number: 200509181477.1_ed0d00bf192113df. Ross Terrill, The New Chinese Empire and What It Means for the US, New York: Basic Books, 2003, p. 335. Hu Jintao, “Guanyu goujian shehuizhuyi hexie shehuide jige wenti,” (24 February 2006), (Several problems on constructing a socialist harmonious society), SWHJTII, p. 425. See Wu Genyou, Peace – The Roots of the Cultural Tradition and Values of the Chinese People, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2007, p. 195. “RMRB Article Views Global Popularity of Confucius, China’s Peaceful Rise,” Renmin ribao, 29 September 2005, NewsEdge Document No.:200509291477.1_81f60 0bc65924acf, as discussed in Keith, China from the Inside Out, p. 245. “Hu Jintao Delivers an Important Speech at the Consultative Conference of Saudi Arabia,” 29/07/2007, http://www.chinaconsultatesf.org/eng/xw/t248648.htm. Information Office, State Council, China’s National Defense in 2010, english.gov.cn/ archive/whitepaper/2014/0909/content2814749862854525.htm. Accessed 1 April 2017. For example, see D.S. Rajan, “China: Xi Jinping’s Foreign Policy – Expect No End of Assertiveness,” Paper 5539, 7 August 2013, South Asia Analysis Group, passim. Xi Jinping, “Jianchi he yunyonghao Mao Zedong sixianghuode huoling,” (Grasping and materializing the spirit of Chairman Mao’s thought), Xijinping tanzhiguo lizheng (Xi Jinping talks on ruling and governance), (26 December 2013), (hereinafter XJPTZG), Beijing: Waijiao chubanshe, 2014, p. 29.

Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy  261 57 Xi Jinping, “Jinjin weirao jianchi he fazhan Zhonguo tese shehuizhuyi xuexi xuanchuan guanche dangde shibada jingshen,” (Tightly focus on socialism with Chinese characteristics’ peace and develop, study, propagate and materialize the spirit of the Eighteenth Party Congress), (17 November 2012), XJPTZG, p. 13. 58 Xi Jinping’s 28 June 2014 speech, “Carry Forward the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to Build a Better World Through Win-Win Cooperation,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, 1 July 2014, www.fmprc. gov.en/mfa_eng/wjdt_665385/2yh.665391/t117 0143:shtml Accessed 9 December 2015. 59 Xi Jinping, “Jiji shuli Yajiu anquan guan, gong chuang anquan hezuo xin jumian,” (Actively building an Asia Pacific security concept, together creating a new situation for security cooperation), XJPTZG, p. 357. 60 Xi Jinping, “Speech on China-EU Relations at the College of Europe,” (1 April 2014), www.fmprc.gov.cn/infu.eng/wjdt_665385/zyjn_665391/t1144230.shtml. Accessed 8 September 2017. 61 Xi Jinping, “Zuo heping fazhan daolu shi Zhongguo renmin dui shixian zi shen fazhan zi shide xixin he zijue” (Following the Road of Peaceful Development manifests the self-awakening and self-confidence of the Chinese people in the face of reality), (28 March 2014), XJPTZG, p. 267. 62 Xi Jinping, “Speech on China-EU Relations at the College of Europe,” p. 5. 63 Xi Jinping, “Shenhua gaige kaifang, gong chuang meihao Ya-Tai,” (Deepen reform and the open door, [and] jointly create a bright Asia Pacific future,” (7 October 2013), XJPTZG, p. 348. 64 Xi Jinping, “Zhonghua minzu jindai yilai zui weidade mengxiang,” (The great dream of the Chinese people of modern times), Chinese Communist Central Propaganda Bureau, Xi Jinping Zongshuji xilie zhongyao jianghua duben (2016), (Reader of a series of important speeches by General Secretary Xi Jinping), Beijing: Xuexi chubanshe, 2016, p. 8. 65 “Smiles and Waves: What Xi Jinping Took Away from Moscow,” Carnegie Moscow Center, 29 May 2015, p. 3, http://carnegie, ru/commentary/?fa=60248, accessed 1 April 2017. 66 Thomas E. Kellogg, doubts such sponsorship as he believes that China’s “engagement with the world” is likely to continue taking a “cautious and reactive approach to international affairs.” Thomas E. Kellogg, “Xi’s Davos Speech: Is China the New Champion for the Liberal International Order?,” The Diplomat, 24 January 2017, p.2, http://thediplomat.com/2017/01/xis-davos-speech-is-china-the-new-champion-forthe-liberal –international-order, accessed 22 March 2017. 67 Xi Jinping, Opening Plenary Speech at Davos 2017, https://www.weforum.org/ agenda/2017/101/full-text-of-xi-jinping-akeynote-at-the-world-economic forum, p. 2, accessed 22 March 2017. 68 Shambaugh, China Goes Global, pp. 6, 311. 69 Deng Xiaoping, “China Can Have Great Hopes for the Future,” (4 September 1989), SWDXPIII, p. 310. 70 For discussion on the dilemma of “rising,” see Ronald C. Keith, “New History inside Hu Jintao’s Foreign Policy: ‘Harmony’ versus ‘Hegemony,’” in Jospeh Y.S. Cheng, ed., China: A New Stage of Development for an Emerging Superpower, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong, 2012, pp. 250–2. 71 Yan Xuetong, “From Keeping a Low Profile to Striving for Achievement,” The Chinese Journal of International Politics, 2014, pp. 153–84, passim, doi: 10.1093/cjip/pou027, advanced access date, 22 April 2014. 72 See “With One Eye on Washington, China Plots its own Asia Pivot,” https://readtiger. com/www.reuters.com/article/us-china-diplomacy-idUSKBNOF82GX20140703. The

262  Deng & China’s contemporary foreign policy

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76 77 78

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Director of the Chennai Centre for China Studies, India, D.S. Rajan argues that the leadership in Beijing has already decided to move away from Deng’s “low-profile” approach. See Rajan, “China: Xi Jinping’s Foreign Policy – Expect No End to Assertiveness,” 7 August 2013, Paper no. 5539, South Asia Analysis Group. Hu Jintao, “Hold High the Great Banner of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics and Strive for New Victories in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in all Respects,” (15 October 2007), Documents of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2007, p. 16. Xi Jinping, “Jinjin weiraojianchi he fazhan Zhongguo tese shehuizhuyi xuexi xuanchuan shichie Guanche dangde shibada jingshen,” (Firmly grasping in all round way and developing, studying and penetrating the spirit of the Eighteenth Party Congress), (17 November 2012), XJPTZG, p. 7. Xi’s reference to comprehensive included the comprehensive deepening of reform, the comprehensive reliance on the rule of law and the comprehensive respect for Party rule. See Central Committee Institute of Documentary Research, ed., Xi Jinping guanyu quanmian jiancheng xiaokang shehui lun shuzhaibian (Extended extracts of Xi Jinping on the comprehensive moderately prosperous society), Beijing, Zhongyong wenxian chubanshe, 2016, p. 6. Jonathan Mearsheimer’s comments at the Panel: China, US and the World, Chicago international conference, “China and the Future of the World,” 2006, Panel transcript, p. 114. Mearsheimer’s comments at the Panel: China, US and the World, Chicago international conference, “China and the Future of the World,” p. 117. Wu’s reply to Mearsheimer, “China and the Future of the World Conference, Chicago, 2006. Mearsheimer’s discussion of China’s rise relates to his focus on “offensive realism.” See the last chapter, John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Powers, New York: Norton, 2014. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of the Great Powers, New York: Norton, 2014. “China’s peaceful development road,” People’s Daily Online, 22 December 2005, http:// english.peopledaily.com.cn/200512/22/eng20051222)230059.html, accessed 8 September 2010.

Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy

balance of power shili junheng 实力均衡 behaviouralism xingweizhuyi 行为主义 benevolent government renzheng 仁政 big family da jiating 大家庭 bloc politics jituan zhengzhi 集团政治 build a new kitchen lingqi luzao 另起炉灶 “building a ship is not as good as buying a ship, and buying a ship is not as good as renting a ship” zaochuan buru maichuan, maichuan buru zuchuan 造船不如买船, 买船不 如租船 burial diplomacy zangli waijiao 葬礼外交 China threat Zhongguo weixie 中国威胁 coercive diplomacy qiangli waijiao 强力外交 co-evolution gongtong jinhua 共同进化 comprehensive creation of a moderately prosperous society quanmian jiancheng xiaokang shehui 全面建成小康社会 cultivate the self, regulate the family, rule the kingdom and then [there is] peace under heaven xiu shen, qi jia, zhi guo, ping tianxia 修身齐家治国平天下 democratization of international relations guojiguanxi minzhuhua 国际关系民主化

264  Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy determination of interests liyi panduan 利益判断 dig tunnels deep, store grain everywhere, and never seek hegemony shenwa dong guang jiliang bucheng ba 深挖洞广积粮不称霸 diplomacy of exclusion paichu waijiao 排除外交 economic globalization jingji quanqiuhua 经济全球化 Enemy troops are outside the city wall. They are stronger than we. We should mainly be on the defensive. Bing lin chengxia diqiang woruo yishou wei gong. 兵临城下敌强我弱以守 为攻 Family is the smallest country, and the country is like ten thousand families. Jia shi zuixiao guo, guo shi yu wanjia. 家是最小国, 国是于万家 fine traditions youliang chuantong 优良传统 Firmly grasp the independent foreign policy of peace, never departing from the road of peace and development. Jiu yao jianchi duli zizhudeheping waijiao zhengce jianding buyi heping fazhan daolu. 就要坚持独立自主的和平外交政策坚定不移和平发展 道路 First, we should observe the situation coolly. Second, we should hold our ground. Third we should act calmly. Lengjing guancha, zhanwen jiaogen, chenzhuo yingfu. 冷静观察, 站稳脚跟, 沉着应付 Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence heping gongchu wuxiang yuanze 和平共处五项原则 foreign affairs tradition with Chinese characteristics Zhongguo tesewaijiao chuantong 中国特色外交传统 foreign relations as the continuation of domestic politics waijiao shi neizhengde yanxu 外交 是 内政的延续 four aspirations [Deng’s aspirations included Sino-Japanese normalization and Sino-US normalization to solve the question of Hong Kong’s return to China and to realize Sino-Soviet normalization] sida yuanwang 四大愿望 global governance quanqiu zhili 全球治理 great rejuvenation of the Chinese people Zhonghua minzu weida fuxing 中华民族伟大复兴 groping the rocks on the river bed to cross to the other side of the river mozhe shitou guohe 摸着石头过河 harmony hexie 和谐

Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy  265 harmony with differences (or harmony without uniformity) he er butong 和而不同 hegemonism baquanzhuyi 霸权主义 hide capabilities and bide our time (Also see below under “observe with a cool head.”) taoguang yanghui 韬光养晦 human rights diplomacy renquan waijiao 人权外交 independence and self-reliance duli zizhu zili gengsheng 独立自主自力更生 independent foreign policy duli zizhu waijiao zhengce 独立自主外交政策 interdependence xianghu yilai 相互依赖 international strategic thinking guoji zhanlue sixiang 国际战略思想 inviting in qing jinlai 请进来 leaning to one side yi bian dao 一边倒 letting go of the past, and opening up the future jieshu guoqu, kaipi weilai 结束过去, 开辟未来 make foreign things serve China yang wei Zhong yong 洋为中用 moderately prosperous society xiaokang shehui 小康社会 mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, cooperation, respect for diverse civilizations and seeking common development (attributes of the “Shanghai spirit”) huxin huli, pingdengxiezuo, zunzhong duoyang wenming, mouqiu gongtong fazhan 互信互利平等协作, 遵重多样文明, 谋求共同发展 new interventionism xin ganshezhuyi 新干涉主义 New Security Concept Xin anquan guan 新安全观 new thinking xin sixiang 新思想 no alliances and no playing of cards bujie meng, buda pai 不结盟, 不打牌 observe with a cool head, hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time, stand firm, calmly reply, make friends and know what is what lengjing guancha, daoguang yanghui, zhanwen jiaogen, chenzhuo yingfu, pengyou yaojiao, xinzhong youshu 冷静观察, 韬光养晦, 站稳脚跟, 沉着应付, 朋友要交, 心中有数

266  Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy one country, two systems yige guojia liangzhong zhidu 一个国家两种制度 open door and self-reliance policy ziligengsheng kaifang zhengce 自力更生开放政策 one world, one dream tong yige shijie, tong yige mengxiang 同一个世界, 同一个梦想 Our policy is to learn from the strong points of all nations and all countries. . . . Womende fangzhen shi, yiqie minzu, yiqie guojiade zhangchu dou yaoxue. . . . 我 们的方针是, 一切民族、一切国家的长处都要学 the past is to serve the present yi gu wei jin 以古为今 peace and development heping yu fazhan 和平与发展 peaceful evolution heping yanbian 和平演变 personal example is superior to teaching by words shenjiao sheng yu yanjiao 身教生于言教 post-international politics hou guoji zhengzhi 后国际政治 power politics qiangquan zhengzhi 强权政治 “pragmatism” (the CCP variant as derived from the “unity of theory and practice”) shijizhuyi 实际主义 “pragmatism” (the Western variant) shiyongzhuyi 实用主义 punitive military expeditions zhengfa 征伐 realism xianshizhuyi 现实主义 realist foreign policy xianshizhuyi waijiao 现实主义外交 realpolitik xianshi zhengzhi 现实政治 reform and open door gaige kaifang 改革开放 retrogression of history lishide daotui 历史的倒退 saving the country, and saving the people jiu guo jiu min 救国救民 seeking common ground, while reserving differences qiu tong cunyi 求同存异 seeking the truth from the facts shishi qiu shi 实事求是

Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy  267 socialist idealism shehuizhuyi lixiangzhuyi 社会主义理想主义 socialist realism shehuizhuyi xianshizhuyi 社会现实主义 “son of the Chinese people” Zhongguo renminde erzi 中国人民的儿子 (i.e., Deng Xiaoping) spheres of influence shili fanwei 势力范围 stage overstepping chaoyue jieduande zuofa 超越阶段的做法 strategy for striving for achievement fen fa you wei 奋发有为 taking domestic sales as primary and foreign sales as supplementary yi neixiao wei Zhong wai wei fu 以内消为中外为辅 teach by one’s own example shenjiao 身教 they rectify themselves and others are rectified zhengji er wuzhengzheye 正己而无正者也 things that oppose each other also complement one another xiang fan xiang cheng 相反相成 third world war without gunsmoke meiyou xiaoyande disanci shijie dazhan没有硝烟的第三次世界大战 three favourables (i.e., enhance China’s productive forces, reduce polarization in society and promote common prosperity) sange you li 三个有利 three great work styles (namely “integrating theory with practice,” “forging links with the masses” and “practicing self-criticism”) san da zuofeng 三大作风 three honests (namely “the honest person, honesty in words and honesty in deeds”) sanlao 三老 three obstacles 三个障碍 (Soviets in Afghanistan, Soviet troops massed on China’s border and Vietnam in Cambodia) unity of theory and praxis lilun he shiji 理论`和实际 vassal fuyong 附庸 walking out zou chuqu 走出区 way of the hegemon badao 霸道 way of the king wangdao 王道

268  Select glossary of Chinese foreign policy widened open door kuoda kaifang 扩大开放 words to match deeds yanxing yizhi 言行一致 world’s largest developing country shijieshang zuidade fazhan guojia 世界上最大的发展国家 worldwide technological revolution shijie jishu geming 世界技术革命

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References  273 Chen, King C., ed., China and the Three Worlds, White Plains, New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1979. Chen, Theodore, ed., The Chinese Communist Regime: Documents and Commentary, New York: Praeger Publishers, 1967. Chi Hsin, ed., The Case of the Gang of Four with First Translation of Teng Hsiao-ping’s “Three Poisonous Weeds,” Hong Kong: Cosmos Books, 1977. Chinese Communist Party, Documents of the 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, 2002, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2002. Chinese Communist Party, Documents of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, 2007, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2007. Chinese Communist Party, Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1981. Chinese Communist Party, The Twelfth National Congress of the CPC, September 1982, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1982. Deng Xiaoping, Build Socialism with Chinese Characteristics, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1985. Deng Xiaoping, Deng Xiaoping on the Question of Hong Kong, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1993. Deng Xiaoping, The Fundamental Issues in Present-Day China, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1987. Deng Xiaoping, Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, 1975–1982, vol. 2, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984. Deng Xiaoping, Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, 1982–1992, vol. 3, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1994. Deng Xiaoping, Speech by Chairman of the Delegation of the People’s Republic of China, Teng Hsiao-ping at the Special Session of the U.N. General Assembly, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1974. Dittmer, Lowell, Sino-Soviet Normalization and its International Implications, Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 1992. Evans, Grame, & Jeffrey Newnham, Dictionary of World Politics, New York & London: Simon & Schuster, 1990. Evans, Richard, Deng Xiaoping and the Making of Modern China, New York: Viking Press, 1994. Fairbank, John K., ed., The Chinese World Order: Traditional China’s Foreign Relations, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968. Fallaci, Oriana, trans. by John Shepley, Interview with History, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1976. Ferguson, Niall, Kissinger, 1923–1968: The Idealist, New York: Penguin Books, 2015. Fook, Lye Liang, “China and Global Governance: A More Active Role on a Selective Basis,” China: An International Journal, February 2017, vol. 15, no. 1, pp. 214–33. Gittings, John, The Changing Face of China: From Mao to Market, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. Gittings, John, ed., Survey of the Sino-Soviet Dispute: A Commentary and Extracts from the Recent Polemics 1963–1967, London: Oxford University Press, 1967. Gittings, John, The World and China 1922–1972, London: Eyre Methuen, 1974. Goldman, Marshall, “China Rethinks the Soviet Model,” International Security, vol. 5, no. 21, Fall 1980, pp. 49–65. Goodman, David, Deng Xiaoping and the Chinese Revolution: A Political Biography, London & New York: Routledge, 1994.

274 References Goodman, David and Gerald Segal, eds., China Rising: Nationalism and Interdependence, London and New York: Routledge, 1997. Guo, Sujian and Jean-Marc Blanchard, eds., Harmonious World and China’s New Foreign Policy, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2010. Gurtov, Melvin, and Byong-Moo Hwang, China under Threat: The Politics of Strategy and Diplomacy, Baltimore and London: The John Hopkins University Press, 1980. Guthrie, Doug, China and Globalization: The Social, Economic and Political Transformation of Chinese Society, Milton Park, Abingdon: Routledge, 2006. Haig, Alexander, Caveat: Realism, Reagan and Foreign Policy, New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1984. Harding, Harry, ed., China’s Foreign Relations in the 1980s, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984. Holmes, Christina, “The Soviet Union and China,” in Gerald Segal, ed., The Soviet Union in East Asia: Predicaments of Power, London: Heinemann, 1983, pp. 16–30. Hoxha, Envers, Reflections on China, vol. 1, 1962–1972: Extracts from the Political Diary, Toronto: Norman Bethune Institute, 1979. Huang Hua, Huang Hua Memoirs, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2008. Hughes, Christopher, R., “Globalisation and Nationalism: Squaring the Circle in Chinese International Relations Theory,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 26, no. 1, 1997, pp. 103–24. Jiang Zemin, “Hold High the Banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory for an All-Round Advancement of the Cause of Building Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” Beijing Review, 6–12 October 1997. Jiang Zemin, Jiang Zemin on the ‘Three Represents,’” Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2001. Jiang Zemin, The Selected Works of Jiang Zemin, vol. 1, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2010. Jones, Peter and Sian Kevill, comp., China and the Soviet Union 1949–1985, New York: Facts on File Publications/Longman, 1985. Kapchenko, N., “The ‘Cultural Revolution’ and the Mao Group’s Foreign Policy,” International Affairs, Moscow, no. 2, 1968. Keith, Ronald C., China as a Rising World Power and its Response to Globalization, London & New York: Routledge, 2005. Keith, Ronald C., China from the Inside Out: Fitting the People’s Republic into the World, London: Pluto Press, 2009. Keith, Ronald C., “China’s Emergence from Continentalism”; The Study of Underlying Continuities in Chinese Foreign Policy,” in F. Quei Quo, ed., Politics of the Pacific Rim: Perspectives on the 1980s, Burnaby, B.C.: SFU Publications, 1982, pp. 135–61. Keith, Ronald C., “China’s Modernization and the Policy of ‘Self-Reliance,’” China Report, vol. xix, no. 2, March–April, 1983, pp. 19–34. Keith, Ronald C., The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, London & New York: Macmillan Press and St. Martin’s Press, 1989. Keith, Ronald C., “‘Egalitarianism’ and ‘Seeking the Truth from the Facts’ in the People’s Republic of China,” Dalhousie Review, vol. 63, no. 2, Summer 1983, pp. 322–40. Keith, Ronald C., “New History inside Hu Jintao’s Foreign Policy: ‘Harmony’ versus ‘Hegemony,’” in Joseph Y.S. Cheng, China – A New Stage of Development for an Emerging Superpower, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong Press, 2012, pp. 235–54.

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Index

“absolute security” 243 Acheson, Dean 182 Afghanistan 174, 185, 189 Albanian Workers Party 138 “all directional diplomacy” 245 alliances 3, 16, 17, 77–8, 88, 93, 114, 134, 135, 152, 182, 193, 199; “bullying” 3; “card playing” 4; China has no need for alliances 52, 68, 80, 104, 108, 114, 153, 243; Deng’s “no alliances and no playing cards”, 150; “treaty organizations no longer work” 101 “Allied Army” (1900) 73 Analects 27, 30, 71 Andropov, Yuri 188, 190 Ansari, Mohammad Hamid 250 APEC 206, 208, 251 Argentina 43 Asian Collective Security 148 Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank 252 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) 111, 162, 252 Australia 96 autarchy 45 Baker, James 161 balance of forces 136, 250 balance of power 17, 21, 45, 114, 122, 137, 142–3, 243: Chinese view 3; classical balance 124. See also “classical European statesmanship” under Kissinger, Henry. Bandung 82, 114, 166, 173, 174, 176 Bangladesh 45 Baoshan Iron and Steel Complex 212 Barnett, Doak 154 Baylis, John 206 “behaviouralism” 21, 36 Belgrade Declaration 174

“Belt and Road” 251–2 “benevolent government” 251 Bernstein, Eduard 177 “the big family” 41,126 Bismarck, Otto von 21, 33 Blanchard, Marc 246 “blind Westernization” 44 “bloc politics” 41, 126 Book of Rites 220 Borgia, Cesare 31 Brazil 227 Britain 76, 85, 96, 155 Brzezinski, Zbigniew 9, 124, 173, 175, 206, 227 Brezhnev, Leonid 145, 147, 152, 187; Brezhnev Doctrine 126, 156, 174, 183, 185, 189; Tashkent speech 186, 189 “build a new kitchen” 73 “burial diplomacy” 187 Burma 89, 94, 112, 250 Burr, William 133 Bush, George H.W. 124, 152, 160, 184, 198, 249; attempts to re-start relations after Tiananmen 158; rejects Gorbachev request for financial assistance 196 Bush, George W. 246 Callahan, William 50; “pessoptimism” 236 Cambodia 2, 104, 126, 185, 190, 257 Canada 123, 157, 158 “card playing” 35, 51, 52, 68, 108 111, 122, 135, 139, 140–1, 145, 151, 154, 184, 193 Carr, Edward H. 14 Carter, Jimmy 124–5, 149, 151, 155; on the Chinese at the “centre of civilization 132; considers change to US recognition policy 149–50; note to Deng on

Index  279 imminent invasion of Vietnam 150; signs Sino-US Joint Communique 152 Ceausescu, Nicolai 18, 160 Center for Strategic and International Relations (Georgetown) 106 Central Foreign Affairs Group 128 Chamberlain, Arthur Neville 148 Chen Boda 177 Chen Jian 227 Chen Qiman 219 Chen Yi 89, 128 Chen Yun 215 Chernenko, Konstantin 188, 189 China: “Red China” 166; as “large developing socialist country with an ancient civilization”244; as victim of aggression 91; as “world’s largest developing country” 16, 162, 164, 204, 226, 253–4. “China Threat” 4, 17, 49, 79, 126, 114, 164, 228, 229, 230, 246–7, 252–3 “China will never become a superpower” 13–5,136, 139, 236, 244 Chinese Communist Party: 1981 Resolution on Party History 40, 101, 183, 192, 213; Central Advisory Commission 43, 155, 221; CCPCC 15 June 1964 letter to CPSU 181; Eighteenth Party Congress 249, 255; Eighth Party Congress, Second Session 89, 92; Eleventh Central Committee, Third Plenary Session 39, 44, 69, 151, 163, 213, 228, 238; Fifteenth National Party Congress 226; Fourteenth National Party Congress 221, 225, 226, 243–4; International Liaison Department 108; Military Affairs Committee 103, 110, 113, 221; Seventeenth Party Congress 255; Sixteenth Party Congress, 244, 255; Thirteenth CCPCC, Seventh Plenum 223, 241; Twelfth National Party Congress 100, 104, 107, 124, 154, 188, 216 “Chinese learning as essence, Western learning as use” 88–9 Chiang Kai-shek 36, 73, 74, 76–7, 84, 128, 176, 210: and dialectics 36; Mao’s “old friend” 131, 155 classical European statescraft see Kissinger, Henry Churchill, Winston 1 Clausewitz, Karl von 24 Clinton, William 242: “triple play” 206 “coastal outward looking economy” 227

“collective self-reliance” 98, 108, 212 Common Program: foreign policy 76, 81, 210; related 1954 state constitution articles 84 “coercive diplomacy” 44 “common development” 229, 245, 248 Communist Party of the Soviet Union, 12, 174, 195, 212: Mao’s “feudal cult” 185; Mao setting up “the Age of Mao” 181; as “patriarchal party” 155; Twentieth National Party Congress 12, 176; Twenty-Second Congress 177 “complex governance” 205 Confucius: “five constants” 29; on honesty 87; military equipment 28–9 Council for Mutual Assistance 79 Cuba 54 “cultivate the self, regulate the family, rule the kingdom and then [there is] peace under heaven” 26 cultural revolution 13, 17, 35, 38, 40, 48, 69, 94–5, 111, 128, 191, 198, 212, 220, 238; as “civil war” 69; at the Foreign Ministry 94, 183 Czechoslovakia 127, 156 Dai Bingguo 20 Daladier, Edouard 148 Daqing 212 “decorum” (礼) “democratization of international relations” 57, 242, 244, 248, 249 Deng Xiaoping: 1978 visit to Japan 105–6; 1989 meeting with Gorbachev 32, 51, 55, 172, 174, 191–3; “agriculture as the foundation of the economy” 227; attacks Khrushchev on Eisenhower 179; on Anti-Rightist Campaign 94; on “Asia-Pacific Century” 222; argued with Kissinger over Taiwan Question 131; on book reading and bookishness 5–6; capitalism as “retrogression” 14, 114; changing China’s image 39, 157, 230, 246–7; charged with “national betrayal” 95, 99; China does not need US to deal with Soviets 184; on CCPCC’s “25 points” 181; criticized for “white cat, black cat” 98; Cultural Revolution 17, 219, 237; defined “selfreliance” 98; Deng Xiaoping Theory 38, 69, 235, 239, 257; editing of Deng’s own third volume of selected works 38 ; “four aspirations” 186; Europe in geopolitics 108; on “European

280 Index Insecurity Conference 148; in France 5; Group of Seven like 1900 Allied Army 157; improving relations with both US and Soviet Union at same time 190; inequality at the bottom of SinoSoviet dispute 192; on Lenin splitting the Social Democrats 179; “liberation” of productive forces 222, 225; lowposture foreign policy 15, 52, 106, 108, 114, 115, 161, 163, 184, 194, 205, 235, 239, 241, 253, 254; on Mao Zedong Thought 12; on Mao’s personality cult 87–8; “military modernization” 102–103, 188, 205; on “modesty” 84; in Moscow 1960 92–3, 179, 180; led Moscow Delegation 1963, 172–3, 175; meets Nakasone 17; “never claim leadership” 20–1; “national betrayal 97, 99; ; on old people making mistakes 48; “one country, two systems” 41, 43; “opening” as an “experiment” 218; political relations with Mao 11, 12; “primary stage of socialism” 225, 255; qualifications to openness 217; recommended Carter negotiate Vietnamese recognition 149; reduced possibility of general war 107, 109–10, 114, 219, 236 ; “reform as revolution” 47; regrets delay in opening up Shanghai 222, 224; rejects Vietnamese plan for Southeast Asian Federation 191; returns to Beijing November 1973 183; revises Mao’s Three Worlds 109–10, 113, 160, 163, 207; Sha-lin style “shadow boxing” 144; “slavism to foreign things” 100, 212; “socialism with Chinese characteristics” 240, 242;“son of Chinese people” 4, 12, 55, 157, 204, 212, 217, 249; South East Asian Federation 191; Southern Tour 221, 223–4, 248; Soviet gift to Eisenhower 178; speech at UN General Assembly 13, 95–6, 128, 140, 212–3, 216, 256, 274; on Stalin’s personality cult 6, 87; on Suez crisis 180; supported Mao’s fifth volume of selected works 46; on “third world war without gunsmoke” 149 “three falls, three rises” 4, 35;”three favourable” 248; “three objectives” 220; on Three World Theory 96–7, 104, 113, 126, 128, , 139, 161, 207, 229, 256–7; Treaty of Peace and Friendship” not “united action” with Japan against the USSR 149;

“unequal treaties” 42, 192; US lacks ideals 10; in Washington, D.C. 124–5; views on arms limitation treaties 189; Zhou Enlai as mentor 5, 6, 7, 11, 13, 19. See also Mao, “On the Ten Major Relationships”. Deng Rong 4 “develop the economy and ensure supplies” 210 Dewey, John 17 Dialectics: and policy implications 12, 36, 38, 45, 51–2, 57, 69–71, 77, 84, 87, 90–1, 93–4, 96–7, 99–100, 129, 133, 138, 144, 193, 195, 205, 207–8, 210–1, 213–4, 218, 221, 223, 226, 228–9, 237, 241, 257: “dual nature of things” 90; foreign policy and ideology 134; Lenin’s definition 72; “making friends everywhere” 87; “one splitting in to two” 181; on “strong points” of all countries 5, 47, 89, 93, 211, 241, 257; yin and yang 72 Diaoyu Islands 141, 192 Dictionary of World Politics 4 “dig tunnels deep, store grain everywhere, never seek hegemony” 30, 185–6 “diplomacy of exclusion” 74, 150 “diversity of civilizations” 57, 242, 244, 252 Dixie Mission 210 Doe, Samuel Kanyon 106, 215 “dual tactics” 2, 76, 134, 138, 144, 241 Dulles, John Foster 83, 155 “dumbbell strategy” 185 economic globalization see globalization Eden, Anthony 82 Eisenhower, Dwight David 178–9 “empty talk” 6, 15, 37, 51, 175 Engel, Jeffrey 159 Ershad, Hussain Muhammad 45, 102 European Union (EU) 111 “exporting revolution” 21, 52, 83, 102, 104, 108–9, 214, 150, 158, 174, 180, 189, 214 Fallaci, Oriana 12, 22 “family is the smallest country, and the country is like ten thousand families” 250 “February adverse current” 94 Fengqing Steamship Event 216 “fine traditions” 38 Figueiredo, Joao Baptista de Oliveira 35

Index  281 “five constants” 29 (sincerity, benevolence, righteousness, decorum, knowledge) Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence 1, 2, 14, 21, 41, 42, 47, 49, 51, 54, 55, 75 91, 99, 102, 106, 108, 110–1, 114, 122, 126, 129, 150, 155, 161, 164, 166, 175, 185–6, 207–8, 223, 237, 240, 242–44, 250, 253, 257; American reservations 137–8; applied to socialist states 173–4 198; and “great nation chauvinism” 173; origins 80–4; related to “diversity of civilizations” 244; and Sino-Soviet normalization 196–8; source of “New Security Concept” 243; surviving all “tests” 112; “ultraleftist” attack on 94 Ford, Gerald 130, 147–9 “foreign affairs tradition with Chinese characteristics” 245 “foreign relations as the continuation of domestic politics” 27; “unity of foreign and domestic policy” 38 “four cardinal principles” 45, 208, 238 four modernizations 12, 103; see also “military modernization” under Deng Xiaoping “four points” (“use, criticize, change and create”) 99–100, 214–5 “fractionalism” 172, 177 France 25, 85 Freedman, Lawrence 23 Fujian 217, 224 G20 227 Gandhi, Mahatma 81 Gandhi, Rajiv 112 “Gang of Four” 40, 99–100, 218 Gao Gang 11 Gao Jinhu 3 Gao Yi 4 Geneva Conference 82–3, 89, 173, 176 globalization 50, 55–6, 207, 209, 225, 227, 252; “global Americanization” 208, 229; “globalism” 207; The Globalization of World Politics 206; “economic globalization” 56, 205–8, 227–30, 237, 257; “independent globalization” 56–7, 205; and multipolarity 245. See also “worldwide technological revolution.” Gong Honglie 3 Gong Li 19 Gomulka, Wladyslaw 174

Goodman, David 12, 49–50, 55, 206; Deng “relatively uninterested in international affairs” 235 Gorbachev, Mikhail 51, 188–90, 249; 21st August coup 193; televised letter on death of Soviet Union 194; on foreign policy contradictions 188; on “imperial overreach” 189; “new thinking” compared with “seeking the truth from the facts” 188, 192; perestroika and glasnost 193; views on normalization with China 190; Vladivostok speech 189–90. See also Deng Xiaoping. “great game” 2 “great international circle” 223 Great Leap Forward , 12, 38, 46, 92, 93, 192, 212; and autarchy 212 Gromyko, Alexei 187; “interests of third countries” 189 “groping the rocks on the river bed to cross to the other side of the river” 7; distinguished from “crossing the river and slipping on the rocks” 8 Group of Seven 85, 159, 164, 195, 198, 221, 257 Gu Ming: call for “three balances” 214 Guo Sujian 246 Guangdong 217, 224, 226 Guo Moruo 177 Guomindang 76–7 Gurtov, Melvin 69 Haig, Alexander 9, 141, 153, 154 Hainan 219, 224 Han Fei-tzu 6 Han Nianlong 17 Han Xu 141, 145, 154 harmony 30, 237, 252; Renmin ribao’s gloss 247–8; as “the rational composition of different things” 247; requires independence 248 “harmony with differences” 32, 57, 247 “He acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his actions.” 30 Heath, Edward 40, 136 Hegel, Friedrich 71–2 hegemonism 3, 14, 21, 30, 50, 68–9, 77, 85, 91, 96–9, 99–104, 107, 110, 122–3, 130, 134, 137, 139, 141, 149, 157, 164, 191, 214, 236, 237, 241, 243, 250, 256; on a case by case basis 114 Helsinki Final Act 148 “hide China’s capabilities and bide our time” 18–20, 252, 256. See also

282 Index “observe with a cool head, hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time, stand firm, calmly reply, make friends, and know what is what.” Hitler, Adolf, 22, 148; “theory of the Big Lie” 34 Ho Chi Minh 179 Hoffman, Stanley 23 Holbrooke, Richard 154 Hong Kong 1–2, 33, 40–3, 92, 94, 163, 218, 257; criticism of SEZs 218; Sino-British Declaration 33, 42; “one country, two systems” 41, 42–3 Hoxha, Enver 138–9; “American counterrevolutionary dual tactics” 138 Hu Jintao 3, 6, 57, 227–8, 255; on Deng Xiaoping’s attributes 3, 5; on diplomatic work 20; on Deng’s foreign policy legacy 245–9; “harmonious world” 245–6; on “rejuvenation of the Chinese people” 245; “third great revolution” 209; on Jiang’s “three represents” 245 Hu Yaobang 8, 44, 105, 107, 220, 225, 238 Hua Guofeng 99–100, 151, 184 Huan Xiang 21 Huang Hua 14, 41, 49, 125, 128, 132, 153, 186–7; “Chinese diplomatic style” 141 Hughes, Christopher 205 “human rights diplomacy” 142, 157–8, 160, 257 Hungary 90, 173–4 Huntington, Samuel 242 Hurley, Patrick J. 210 Husak, Gustav 39 Hussein, Saddam 161 Hwang Byong-moo 69 Ibarruri, Dolores 180 IMF 196 “independence and self-reliance” 10, 14, 17, 45, 51, 69, 77, 82, 104, 107–9, 122, 124, 130, 144, 146, 151, 156, 206, 208, 210–1, 228, 236, 241, 258; and party-to –party relations 87; “self-reliance” versus alliance systems 184 “independent foreign policy” 1, 4, 15, 30, 37, 49, 52–4, 57, 68–121, 161, 188, 190, 205, 214, 226, 229, 235, 236, 238, 239–40, 242–44, 249–50, 253, 256; beginnings 76 India 2, 80, 89, 94, 227, 250; 1954 SinoIndian Communique 112; 1962 border

war with China 79, 103, 112, 146, 176, 180 Indochina Communist Party 103 Indonesia 89, 94 “interdependence” 56, 204 Iraq 49, 161 Italy 158 Jacques, Martin 253 Japan 2, 49, 105, 110, 111, 123, 128, 199, 240, 257; breaks Group of Seven ranks 161, 195; Chamber of Commerce 107; emperor’s visit to China 161; Japanese model for diplomatic relations with PRC 146, 147; “Nixon shock” 136; Taiwan seats in the UN 140 Jiang Qing 13, 146; opposes Deng going to New York 95–6 Jiangxi 44, 183 Jiang Zemin 57, 86, 197, 208, 209, 215, 221, 223, 224, 225, 244, 255: “both ends reach outward” 223; on borrowing foreign funding 221; changing “united front” usage 114, 243; declining class struggle 207; and Deng’s foreign policy legacy 238–45; on “diversity of civilizations” 244; economic globalization as “double-edged sword 208; do not reduce SEZs because of “comprehensive opening” 226; endorsed “twelve principles” 223; “inviting in” and “walking out 227; “new style of state-to-state relations” 244; “opening at different levels, through multiple channels and by various means” 224–5; on seeking hegemony as self-defeating 236; sixteen-character approach to US 241; “three represents” 243, 245; on US response to Tiananmen and “belling” the tiger 159, 240 Joint Declaration on the Basic Principles Governing Bilateral Relations (1992) 197 Kaifu Toshiki 161 Kauppi, Mark 15 Kazakhstan 194, 198 Kennan, George F. 22 Kenya 94 Khrushchev, Nikita 36, 39, 106; 1953 visit to Beijing 176; Bucharest attack on Mao 172 “secret speech” 87, 176 Kim, Samuel 10, 49–50 King, Martin Luther 124

Index  283 Kissinger, Henry 3, 20–1, 25, 128, 164; America’s “idealistic tradition” 142; China as “one of our better NATO allies” 123; Chinese as “fanatics” and “pragmatists, 16, 21; Chinese play “barbarians” off against one another 133; “co-evolution” 164–6; deception on Taiwan Question 23; claims “hegemony” is US term 139; Deng as “more anti-Soviet” than Mao 122; Deng as “nasty little man” 8; Deng on UN training mission 14; Harvard professor on diplomacy and ideology 54, 132, 143; identification of differences 32; on Kant 22–3; on Hegel 129 in Beijing; Mao and Zhou as “artists of relativity” in the “great classical tradition of European statesmanship” 22, 25–6, 34, 54, 132, 142–4, 164; “modern Machiavellianism” 22, 128–9, 135, 143; “No allied leaders received fuller briefings . . . .”122; World Restored 25; Zhou rejected “salami tactics” 133 Khrushchev, Nikita 36, 106; and Stalin 39; Chinese cannot manage nuclear weapons 178; criticism of China’s communes 177; “Khrushchevism without Khrushchev” 182; scheme to blockade China’s coast 176 Kohl, Helmut 108 Korea 84, 161: Chinese Volunteers 79; nuclear crisis 49 Kosygin, Alexei 126, 185 Kozyrev, Andrei 194 Kyrgyzstan 198 Kuwait 161 Lampton, David 56 Lange, David 190 Laos 2, 257 Laxalt, Paul 124 “lean to one side” 79; “leaning” and “learning 146; and self-reliance 75–6 “leap-frog diplomacy” 136 “learn from the strong points of all countries and all nations” see dialectics. Lee Kuan Yew 1, 9, 11; comparing US and China foreign policy approaches 83; led ASEAN response to Group of Seven sanctions 162; on “hiding capabilities” 18; Deng succeeded in Vietnam 104 Lenin, Vladimir 71, 72, 219: equality between socialist parties 176; new economic policy 217; “state structures”

195; theory on imperialism 31, 91, 139, 207, 212, 252; treaties as “scraps of paper” 148 “let the foreign serve China” 212 “letting go of the past and opening up to the future” 55, 175 Li Hongzhang 40 Li Peng: on Mao’s “foreign policy thought” 195 Li Ronghai 206 Li Xiannian 177 Liu Xiaoqi 38, 145, 183 Li Yihu 51 Li Zhongjie 51, 73 Lin Biao 40, 95 “loyalty” (忠) 27 “low-posture” foreign policy see Deng Xiaoping Lubbers, Ruud 107 MacArthur, Douglas 79, 155 Machiavelli, Niccolo 21, 30–3, 35, 39; compared to Sun Tzu 23–4; “modern Machiavelleanism” defined 22; ideals as ruination of the prince 31 “make foreign things serve China” 40 “making friends with everyone” 54, 68, 77, 86, 105, 111, 114, 123 “mainly be on the defensive” 19 Mancall, Mark 17, 26 Mao: acting “against Stalin’s will” 173; attacks Khruschev’s “peaceful coexistence” and “peaceful transition” 176; on British and American help 74, 77; China’s armies will not cross China’s frontiers 183; on China’s “great nation chauvinism 91, 244; on China’s UN support 130; on Confucius and learning 69, 87, 92; on confusion over Hungarian events 174; on delayed US recognition 78; on Deng’s character 4, 36, 93; dealing with Stalin in Moscow 75–6, 88; on Deng’s leadership and dialectics 36; on Deng’s Marxism 8, 98; on “Doctor Kissinger” 47 135; “the East Wind Prevails over the West Wind 178; and Emperor Qin Shihuang 83; on “hotheadedness” and “coolheadedness” 84; on Khrushchev’s “swelled head” 86; to Kissinger, “leaping to Moscow on our shoulders” 148, 154; as “loose” or “empty cannon” 83, 137, 144, 149, 165; on “modesty” 85, 91–2; normalization as an American “tactical manoeuvre”

284 Index 141; ping pong with the US 128; “On Policy” 76; preferred “The Great Teacher” 46; repudiation of Debronin school 72; on Soviet leadership of socialist world 177; on Soviet “mistakes of principle” 178, 212; “self-reliance” as the major policy 212; on Stalin’s “metaphysics” 71–2; “On the Ten Great Relationships” 27, 40, 45, 47, 89, 91, 99, 102, 172; on “theatrical pretensions” 89; on “three basic points” 239; on Three World Theory 51, 96, 101, 104, 108; on UN membership and the US 89; withdrawal of Soviet experts from China 92, 166, 211 Marshall Plan 196, 257 McNamara, Robert Strange 179 Mencius: “a great country serves a small one” 27, 30, 91, 158 Melian discourse 27 Meirsheimmer, Jonathan 21, 255 ; “offensive realism” 19, 256 Memhet Shehu 138 Metternich, Clemens Werzel Lothar 134 Middle Kingdom 27, 132, 164, 241; Kissinger on “Middle Kingdom diplomacy” 132 “millet plus rifles” 30, 148 Mirsky, Jonathan 160 “moderately prosperous society” 49, 57, 217, 219–20, 246, 255; “comprehensive moderately prosperous society” 253, 255 Mondale, Walter 153 Monkey King 90, 184, 237 Monroe Doctrine 57, 256, 257 Montgomery, Bernard Law 93 Morgenthau, Hans 16, 21; interest defined as power 34; foreign policy between science and ideology 34, 36, 45 Moscow Declaration 1977 Moto Goto 130 Mubarak, Hosni 160 Mugabe, Robert 113 Mwinyi, Ali Hassan 218 NAFTA 206 Nagy, Imre 174 Nathan, Andrew 8 National Council for the Promotion of International Trade 214 National People’s Congress: Seventh Congress 1993 NATO 79

Nehru, Jawaharlal 81–2, 112, 176 “never claiming leadership” 20–1; 241, 253 New International Economic Order 110, 112–3, 207, 212 New International Political Order 112–3, 207, 212 “new interventionism” 246 New Security Concept 35, 57, 243–44, 249 New Zealand 190 Nie Rongzhen 128 Nixon, Richard 9–10, 21, 22, 122–3, 127, 129–31, 134–5, 140, 144, 156, 157, 240; on “five great economic superpowers” 133; “imperial presidency” 151; Kansas speech 133; resignation 146; on “weasel-worded communiques” 135; “no conflict, non-confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation” 164 Nye, Joseph 50 Nyerere, Julius 157 Obama, Barack: “pivot” 164–5, 254 “observe the situation coolly, hold our ground and act calmly” 86 “observe with a cool head, hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time, stand firm, calmly reply make friends and know what is what” 19, 161, 194, 241 Ohira, Masayoshi 219–20 On China 20, 164 “one line strategy” see “single-line strategy” “one world, one dream” 228 “open door and self-reliance” see “selfreliance and open door” “pacta sunt servanda” (treaties must be kept) 33: Thatcher to Deng 42 Pakistan 89 Pan Gu 71 Panchscheel 81 Panmunjom 157 “the past is to serve the present” 69 Patten, Christopher Francis 43 “peace and development” 1, 51, 57, 68–9, 85–6, 104, 105, 107, 161, 164, 184, 193, 197, 199, 205, 227–9, 238, 242–45, 250, 252–4, 256 “peaceful evolution” 18, 77, 85–6, 114, 126, 157, 204, 223, 227; and “historical regression” 114; as “long-term strategic objective of some Americans” 241 “peaceful rise” 254–5 Peng Zhen 179

Index  285 Peng Dehuai 177 “personal example is better than imperial writ” 29 playing cards see “card playing” Poland 34, 90, 160, 173 “points to the surface, linking points and surface” 218 post-international politics 56, 205 “power politics” 42, 68 “pragmatism” (实用主义) 3, 18, 38, 52, at fn. 5, 57–8; Chinese style, 实际主义 38 proletarian internationalism 86, 108 Pudong 225 Putin 251 “punitive military expeditions” 24 Pye, Lucien: on Deng’s character 8, 10 Qian Qichen 17, 160, 161, 190–3; dialectics and Mao’s foreign policy 195; evaluation of Gorbachev 192; sanctions “against the tide of history” 162 Qiao Guanhua 13, 129–30, 148 Reagan, Ronald 9, 152, 154, 184; hightechnology trade with China 156; sees relations with Taiwan as “official” 153 “realism” 10, 15, 21, 109, 158, 204; Chinese and Western 17, 21, 43, 52, 247 “realist foreign policy “ 19 realpolitik 21, 33, 56, 160 “reform is revolution” 47 Reston, James 130 revolutionary diplomacy 13, 111 Richelieu, Armand-Jean du Plessis de 22, 25, 54, 77 Romania 160 Roosevelt, Franklin 210 Rosenau, James 56, 205 Ruan Ming 8 Rusk, Dean 179 Russia 2; normalization with China 52, 81; Chinese recognition 194 Satow, Ernest 25 Saudi Arabia 248 “saving the country, and saving the people” 5 Scarborough Reef 166 Schmidt, Helmut 1, 9, 11; on Churchill 1 Schultz, George 45, 154 Scowcroft, Brent 159–60 “seek common ground while reserving differences” 42, 77, 82, 126, 165–6, 207, 237, 241, 242, 244, 248–9,

253; compared to “harmony with differences” 247; opposing “clash of civilizations” 242, 248 “seeking friends everywhere” see “making friends everywhere” “seeking the truth from the facts” 1, 6, 10, 11, 16, 32, 37–8, 42–4, 46, 51,54, 70–1, 93, 106 114, 209, 212–3, 215, 224, 228, 235, 237, 238, 243; Deng faction 1, 44, 219; Mao’s 1941 gloss 71 as “workstyle” 38 Segal, Gerald 49–50, 55, 206; “China threat” 17 “self-reliance and open door” 45, 106–9, 208–9, 212–15, 226; definition of self-reliance 46–49, 57, 69, 209–10; “develop the economy and ensure supplies” 210; as dialectical relationship 110, 210; distinguished from “selfseclusion” and “rejection of foreign aid” 97, 212–3; “doing it yourself to achieve self-supply” 210; extension to fourteen coastal cities 217; “selfreliance is primary while striving for foreign aid is secondary” 100; and “temporary exploitation” 214. See also “independence and self-reliance.” Service, John 210 “sever relations, withdraw troops and abrogate the defence treaty” 125 Sevodnya Commentary: “pragmatic leadership in Beijing” 197 Shambaugh, David 51, 253; centrality of economics in PRC foreign policy 204; China as a “realist state” 236 Shanghai Commune 95 Shanghai Communique (1972) 32, 54, 125–6, 129, 135–6, 146, 155, 164, 192; “all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait” 130; differences on drafting 125–6, 134–6, 143; Vietnamese reaction 135; Kissinger sees it as a “kind of alliance” 141 Shanghai Cooperative Organization 2, 55, 114, 251; based on Treaty on Strengthening Trust in Military Affairs in the Border Region 198 Shanghai Five 198 “Shanghai Spirit” 198; summed up in 20 characters at fn103, 203 Shenzhen 216–19, 225 Shevardnadze, Eduard: meeting with Deng on Vietnam 190; choosing between China and Vietnam 190

286 Index Shih Yu-chih 36 “si vis pacem para bellum” 25 “single line strategy” 108, 111, 126, 136, 139, 144, 149 , 151, 152, 160–1, 163, 188, 236; “one line, one big surface” 110 Sino-Indian Agreement on Tibet 81 Sino-Japanese Joint Communique 140, 147 Sino-Japanese Treaty of Peace and Friendship 149 Sino-Russian Good-Neighbourly Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation (2001) 244 Sino-Soviet Agreement on Technical and Economic Cooperation (1984) 187 Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship (1950) 75–6, 81, 104, 123, 124, 141, 179; not renewed 186 Sino-US Joint Communique, (1978) 152 Sino-US Joint Communique (1982) 154 Sino-Soviet Joint Communique (1989) 193 Sino-Vietnamese Joint Communique (1991) 191 Smith, Hazel 242 Snow, Edgar 93, 183 “socialist idealism” 16 “socialist imperialism” 101, 128, 134, 139, 182, 185 “socialist realism” 16 “socialism with Chinese characteristics” 12, 37, 40, 47, 205, 221, 240, 242, 247, 250 Song Shichang 206 South Africa 227 “southward strategy” 185 Soviet Union 2, 86, 92, 106, 108, 111, 128, 240, 254; collapse 160, 199, 243, 257; criticism of Chinese Confucianism and “great nation chauvinism” 181; encirclement of China 2, 104; foreign policy focus on domestic economy under Gorbachev 186; the “great historical regression” 182, 193, 237; the “more hungry superpower” 96, 133; linking Chinese bomb with West German Question 179; neutrality over Tiananmen Square 193; normalization with China 52, 79, 114–5, 185; seizure of Chinese territories 192; Vietnam 104; withdrawal of experts from China 211 Soviet-Vietnamese Treaty of Friendship 151 special economic zones (SEZs) 39, 215–19, 225–6, 241, 254; distinguished from “special political zones” 38

“spheres of influence” 41, 69, 126 “stage overstepping” 192 Stalin 219; assistance to China 106; China’s “fake revolution” 87, 176; Chinese criticism of his “metaphysics” 71; “seventy per cent” correct 173, 175, 178; and the Yalta Agreement 176 Statutes of the China International Trust and Investment Corporation 214 “strategic ambiguity” 166 Strategic Arms Limitation Talks 125, 133, 140, 149; and Sino-American normalization 144 “strategically despising the enemy” 25, 32, 46, 178; “real tigers devour people” 84; “contempt for difficulties” 84 “strategy for striving for achievement” 254. See also Xi Jinping. “study, study and study some more” 5 Sun Tzu: On the Art of War 24 Sun Yatsen 44, 209 Sun Yatsen University 5 Sunao Sonoda 141, 149 Suslov, Mikhail 89, 173, 180, 184 Tanzania 157 Taiwan 2, 24, 42, 54, 77, 101, 125, 129, 131, 139, 149, 153, 163, 199, 249; as “the biggest obstacle” 127; not in Deng’s lifetime 54, 126; as the “small question” 130; “unsinkable American aircraft carrier” 78, 146, 152, 155; US lobby 125 Taiwan Relations Act 2, 125, 152–3, 156, 184; as “immense obstacle” 155 “taking domestic sales as primary and foreign sales as supplementary” 78 Tajikistan 194, 198 “teach by one’s own example” 26 Terrill, Ross 247 Thailand 104 Thatcher, Margaret 42–3, 92, 249; on Chinese administration of Hong Kong 92; Deng turns back on capitalism 43 Theory of Three Worlds see under Mao. “Third World war without gunsmoke” 18 Thirty Points of Industry 214 “three objectives”: distinguished from “three stages” 220 “three great workstyles” 7 “three honests” 32 (honest person, honesty in words and honesty in deeds) “three obstacles” 55, 186, 188–9 “Three People’s Principles” 161

Index  287 Tiananmen Square demonstrations 2, 18, 39, 44, 48, 80, 85, 126, 159, 166, 194, 220, 222, 240 Tibet 80, 249; US on human rights 156; Tito, Josip Broz 188 Tolstoy, Leo 6 Treaty of Shimonoseki 40 Treaty of Westphalia 25 “triangular diplomacy” 17, 35, 51, 110, 111, 140, 154, 161, 163, 199; China not part of “big triangle” 107–8, 110–1, 158 The True Story of Ah Q 47 Trump, Donald 206 Trudeau, Pierre Elliot 156 The True Story of Ah Q 47 Tuchman, Barbara 210 Tunisia 94 Turkmenistan 194 U San Yu 112 U Thein Sein 250 united front strategy 91, 96, 114, 145, 243 “unity of foreign and domestic policy” 38 “unity of theory and practice 1, 2, 18, 39, 53 UN: China denied entry 78; seating of PRC 129–30 United States 108–9: establishes diplomatic relations with China 125–6; as “globalizing state” 206; keeping promises on Taiwan 123, 128, 146–7; Sino-American normalization 54–5, 114–5, 130, 185; US UN resolution on Kuwait 161 Uzbekistan 194 Vance, Cyrus 149, 150 Vietnam 2, 21, 54, 103, 126, 136, 145–6, 150–1, 161, 163, 182, 185, 187, 190, 191, 199; China’s “moral lesson” 103, 151, 190; “eight point proposal” 136; integration with Cambodia and Laos 103, 257; “united action” 182–3 Viotti, Paul 15 Vladivostok 147, 189, 190 Vlajkovic, Radovan Vogel, Ezra 8–9, 50, 51, 87, 239; on Deng’s globalization 50, 56; Deng as “pragmatist” as opposed to ideologue 239–40 Wallace, Mike 8, 101–2, 126, 155, 190 Waltz, Kenneth 21; images 27 Wang Hongwen 96, 184

Wang Jinqing 194 Wang Junyan 81 Wang Jisi 22 Warren, Christopher 152 Warsaw Treaty Organization 79, 174 Watergate 123, 145, 151 “way of the hegemon” 30: definition 26; “bully” “way of the king” 26, 139 Wedemeyer, Albert 210 Wen Jiabao 229 White Paper on China’s Peaceful Road to Development (2005) 228, 256 Whiting, Allen 154; “misrepresentation” of Sino-US relationship as alliance 154 Wilson, Sir David 42 Woodcock, Leonard 151 “world technological revolution” 13, 47, 51, 198, 207, 209, 224, 226, 257 World Trade Organization 227 Wotton, Sir Thomas 33 Wu Jianmin 256 Wuchang 225 Xi Jinping 57, 68, 228–9; “champion of the liberal international order” 252; China’s foreign policy and civilization 150–1; China’s “rejuvenation” 154; dismisses US “pivot” 249; endorses Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence 68; extends Deng’s foreign policy legacy 249–252; “new type of great power relations” 163, 254; “family is the smallest country, and the country is like ten thousand families” 251; and the “open door” 229; “theory of moral relativism” 254; at World Economic Forum, 2017 2. See also “moderately prosperous society”. Xinjiang 249 Xiong Guangkai 111 Xunzi 2 Xu Xiangzhen 128 Yahuda, Michael, 56, 82 Yan Xuetong, 254 Yang Shengkun 156 Yao Wenyuan 96 Ye Jianying 128 Ye Zicheng 10, 69, 73 Yeltsin, Boris 193: address to US Congress 195; on “Atlanticism” versus “EuroAsianism” 195–6; changing views on China’s path to economic success 196–7; criticized for “infantile

288 Index pro-Americanism” 198; Group of Seven rejection of assistance 195 Yugoslavia 75, 114 Zhang Qunqiao 96 Zhao Ziyang 42, 187, 220, 223, 225, 238; Cancun Summit 153; “two ends of production on the outside” 223 Zhenbao Island 126 Zheng Bijian 254 Zheng Weizhi 75 Zhou Enlai 6, 10, 13, 19, 22, 30, 32, 38, 41, 50, 54, 70, 72, 77, 80–3, 87, 88, 96, 98, 99, 112, 114, 122, 123, 128–30, 131, 133, 138, 149, 150, 173, 174, 183, 184, 185, 208, 210, 211, 215, 218, 242: 1949 classicus locus on self-reliance and independence 74, 76, 98, 211; accused of ‘rightist capitulationism” 122; and “Anti-Confucius Campaign”

96; Bandung understandings 104–5, 114; China’s “ancestoral obligation” to Vietnam 136; on China’s UN diplomats 19, 129; disagrees with Kissinger on the centring of geopolitics 134; first volume, selected works 76; on “conceited nationalism” 79; Geneva Conference 21; instructions to New China diplomatic corps 75; on “isolationist” and “parasitic views” 88–9; Mao on studying 72; rejects “Asian alliance” 80; on removing the “mystery” of the Middle Kingdom 132; “shadow boxing” with the USSR 143–4; on US and USSR and “China’s right to exist” 141, 144. See also under Deng Xiaoping Zhou Yijun 3 Zhu De 38 Zhuhai 225 Zhukov, Georgi 6