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budge.
The
purpose of the Japanese
lawmakers' yjsit in 1969 was therefore
to move the U. S. off dead-center on its
China policy.
As Mr. Utsunomiya diplomatically
warned:
"If
Japan and the United
$tates want to maintain dose and
f
riendly relations, they must undertake
a serious joint reappraisal of their China
policies."
Americans Agree
The words and warrungs of the Japa–
nese representatives found receptive ears
among the American delegates.
Arthur Goldberg, former U. S.
Ambassador to the United Nations and
Supreme Court Justice, called for U. S.
support for China's admission to the
U.N. as part of a "two-China" proposaL
Oregon Senator Mark Hatfield
warned that official
U
S. policy toward
Communist China was becoming obso–
lete. Instead of "isolating" Peking and
persuading allies to deny it official rec–
ognition and U.N. membership, it was
the U. S. that was becoming isolated.
Since his remarks, additional nations
- including Canada and Italy - have
recognized Peking and broken ties with
Taipei . In 1970, for the first time, a
majority of U.N. members voted to seat
Communist China. But the vote fell
short of the necessary two-thirds
majority.
Senator Edward M. Kennedy did
not personally attend but sent a sum–
mary statement. He called for the relax–
ations of travel barriers between the two
nations and for agreements to exchange
persons in the field of science, educa–
tion, the arts, and significantly enough,
athletics.
Me.
Kennedy also urged the Ameri–
can government to examine whether
more sales of non-strategic goods could
be made.
Government Was Obviously
Listening
It cannot be stated whether or not the
new Nixon Administration in Washing–
ton - only 4 days old at the time -
took its cue for a new China policy
directly from the proceedings at Santa
Barbara.
But it is significant that beginning
that year, the U. S. Administration
The
PLAIN TRUTH
began sending secret friendly messages
to Communist China's rulers.
For about a year and a half the
probing continued, often through
European third parties. Then in Febru–
ary of this year, President Nixon, in bis
"state of the world" message, openly
cal!ed for warmer U. S.-Chinese rela–
tions and expressed a desire to see main–
land China take a place in the United
Nations. He relaxed travel restrictions
on Americans wishing to visit China.
Washington's new China policy
finally bore fruit in the now famous
"ping pong episode" of ApriL Expe–
rienced China watchers admit the
Chinese invitation to the American ath–
letes and newsmen was a carefully
planned response to U. S. initiatives -
not a spur-of-the-moment invitation just
because the world table tennis cham–
pionship bappened to be held in nearby
Nagoya, Japan.
Fear of Isolation
Why did China finally respond to
U. S. overtures?
For one reason, the mainland has
fully recovered from the rampaging
chaos of the Great Proletarian Cultural
Revolution of the middle and late
1960's. China is perhaps more unified
now than she has been for centuries.
China's leaders fee! the time is ripe
for the nation to assume its rightful
great-power status in the world. For trus,
United Nations membership is essential
- but only on Peking's terms, of course.
Furthermore, China's economic house
has been put back in shape. Necessary
food imports are at a minimallevel. The
nation can now afford to emphasize
controlled industrial development. This
necessitates the purchase of machine
tools, basic transport and heavy equip–
ment from the outside world.
But the biggest factor behind Peking's
move is very probably China's age–
old fear of "encirclement" by rival big
power neighbots.
To China, the Soviet Union is now
the lt>ading "devil-figure." So strained
are relations between Peking and Mos–
cow that Soviet affairs authority Harri–
son Salisbury said we should not ask
if
war is possible between China and the
Soviet Union, but
WHEN
will it occur.
In sharp contrast to President
July 1971
Nixon's kindly words was the bellicose
anti-Chinese polemic expressed by So–
viet Party boss Leonid Brezhnev in bis
address to the recent Communist Party
Congress in Moscow.
Conditions between the Kremlin and
Peking have, in fact, steadily worsened
since the late 1950's. Sino-Soviet trade
is virtually non-existent. From a peak of
$2.05 billion in both directions in 1959,
trade between the two Red giants
plummeted to a mere $55 million in
1970.
The Chinese, moreover, fear the con–
tinued build-up of Soviet military might
along their northern frontiers. They
also are deeply concerned about the
remarkable growth of the Soviet navy.
Ships bearing tbe bammer-and-sickle are
pushing in greater numbers into South–
east Asia and the Indian Ocean. China's
leaders are fully aware that there exists
a powerful faction within the Soviet
government that favors a "preventive"
nuclear blitz against China's budding
nuclear installations, located not far
from the Siberian border.
Historie Enemies
Historial and geographical factors
make friction or war much more possible
between Russia and China than they do
between Russia and the United States.
The rapprochement between China
and tbe Soviet Union duriog the 1950's
was but a brief interlude in centuries of
suspicion, fear and hostility.
The Russians view the hundreds of
millions of Chinese as "new Mongols"
- an ever-present threat to ravage the
lands of Mother Russia just as the
Golden Horde of Genghis Khan did
700 years ago.
The present-day Chinese are not de–
scendents of the rampaging Mongols of
the thirteenth Century. But the ever–
wary Russians make no distinction be–
tween the peoples of the East.
The Chinese, in turn, view Soviet Rus–
sia as the last European power still
squatting on China's original territory.
The Chinese !ay claim to hundreds of
thousands of square mi-les of what is
now Siberia and tbe Soviet Pacific Mari–
time region.
The Chinese are also bothered by
Russia's continued domination of the
People's Republic of Mongolia. This