But as if secrecy and language barriers were not enough, the evident apathy appears also to have stemmed from the belief among many Western scholars of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s that they already knew and understood the reasons behind the alliance's rise and demise. In the first decades of Chinese and Russian communism, it was believed, sufficient ideological attraction existed between the two to make the countries they controlled natural allies. Then, as the new states came better to recognize their national interests, they drifted apart, and the traditional pattern of rivalry and mistrust between Russia and China recommenced. Often linked to general presumptions about modernization and state behavior, this realist paradigm dominated the field across political and parochial divides within the scholarly community.
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In the late 1980s, however, as the Cold War drew to a close, the database for studying the foreign relations of Communist countries suddenly changed. Gorbachev's glasnost and the stunning liberalization that took place in China under Deng Xiaoping burst the shackles of secrecy and, for the first time, allowed Russian and Chinese scholars to begin serious work in their archives. Since then the trickle of new documents has turned into a flood. While ten years ago barely enough inner documents of the Sino-Soviet alliance existed for me to fill the normal space of a classroom lecture, today we have considerable access to a vast amount of archival documents, printed collections, briefing books, and manuscripts throughout China, the former Soviet Union, and the Eastern Bloc. In addition, as this volume demonstrates, wide-ranging opportunities have opened up to interview former policymakers and participants involved in the bilateral relationship.
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While in no way unproblematic from a scholarly standpoint, the recent flood of documents has opened up possibilities for a reevaluation of the main issues of the alliance.
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This reevaluation has been heavily influenced by new opportunities for scholarly cooperation across national boundaries. Working with colleagues from China and Russia has allowed European and American scholars to benefit from their insights into the mentalities of the Communist regimes. Likewise, scholars working from within the geographical space of the former alliance have learned to question their established troths and to employ new methodologies and approaches.
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This volume gathers writings by some of the foremost younger experts on the history of the alliance from China, Russia, the United States, and Western Europe. Our cooperation began in 1994, when the contributors, on my invitation, agreed to write for the volume. Since then the project has developed in many different ways. We have shared information and documents, have helped each other gain entry to archives, and, of course, have read and commented on draft
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