Brothers in Arms (94 page)

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Moreover, in the conflict with the Soviets, the chairman found one of the long-term weapons he badly needed to enhance the much-weakened momentum of his continuous revolution. In the early 1960s Mao repeatedly used the conflict with Moscow to claim that his struggle for true communism was also a struggle for China's national integrity. As far as Chinese politics is concerned, the growing confrontation with Moscow made it more difficult for those of Mao's comrades who disagreed with some of the chairman's radical ideas to challenge him.

¹⁴⁹

There is a striking similarity between the new patterns that emerged in China's domestic politics and in external relations in the early and mid-1960s. On one hand, Mao, especially after 1962, repeatedly argued that in order to avert a Soviet-style "capitalist restoration," it was necessary for the Chinese party and people "never to forget class struggle," pushing the whole country toward another high wave of continuous revolution. On the other hand, Mao personally initiated the great polemic debate between the Chinese and Soviet parties, claiming that the Soviet party and state had fallen into the "revisionist" abyss and that it had become the duty of the Chinese party and the Chinese people to hold high the banner of true socialism and communism.
¹⁵⁰

Mao's wrecking of the Sino-Soviet relationship did not happen without challenge within the CCP leadership. In February 1962 Wang Jiaxiang, head of the CCP' s International Liaison Department, submitted to the party' s top leadership a report on China's international polices. He argued that the strategic goal of China's foreign policy should be the maintenance of world peace, so that it would be able to focus on socialist construction at home. He particularly emphasized that "it is necessary [for China] to carry out a foreign policy aimed at easing international tension, and not exacerbate [the tension]."
¹⁵¹

Wang's views received the consent (if not the active support) of several party leaders, including Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping. Mao, understandably, was upset. The CCP chairman characterized Wang's ideas as an attempt to be conciliatory toward imperialists, revisionists, and international reactionaries, while at the same time reducing support to those countries and peoples fighting against the imperialists. Mao stressed that the policy of "three reconciliations and one reduction" came at a time when some leading CCP members (as it would turn out, he had Liu and Deng in mind) had been frightened by the international reactionaries and were inclined to adopt a "pro-revisionist" policy line at home. He emphasized that his policy, by contrast, was to fight against the imperialists, revisionists, and reactionaries in all countries and, at the same time, to promote revolutionary developments at home and abroad. 152 Those of Mao's colleagues who might have doubts about these ideas of the chairman's yielded to his argument without a fight.

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With the continuous radicalization of China's political and social life, the relationship between Beijing and Moscow rapidly worsened. Even Khrushchev's fall from power in October 1964 could not turn around the trend of deteriorating relations. In the meantime, Mao linked his widespread domestic purges during the Cultural Revolution to the "antirevisionist" and "anti-social-imperialist" snuggles on the international scene, labeling Liu Shaoqi, the major target of his purge during the Cultural Revolution, "China's Khrushchev." Consequently, until the last days of his life, Mao made the rhetoric of antirevisionism (after 1969, anti-social-imperialism) central slogans in mobilizing China's people to sustain his continuous revolution. The Soviet Union, accordingly, became China's worst enemy. Not until the mid-and late 1980s, when Mao's continuous revolution had long been abandoned in China, would Beijing and Moscow move toward normal state relations.

Notes

1. Chinese archives are still largely closed to scholars. Yet in recent years many valuable sources related to Sino-Soviet relations have appeared, including memoirs, selected party documents and leaders' works, and official and semiofficial histories based on archival sources. Among these sources, the most important ones include
Jianguo yilai Mao Zedong wengao
[Mao Zedong's manuscripts since the formation of the People's Republic], 11 vols. covering 1949 to 1965 (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian, 1987-95);
Mao Zedong waijiao wenxuan
[Selected diplomatic papers of Mao Zedong] (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian, 1994);
Zhou Enlai Waijiao wenxuan
[Selected diplomatic papers of Zhou Enlai] (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian, 1990); Shi Zhe,
Zai lishi jüren shenbian
[Together with historical giants] (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian, 1992); Shi Zhe,
Feng yu gu: Shi Zhe huiyilu
[High peak and deep valley: Shi Zhe's memoirs] (Beijing: Hongqi, 1992); Liu Xiao,
Chushi sulian banian
[Eight years as ambassador to the Soviet Union] (Beijing: Zhonggong dangshi ziliao, 1986); Pei Jianzhang,
Zhonghua renmin gongheguo waijiaoshi, 1949-1956
[A diplomatic history of the People's Republic of China, 1949-1956] (Beijing: Shijie zhishi, 1994); Han Nianlong et al,
Dangdai zhongguo waijiao
[Contemporary Chinese diplomacy] (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue, 1987). For English translations of key documents for the period 1944 to 1950, see Shuguang Zhang and Chen Jian, eds.,
Chinese Communist Foreign Policy and the Cold War in Asia: New Documentary Evidence
(Chicago: Imprint Publications, 1996).

2. Many of these documents have been translated into English and are available in the
Cold War International History (CWIHP) Bulletin
published by the Cold War International History Project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C.

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Page 278

3. Mao Zedong, "On the People's Democratic Dictatorship,"
Mao Zedong xuanji
[Selected works of Mao Zedong] (Beijing: Renmin, 1992), vol. 4, 1477.

4. See, for example, Lu Dingyi, "Explanations of Several Basic Problems Concerning the Postwar International Situation,"
Jiefang ribao
[Liberation daily], January 4, 1947; Liu Shaoqi, "On Internationalism and Nationalism,"
Renrnin ribao
[People's daily], November 7, 1948.

5. Mao Zedong, "The Current Situation and the Party's Tasks in 1949," January 8, 1949; Mao Zedong, "Plans to March to the Whole Country," May 23, 1949; both in
Mao Zedong junshi wenxuan
[Selected military papers of Mao Zedong], (Beijing: Jiexangjun, 1981), 328, 338.

6. Han Nianlong et al.,
Dangdai Zhongguo waijiao,
4.

7. In the 1940s, Mao Zedong divided the Chinese Communist revolution into two stages: the stage of new democratic revolution and the stage of socialist revolution. During the first stage, the revolution had to overthrow the rule of the bureaucratic-capitalist class, wipe out foreign influence, eliminate remnants of feudal tradition, and establish a Communist-led regime. The second stage of the revolution would transform China's state and society, laying the foundation of China's transition into a socialist and later Communist society. In 1949, he was thinking about leading the revolution into its higher second stage. See Mao Zedong, "The Chinese Revolution and the Chinese Communist Party," and "On New Democracy,"
Mao Zedong xuanji
[Selected works of Mao Zedong], (Beijing: Renmin, 1965), vol. 2, 626-47, 656-72; Mao, "On People's Democratic Dictatorship," ibid., vol. 4, 1473-86.

8. See, for example, Mao Zedong, "Report to the Second Plenary Session of the Seventh Central Committee,"
Mao Zedong xuanji
vol. 4, 1439-40; Zhou Enlai, "Report on Problems Concerning Peace Talks,"
Zhou Enlai xuanji
[Selected works of Zhou Enlai] (Beijing: Renmin, 1984), vol. 1,318.

9. Mao Zedong, "Report to the Second Plenary Session of the Seventh Central Committee,"
Mao Zedong xuanji,
vol. 4, 1425-6.

10. See Zhou Enlai, "Our Diplomatic Policies and Tasks,"
Zhou Enlai waijiao wenxuan,
48-51; see also Han Nianlong et al.,
Dangdai Zhongguo waijiao,
4-5; Pei Jianzhang,
Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo waijiaoshi,
2-4.

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