A Study On The Process Toward A Sino-U.S. Détente (1969-1972)

After engaging in a confrontation lasting for over two decades, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, China and the United States—under the influence of complicated domestic and international factors—were willing to improve the relations between the two countries. For the Nixon Administration of the United States, to improve relations with China would allow the United States to exploit the contradiction between the Beijing and Moscow, and would help prevent each of them from filling the geopolitical vacuum in East Asia as the US was pursuing a policy of "Vietnamization" for the purpose of "getting out of the Vietnam War." The Chinese-American rapprochement, in the long run, would help create a multi-polar system relatively favorable to the US when a structural transition of the postwar order toward multipolarism was envisaged inevitable. Meanwhile, the Chinese leadership headed by Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai was also seeking a rapprochement with the US under the circumstances of the deteriorating Soviet threat from abroad and continuing political turmoil at home (caused by the Cultural Revolution). Using the US power to balance the Soviet threat and improve China's security situation was at the core of the Chinese perception and endeavor to improve relations with the United States.Although the above-mentioned driving forces were pushing the two governments toward improving relations between them, there were many obstacles along the road leading up to a rapprochement. First, as the result of hostilities lasting for over two decades, the gulf between the two peoples and the mistrust between the leaders of the two countries could not be wiped out overnightly. Second, the different interest groups and political forces that had benefited from the Chinese-America confrontation, such as several allies of Beijing and Washington, were unwilling to see changings in the status quo. Third, given that its own position could be jeopardized by the Sino-US rapprochement, the Soviet Union was more than willing to generate its enormous power to block the Chinese-American endeavor in one way or another. Fourth, the domestic opponents in the two countries might use such factors as the lack of mutual understanding between the two peoples, the resentment among the allies, the disruptive intervention of the Soviets, and mismanagement by each of the two governments to weaken the credibility and power of the leaders of the two countries, thus serving their own political interests. Therefore, the path toward rapprochement could not be a straightforward one.Facing these challenges, both Chinese and American leaders strived to promote the national interests of their own countries while, at the same time, minimizing the impact of possible political risks that the rapprochement might bring about. To achieve these goals, they had to prevent (1) the rapprochement being viewed as a compromise based on the trading of principles; (2) the rapprochement being viewed within both camps as a betrayal of allies; (3) the rapprochement being viewed by the Soviet leaders as an endeavor to build an anti-Soviet alliances; and (4) the other party taking excessive advantage of the rapprochement for serving it own interests.These concerns were crucial in shaping the behaviors of leaders of both sides when they were working on improving relations between the two countries. They also determined how the two sides would interact with each other, would set up the emphases of negotiation and the bottom lines for compromises, and would serve to place the relations between China and the United States on the basis of "peaceful coexistence" and "seeking common ground while accepting the existing differences".With the support of recently declassified US archival documents on foreign affairs and also Chinese source materials, this dissertation discusses the handling of the above-mentioned challenges by both the Chinese and US policymakers when they pursued a rapprochement between the two countries. Under discussion are their perceptions and management of the Sino-Soviet boarder clashes of 1969, the 135^th and 136^th Sino-US ambassadorial talks, the ping-pong diplomacy, President Nixon's visit to China and reactions by other parties with a stake in the Chinese-American rapprochement. This dissertation represents an effort to help develop a deeper understanding of the Chinese-American relations in general and the Chinese-American rapprochement in the late 1960s and early 1970s in particular.