Needstrat: Nixon’s success in China

On 21 February 1972 US President Richard Nixon arrives in China for a historic visit and meets Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai. Relations between China and the US have been cold since the Communists took power in 1949. Mao moved China close to the Soviet Union, but after Stalin’s death, and Khrushchev repudiation of him, they drifted apart. Now Nixon and his National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger make the move to split the two Communist giants further. The visit ends in the Shanghai Communiqué where the US recognizes the “One-China” principle, meaning that Taiwan is a part of China. This leads to China getting the permanent seat in the UN Security Council, instead of Taiwan. On the other hand China supports the negotiations to settle the Vietnam War. Secretly the US gives China information about Soviet military forces. Both parties are very satisfied.

US-Sino relations have gone up and down since 1972; they are today complex with competition in some and co-operation in other areas. On 21 February 2014 President Obama met the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama at the White House. China, seeing this as US interference in its internal affairs, warned that it would damage the relations between the countries. Several countries in East and South-East Asia are also worried about China’s military expansion and assertive policies in territorial conflicts. They look to the US for support, and get it. But for the moment China and the US are interdependent of each other for economic development and stability in Asia.