Chinese – American consensus

President-hawk George W. Bush arrived in Beijing 30 years after president-hawk Nixon’s visit – this is a day-to-day coincidence. Is it possible to find another amazing occasion like that in history?

The Chinese press recollected Nixon’s visit: People’s Daily published an interview with the participant and organizer of that visit, Henry Kissinger (Beijing is rather a secure place for the latter, for the prosecutors in such countries as Chile or France are dying for a meeting with him, the influential journalists of America consider Kissinger to be a war criminal, whose place is in the Hague Tribunal).

The date February 21, 1972 went down in history as the day, which initiated the retrieval of the American ambitions pertaining to the world reign. The USA and China put the USSR in a very complicated geopolitical situation. China, the major cities and industrial centers of which played the role of the potential targets for the nuclear strikes on the part of the United States, set itself free from the fear of “paper tiger,” the USA focused the fire of the cold war on the USSR only and on the national and liberation movements. The USSR provided China with a protection from the American nuclear attacks simply with the fact of its existence.

Today China is celebrating the 30th anniversary of Nixon’s visit as its great diplomatic victory. This is true at first sight. But if we look into the matter, is it the victory, which became the reason for China’s hardest geopolitical problems in the beginning of the 21st century?

Analyzing the reasons of the USSR’s death, one may assume, that it happened in connection with Nixon’s visit to Beijing. The anti-Soviet alliance between America and China, which was set up at that time, intensified the burdens of the Soviet economy, broke the harmony of its foreign policy. May be it was the contradiction with China, which was one of the main arguments of the Afghan venture, the way we were searching for the allies that were not always true in the developing countries? The break-up of the USSR, which was perceived by some of the Chinese as a victory, lifted up the embargo on USA’s anti-Chinese activity. China did not only lose the security in front of America’s nuclear and missile power, China found itself encircled by the NATO bases, which already appeared on its western borders. Because of the USA’s pulling out from the ABM treaty, due to the extreme aggressiveness against China on the part of some of the American politicians, China had to face a very difficult choice after the collapse of the USSR: either to get involved in the arms race, or in the cold war. China can not cope with that, whereas it eventually became a defeat for the Soviet Union.

Bush’s current visit to the USA is undoubtedly good for both China, and the USA - it is a key for a certain improvement of the relations. But the mutual contradictions under the conditions of the global extremely aggressive foreign political and military course of the United States were so serious, that one can hardly suppose there will be a break-through, like it happened 30 years ago.

Everybody, who was watching the meeting between Bush and Jiang Zemin on television, their joint press-conference, the amusing ritual with the guard of honor (which was conducted under the roof for safety reasons), could notice the absolute evident intellectual predominance of the Chinese leader, and Bush’s indifference. USA’s aggressive power dictates the need in a subtle maneuver, in the reliable allies. Only Russia could play such a role for China.

Andrey Krushinsky PRAVDA.Ru Beijing China

Translated by Dmitry Sudakov