For a skeptical
appraisal
of these initiatives, see Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy," 274-78.
Revolution and War_nodrm
On the whole, therefore, the Chinese Revolution provides strong support for the main argument of this book.
Maoist Revolutionary Ideology
Maoist political thought closely resembles the ideal type of revolutionary ideology described in chapter 2. 136 During its long struggle against both the Guomindang (GMD) and Japan, the CCP developed a body of revolution- ary doctrine designed to inspire prolonged sacrifices and provide tactical guidance to the Communist cadres. As a Marxist-Leninist, CCP leader Mao Tse-tung viewed politics as inherently competitive and regarded oppo- nents-e- specially the imperialist powers-as hostile. 137 The Maoist world- view was also intrinsically optimistic: although enemies might appear stronger, they were actually "paper tigers. " "In appearance [they] are terri- fying but in reality they are not so powerful. " As a result, victory was in- evitable provided the cadres did not lose heart. 138 Like Lenin, Mao tempered this optimism with a sense of realism, stressing the need to analyze political and strategic problems systematically and warning against both rightist de- viations (passivity and fear of struggle) and leftist deviations (overconfident recklessness). In his words, the CCP should "despise the enemy strategi- cally while taking full account of him tactically," meaning that although vic- tory was inevitable, achieving it required prolonged effort, careful preparation, and tactical flexibility. 139 Maoist ideology combined nationalist
136 In addition to Mao's writings, this summary of Maoist ideology is based on Stuart Schram, The Thought ofMao Tse-tung (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989); Peter Van Ness, Revolution and Chinese Foreign Policy: Peking's Support for Wars of National Liberation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970), chap. 2; J. D. Armstrong, Revolutionary Diplo- macy: Chinese Foreign Policy and the United Front Doctrine (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977); chaps. 1-2; Edward L. Katzenbach and Gene z. Hanrahan, "The Revolutionary Strategy of Mao Tse-tung," Political Science Quarterly 70, no. 3 (1955); and Tang Tsou and Mor- ton H. Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy and Peking's International Behav- ior," American Political Science Review 59, no. 1 (1965).
137 Likening imperialism to a "wild beast," Mao told his followers not to show "the slight- est timidity. " In his words: "Either kill the tiger or be eaten by him-one or the other. " He also warned that "when we say 'imperialism is ferocious,' we mean that its nature will never change, the imperialists will never lay down their butcher knives, they will never become Buddhas, till their doom. " Selected Works ofMao Tse-tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1961-65), 4=416, 428.
138 See Mao, Selected Works, 1 : 1 17-18, 2:132-36; 4:10o-101; and Van Ness, Revolution and Chi- nese Foreign Policy, 4o-41.
139 See John Shy and Thomas Collier, "Revolutionary War," in Makers ofModern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), esp. 842-43; Richard H. Solomon, Mao's Revolution and the Chinese Political Culture
? ? ? Revolution and War
arid universalistic themes: the removal of foreign (i. e. , imperialist) influence from China was a central goal of the revolution, but the struggle in China was merely one part of the worldwide transition to socialism. 140 Mao also stressed the importance of identifying the "principal contradiction"-de- fined as the main threat at any given time-and endorsed Lenin's strategy of the "united front," which permitted temporary alliances with non-Com- munist groups against the most dangerous adversary, combined with preparations to undermine one's present allies when the opportunity arose. 141
The Chinese Revolution and the Balance ofThreats
The Balance of Power. As in the French, Russian, and Iranian cases, other states saw the revolution in China as a potential threat to the balance of power and as an opportunity to improve their own positions. Such perceptions were not entirely new, as China had been the object of great-power competition since the nineteenth century, and the collapse of the Manchu dynasty in 1911 had intensified foreign involvement in China's domestic affairs. The Soviet Union, Japan, Great Britain, and the United States continued to compete for influence during the interwar period, and Japanese expansionism in China was a crucial underlying cause of World War II in the Pacific.
The GMD became the main Asian ally of the United States during the war, although relations between Washington and Chongqing were strained by Chiang Kai-shek's (Jiang Jieshi's) constant requests for assistance and U. S. irritation at his preoccupation with fighting the CCP instead of the Japanese. 142 The United States also sent a small military mission to CCP headquarters in 1944, but support for Mao's forces never approached the level of aid provided to Chiang. 143 Nonetheless, U. S. president Franklin Roosevelt was convinced that U. S. -Soviet cooperation would continue after
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), 17cr89; Tsou and Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy"; and Mao, Selected Works, 4:181-82.
? 140 See Mao, Selected Works, 2:342-47. After the Sino-Soviet split, Chinese commentators em- phasized that "world revolution relies on frhe thought of Mao Tse-tung. . . . [It] belongs not only to China but also has its international implications. " Quoted in Tsou and Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy," 82.
141 See Mao, Selected Works, 2:441-49; Armstrong, Revolutionary Diplomacy, chap. 2; and Lyman P. Van Slyke, Enemies and Friends: The United Front Doctrine in Chinese Communist His- tory2(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967).
1 4 See Barbara Tuchman, Stillwell and the American Experience in China, 1 9 1 1 - 1 945 (New York: Macmillan, 1971); Herbert Feis, The China Tangle: The American Effort in Chinafrom Pearl Harbor to the Marshall Mission (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 74-77, 151-54, 187-<JW and Tang Tsou, America's Failure in China, 1941-1950 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963), chap. 4?
143 See David D. Barrett, Dixie Mission: The United States Army Observer Group in Yenan, 1 944 (Berkeley, Calif. : Center for Chinese Studies, 1970).
[)12]
? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
the war and envisioned a peaceful resolution of the CCP-GMD conflict that would grant the "so-called communists" a legitimate (albeit minority) posi- tion in a postwar Chinese government. 144
As World War II came to an end, however, U. S. officials became increas- ingly concemed that Communist control of Manchuria would lead to an ad- verse shift in the balance of power in Asia. 145 Truman and his advisors therefore favored the emergence of a strong and unified China that would help prevent Soviet expansion in the Far East, and Truman sent General George C. Marshall to China in December 1945 in a last-ditch attempt to broker a settlement between the rival Chinese factions. Although Marshall's efforts were initially promising, he was unable to overcome the mutual sus- picions between the GMD and CCP, and a full-scale civil war was underway by the spring of 1946. In the meantime, the United States continued to send military aid to Chiang's forces and helped transport GMD units to northern China in an attempt to limit Communist influence there. 146
As U. S. -Soviet relations deteriorated and the CCP gained the upper hand, U. S. officials became even more concerned about the impact of a Communist victory on the global balance of power. Although U. S. officials disagreed over the magnitude of the threat, by 1949 there was a widespread belief that a Communist victory in China would constitute a major gain for the Soviet Union. 147 Truman and Acheson faced growing domestic criticism for having "lost China" after the CCP victory, and though the administration still refused to commit itself to defend Taiwan (where the remnants of the GMD had fled), U. S. policy in the Far East increasingly sought to contain Communist expan- ? ion and "drive a wedge" between the Soviet Union and the PRC. 148
144 See Odd Arne Westad, Cold War and Revolution: Soviet-American ! Rivalry and the Origins of the Chinese Civil War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 24-27.
145 At the end of 1945, U. S. officials feared that Communist control of Manchuria "would . . . place under the control of the Soviet Union the greatest agglomeration of power in the his- tory of the world. " Six months later, a State Department memorandum warned, "Our exclu- sion from China would probably result . . . in an expansion of Soviet influence over the manpower, raw materials, and industrial power of Manchuria and China. The U. S. and the world might then be faced . . . with a Soviet power analogous to that of the Japanese in 1941, but with the difference that the Soviets could be perhaps overwhelmingly strong in Europe and the Middle East as well. " Quoted in Melvyn Leffler, A Preponderance ofPower: National Se- curit-y, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 127-28; and Steven I. Levine, "A New Look at American Mediation in the Chinese Civil War: TheMarshallMissionandManchuria," DiplomaticHistoryJ, no. 4(1979), 354?
146 See Westad, Cold War and Revolu tion, 143-159, and Forrest C. Pogue, George C. Marshall, vol. 4: Statesman, 1945-1959 (New York: Viking, 1987), 54-143.
147 See Leffler, Preponderance ofPower, 246-49. In May 1950, Assistant Secretary of State Dean Rusk concluded that the loss of China "marked a shift in the balance of power in favor of So- viet Russia. " Quoted in Rosemary Foot, The Wrong War: American Policy and the Dimensions of the Korean Conflict, 195o-1953 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985), 52:
148 On U. S. policy in the Far East, see John Lewis Gaddis, 'The Long Peace: Inquiries into the History ofthe Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), chaps. 4 and 6; Warren I.
? ? ? Revolution and War
. Soviet responses to the revolution in China reveal a similar preoccupation with the balance of power. Stalin's diplomacy in the Far East was aimed at securing specific territorial gains for the USSR and preventing either large- scale U. S. intervention or the emergence of a pro-Western Chinese govern? ment. 149 The Soviet Union had already obtained favorable territoriall concessions in China at the Yalta summit, and Soviet troops had occupied\ Manchuria at the end of the war and carried off a substantial quantity of in-
dustrial equipment. Soviet support for the CCP was quite limited during this period, however, and Stalin sought to preserve his gains by signing a friendship treaty with the GMD in 1945. Aid to the CCP rose substantially during the Chinese Civil War, but the Soviets refused to commit themselves to defend the CCP in the event that the United States intervened, and Stalin advised Mao to compromise with the GMD in order to further reduce the danger of a U. S. occupation. 150 Like his U. S. counterparts, in short, Stalin was primarily interested in preventing events in China from causing an ad- verse shift in the regional balance of power. And though U. S. officials be- lieved that Communist ideology created a strong bond between the Soviet Union and the CCP, Marxist solidarity had relatively little effect on Soviet
calculations. 151
PerceptionsofIntent. ThedeteriorationofSino-Americanrelationsalsoil- lustrates the tendency for revolutions to trigger spirals of exaggerated hos- tility. Of course, given the CCP's worldview and the onset of the U. S. -Soviet Cold War, the United States and the PRC were unlikely to es- tablish a close relationship. Yet Mao had predicted that the "international united front" of capitalist and socialist states would remain intact after
Cohen, "Acheson, His Advisers, and China, 1949-50," and Waldo Heinrichs, "American China Policy and the Cold War in Asia: A New Look," in Uncertain Years: Chinese-American Relations 1947-1950, ed. Dorothy Borg and Waldo Heinrichs (New York: Columbia University Press, 198o); Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds. , Sino-American Relations, 1945-1955: A /oint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del. : Scholarly Resources, 1989); Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Patterns in the Dust: Chinese-American Relations and the Recognition Contro- versy, 1949-1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983); and David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith: U. S. Policy Against the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1949-1955 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986).
? ? 149 See Sergei N. Goncharov, John W. Lewis, and Xue Litai, Uncertain Partners: Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), chap. 1; and Westad, Cold War and Revolution, 118-21.
150 See Goncharov, Le? is, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 7, 25-26, 52-53.
151 SeeWestad,ColdWarandRevolution,chap. 2. UsefulaccountsofSovietrelationswiththe rival Chinese factions include Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners; Steven I. Levine, "Soviet-American Rivalry in Manchuria and the Cold War," in Dimensions ofChina's Foreign Relations, ed. Hsueh Chun-tu (New York: Praeger, 1977); and Robert Slusser, "Soviet Policy in the Far East, 1945-1950," in The Origins ofthe Cold War in Asia, ed. Yonosuke Nagai and Akira Iriye (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977).
? ? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
World War II, and several CCP leaders hoped to minimize dependence on the Soviet Union by maintaining cordial relations with the United States as well. As Zhou En-lai told Marshall in 1946: "Of course we will lean to one side. But how far depends on you. "152 CCP officials repeatedly expressed their desire for diplomatic relations with all countries (including the United States), and the CCP made several overtures to U. S. officials in
1949. 153 Similarly, key U. S. officials did not think Sino-American hostility was inevitable (despite the widespread notion that the CCP was under Moscow's tutelage), and Secretary of State Dean Acheson apparently in- tended to pursue better relations with Beijing "when the dust had settled. " Indeed] despite his basic belief in U. S. hostility, even Mao assumed that recognition would be granted eventually and active U. S. opposition would be limited. 154
Unfortunately, a combination of real conflicts of interest and repeated misperceptions magnified each side's suspicions. 155 The idea that capitalist states were inherently aggressive was deeply rooted in Mao's worldview, and with the onset of Soviet-American rivalry he revised his earlier belief in postwar cooperation. Mao now concluded that war between the "two camps" was inevitable, and he predicted that U. S. imperialists would begin by trying to subjugate the "vast intermediate zone" (which included China). Thus, Mao's ideological image of imperialist behavior and his specific
152 Quoted in Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 45? After the arrival of the Dixie mission in 1944, Zhou En-lai told an aide that "with this channel established, future contacts will not be diffi- cult. . . . The prospects for future cooperation are boundless. " Mao declared in 1945 that the wartime cooperation between capitalist and socialist states would conHnue indefinitely, be- cause the Soviet Union was strong enough to deter a challenge and because "progressive forces" in the capitalist world would constrain the reactionary elements. Quoted in Westad, Cold War and Revolution, 61--&}, and Steven I. Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy towards lhe United States," in Borg and Heinrichs, Uncertain Years, 238-45.
153 Mao authorized Huang Hua to begin informal talks with U. S. ambassador J. Leighton Stuart in June, and another CCP official, Yao Yilin, began a similar initiative with Edmund Clubb, the U. S. consul-general in Beijing. U. S. military attache David Barrett also received a conciliatory message, allegedly from Zhou himself, but Stuart was ordered not to meet with Hua and nothing came of these initiatives. See Michael Hunt, "Mao Tse-tung and the Issue of Accommodation with the United States," in Borg and Heinrichs, Uncertain Years, 207-209; and Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 47-48, 57?
For a skeptical appraisal of these initiatives, see Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy," 274-78.
154 At the same time, the United States also began a series of initiatives-including covert actions-aimed at undermining the Communist forces in China. See Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union (Stanford: Stanford Univer- sity Press, 1990), 16; and Thomas J. Christensen, "A Lost Chance for What? Mao, Truman, and the Failure to Avoid Escalation in the Korean War," paper presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Asian Studies (Boston, March 24-27, 1994), 7-9?
155 Summarizing the results of a 1986 conference between Chinese and American scholars, Harry Harding notes that the participants agreed that "each side also made decisions in the late 1940s that magnified the mistrust and skepticism of the other. " See Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, xxi-xxii.
? ? Revolution and War
analysis of postwar international circumstances strongly inclined him to in- terpret U. S. actions in a negative light. 156
U. S. policy in the Far East did nothing to allay Mao's suspicions. The cen- tral problem was U. S. support for the GMD; although U. S. officials saw their earlier efforts to mediate between the CCP and GMD as evenhanded, U. S. policy makers had tried to minimize CCP influence and had consistently fa- vored Chiang. 157 Not surprisingly, Mao concluded that the United States could not be trusted and referred to Marshall's mediation effort as "a smoke screen for strengthening Chiang Kai-shek in every way. "158 Although Ache- son and his advisors eventually concluded that a Communist victory was in- evitable and further U. S. assistance would be counterproductive, pressure from pro-GMD congressmen and his own unwillingness to see China "go Red" prevented Truman from suspending U. S. aid to the GMD. The CCP also accused the United States of helping sink the cruiser Chongqing when its crew tried to defect to the Communists in March 1949, and CCP leaders saw additional evidence of U. S. hostility in Ambassador Leighton Stuart's refusal to meet with Mao, the continued presence of American troops on Chinese soil, the U. S. effort to rebuild Japan, and the growing support in Washington for Taiwanese independence. 159 The CCP also accused the United States of supporting counterrevolutionary activities in China (correctly, as it turned
out), a suspicion reinforced by Acheson's ill-advised statement that "unti- mately the profound civilization and democratic individualism of China will reassert themselves and she will throw off the foreign yoke. "160
156 On the theory of the "intermediate zone" and Mao's suspicions of the United States, see Selected Works, 4:99; Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy,'' 238-42, and "Sino-American Relations," 125-26.
157 Roosevelt saw Chiang as "the only man . . . who could hold China's people together"; Truman declared, "My policy is to support Chiang K. C. ," and Marshall agreed that if a set- tlement in China proved elusive, "it would still be necessary . . . to back the Nationalist Gov- ernment of the Republic of China-through the Generalissimo. " U. S. Marine and Air Force
units helped the GMD reoccupy several strategic areas at the end of World War II, and Lend- Lease shipments to the GMD increased after the Japanese surrender. Quotations from Wes- tad, Cold War and Revolution, 1oo-102, 133; Tao Wenzhao, "Hurley's Mission to China and the Formation of U. S. Policy to Support Chiang Kai-Shek against the Communist Party"; iiind William Stueck, "The Marshall and Wedemeyer Missions: AQuadrilateral Perspective," in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, ;78-81, 84-87.
158 See Mao, Selected Works, 4:109. He later remarked, "[Since] it was the first time we had dealt with the U. S. imperialists, . . . we were taken in. Now with the experience we won't be cheated again. " Quoted in Shu Guang Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture: Chinese-Amer- ican Confrontations, 194! r195B (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), 18-19.
159 See William W. Stueck, The Road to Confrontation: American Policy towards China and Korea, 1947-1950 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981), 52-54; Shu Guang, Deter- rence and Strategic Culture, 18-26; Chang, Friends and Enemies, 12-41; and Christensen, "Lost
Chance for What? " 9?
160 This statement appears in Acheson's letter of transmittal to the official State Department "White Paper" on events in China. Acheson added that the United States should "encourage all developments in China which . . . work towards this end. " See The China White Paper, Au-
? ? ? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
The Chinese Communists had ample grounds for concern, but their per- ceptions of threat rested on a significant misreading of U. S. intentions. U. S. officials were convinced that the CCP was under Soviet influence and would have to be contained, but the Truman administration had no plans for direct intervention. It placed a higher priority on other regions, and sought to curtail aid to the GMD in order to avoid pushing China even closer to Moscow. 161 U. S. officials had already conceded northern China and Manchuria to the CCP by 1948, and the decision to continue a small aid pro- gram to the GMD in 1948 was partly a concession to Republican hard-liners in Congress and partly an effort to bolster the GMD position in southern and central China. 162 Predictably, Mao and his associates saw this decision as a sign of continued U. S. hostility and regarded bellicose statements by pro-GMD congressmen as authoritative expressions of U. S. policy. Similarly,
the lingering American military presence in China was largely a legacy of World War II, and though U. S. forces did aid the GMD on several occasions, these troops were hardly the advance wave of a counterrevolutionary inva- sion. U. S. efforts to rebuild Japan and to keep Taiwan free from CCP control were directed against the Soviet Union rather than China and were not part of a campaign to control the "intermediate zone"; on the contrary, the United States favored decolonization except where it seemed likely to pro- duce a Communist government. Finally, Acheson's statement that China would eventUially "throw off the foreign yoke" was an attempt to deflect right-wing pressure for greater aid to the GMD and not a proclamation of counterrevolutionary ambitions, though it is hardly surprising that Mao in- terpreted it as he did. In short, althoUigh the CCP was correct to regard the United States as hostile, they overstated the U. S. commitment to over-
throwing the regime and exaggerated the threat that U. S. opposition repre- sented. 163
As one woulid expect, Chinese responses reinforced U. S. fears and moved U. S. leaders to take more extensive measures of their own. Relations with
? gust 1949 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967), xvi. The report was intended to prove that the GMD's defeat was due to its own mistakes rather than a Jack of U. S. support, but Mao saw its documentation of U. S. involvement in China as further proof of U. S. hostility. See Selected Works, H25-59?
161 Earlyin1950,theNationalSecurityCouncilandJointChiefsofStaffconcludedthat"the strategic importance of Formosa [Taiwan] does not justify overt military action," and Truman told a press conference, "The United States government will not provide military aid or ad- vice to Chinese forces on Taiwan. " Quoted in Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners,
98. 162 See Gaddis, Long Peace, 75; Stueck, Road to Confrontation, 52-56; and Leffler, Preponder- ance of Power, 248-49.
163 Some CCP accusations were simply wrong; for example, CCP leaders reportedly be- lieved that the U. S. and Great Britain were helping the GMD blockade several Chinese ports in July 1949. Christensen, "Lost Chance for What? " 9-10.
? ? Revolution and War
the CCP had been strained by clashes between CCP units and U. S. Marines in late 1945 and the detention of a group of U. S. diplomats in Shenyang (Mukden) in November 1948, but Acheson had downplayed such incidents as part of the normal disorder accompanying a revolution. In June 1949, however, Mao announced that the threat from U. S. imperialism gave China no choice but to "lean to one side," and China and the Soviet Union signed! a treaty of alliance in January 1950. 164 This development, which discredited! the earlier hope that Chinese nationalism would be a stronger force than Communist solidarity, strengthened the case for a heightened U. S. commit- ment in the region. 165 The Communist victory in China also spawned grow- ing fears of revolutionary contagion throughout Asia; according to the CIA,
"the urgent question of 1950 [was] whether Soviet-oriented, China-based communism can continue to identify itself with nationalism, exploit eco- nomic privations and anti-Western sentiment, and sweep into power by one means or another elsewhere in Asia. "166
To be sure, it is unlikely that the United States and revolutionary China would have become close allies in the absence of these misperceptions. Mao faced a basic strategic dilemma: given his belief that the PRC needed Soviet aid and protection, it was essential that he convince Stalin that China would be a reliabUe ally. Although Mao and other CCP leaders wanted recognition from (and trade with) the United States and its allies, overt efforts to achieve
this goal would only have fed Stalin's suspicions and jeopardized the al- liance. By fthe same logic, Chinese efforts to reassure Moscow merely rein- forced U. S. fears and impeded recognition. Thus, the deterioration of Sino-American relations was partly due to the logic of bipolarity, which forced Mao to choose between the two camps. 167
At the same time, there was more than structural forces at play. Both sides inflated the other's hostility and let slip an opportunity to forge a less acri- monious relationship. In treating the CCP solely as a Soviet puppet, the United States missed a chance to minimize Soviet influence in Asia. By viewing the United States as a rapacious imperialist power, the PRC was forced to rely more heavily on the Soviet Union and was denied potentially beneficial trade relations. Thus, even if close relations were not a realistic
164 See Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 44; Mao, Selected Works, 4:41 1-2. 4; and Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, chap. 3?
165 Pressure to bring Taiwan within the U. S. security umbrella increased throughout the spring, and the commander of U. S. forces in the Far East, General Douglas MacArthur, warned that "the strategic interests of the United States will be in serious jeopardy if [Taiwan] is allowed to be dominated by a power hostile to the United States. " See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 1 56; Gaddis, Long Peace, So-87; and Stueck, Road to Confrontation, 14fr50.
166 Quoted iln Leffler, Preponderance ofPower, 337-38; and see also Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 45, 117.
167 See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 102.
[318]
? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
possibility in the aftermath of the revolution, the exaggerated suspicions that had emerged by 1950 had very real costs. 168
The Korean War
The same dynamics that fueled the Sino-American spiral helped bring the two states into the Korean War, and this unexpected clash offers another ex- ample of the effects of revolutions on perceptions of hostility and on opti- mism about the use of force. 169 The conflict also hardened each state's image of the other and helped keep Sino-American relations in a deep freeze for nearly two decades.
MutualMisperceptions. PriortotheNorthKoreanattack,U. S. policymak- ers believed that Communist military expansion in Asia was unlikely. The invasion seemed to discredit this view completely, and Truman rushed U. S. troops to South Korea under the auspices of the United Nations and sent the U. S. Seventh Fleet to the Taiwan Straits in order to deter an assault on Tai- wan. 170 American intervention soon turned the tide and the UN forces crossed the thirty-eighth parallel in October and headed north to eliminate the Communist government and. reunify the country.
The rapid UN advance raised Chinese perceptions of threat to new heights and prompted extensive military preparations. 171 Truman's decision to inter- pose the Seventh Fleet between Taiwan and the mainland forced Mao to abandon his dream of unifying China under Communist auspices, and Mao now saw U. S. involvement in Korea as "the first step in the whole U. S. Asian scheme of aggression. " Even if the United States did not attack China imme- diately, Mao was convinced that Korea would be the staging ground for an
168 Steven Goldstein likens the Sino-American relationship to a Greek tragedy. : "the result of an interactive process in which the leaders of two nations were so severely limited in their perceived policy options that they were unable to explore meaningfully the possible bases of accommodation or respond to open gestures by the other side. " "Sino-American Relations, 1948-1950: Lost Chance or No Chance? " in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, 12o-21.
1 69 It is worth noting that the North Korean decision to invade (and the Soviet decision to support them) rested on North Korean leader Kim II Sung's erroneous belief that an attack would spark a massive uprising by Communist sympathizers in the south. Thus, the Korean War was caused in part by the (misguided) belief that the "revolution" in the north would be easy to export, consistent with my theory. See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 135? 141-44?
170 On January 5, 1950, Truman had declared that "the United States Government will not pursue a course which will lead to involvement in the civil conflict in China [and] . . . will not provide military aid or advice to Chinese forces on [Taiwan]. " Text in Roderick MacFarqua- har, ed. , Sino-American Relations, 1949-1971 (New York: Praeger, 1972), 70.
171 See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 174; Jonathan D. Pollock, "The Ko- rean War and Sino-American Relations," in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, 215-17; and Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 9? 1.
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inevitable imperialist invasion.
Maoist Revolutionary Ideology
Maoist political thought closely resembles the ideal type of revolutionary ideology described in chapter 2. 136 During its long struggle against both the Guomindang (GMD) and Japan, the CCP developed a body of revolution- ary doctrine designed to inspire prolonged sacrifices and provide tactical guidance to the Communist cadres. As a Marxist-Leninist, CCP leader Mao Tse-tung viewed politics as inherently competitive and regarded oppo- nents-e- specially the imperialist powers-as hostile. 137 The Maoist world- view was also intrinsically optimistic: although enemies might appear stronger, they were actually "paper tigers. " "In appearance [they] are terri- fying but in reality they are not so powerful. " As a result, victory was in- evitable provided the cadres did not lose heart. 138 Like Lenin, Mao tempered this optimism with a sense of realism, stressing the need to analyze political and strategic problems systematically and warning against both rightist de- viations (passivity and fear of struggle) and leftist deviations (overconfident recklessness). In his words, the CCP should "despise the enemy strategi- cally while taking full account of him tactically," meaning that although vic- tory was inevitable, achieving it required prolonged effort, careful preparation, and tactical flexibility. 139 Maoist ideology combined nationalist
136 In addition to Mao's writings, this summary of Maoist ideology is based on Stuart Schram, The Thought ofMao Tse-tung (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989); Peter Van Ness, Revolution and Chinese Foreign Policy: Peking's Support for Wars of National Liberation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970), chap. 2; J. D. Armstrong, Revolutionary Diplo- macy: Chinese Foreign Policy and the United Front Doctrine (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977); chaps. 1-2; Edward L. Katzenbach and Gene z. Hanrahan, "The Revolutionary Strategy of Mao Tse-tung," Political Science Quarterly 70, no. 3 (1955); and Tang Tsou and Mor- ton H. Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy and Peking's International Behav- ior," American Political Science Review 59, no. 1 (1965).
137 Likening imperialism to a "wild beast," Mao told his followers not to show "the slight- est timidity. " In his words: "Either kill the tiger or be eaten by him-one or the other. " He also warned that "when we say 'imperialism is ferocious,' we mean that its nature will never change, the imperialists will never lay down their butcher knives, they will never become Buddhas, till their doom. " Selected Works ofMao Tse-tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1961-65), 4=416, 428.
138 See Mao, Selected Works, 1 : 1 17-18, 2:132-36; 4:10o-101; and Van Ness, Revolution and Chi- nese Foreign Policy, 4o-41.
139 See John Shy and Thomas Collier, "Revolutionary War," in Makers ofModern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), esp. 842-43; Richard H. Solomon, Mao's Revolution and the Chinese Political Culture
? ? ? Revolution and War
arid universalistic themes: the removal of foreign (i. e. , imperialist) influence from China was a central goal of the revolution, but the struggle in China was merely one part of the worldwide transition to socialism. 140 Mao also stressed the importance of identifying the "principal contradiction"-de- fined as the main threat at any given time-and endorsed Lenin's strategy of the "united front," which permitted temporary alliances with non-Com- munist groups against the most dangerous adversary, combined with preparations to undermine one's present allies when the opportunity arose. 141
The Chinese Revolution and the Balance ofThreats
The Balance of Power. As in the French, Russian, and Iranian cases, other states saw the revolution in China as a potential threat to the balance of power and as an opportunity to improve their own positions. Such perceptions were not entirely new, as China had been the object of great-power competition since the nineteenth century, and the collapse of the Manchu dynasty in 1911 had intensified foreign involvement in China's domestic affairs. The Soviet Union, Japan, Great Britain, and the United States continued to compete for influence during the interwar period, and Japanese expansionism in China was a crucial underlying cause of World War II in the Pacific.
The GMD became the main Asian ally of the United States during the war, although relations between Washington and Chongqing were strained by Chiang Kai-shek's (Jiang Jieshi's) constant requests for assistance and U. S. irritation at his preoccupation with fighting the CCP instead of the Japanese. 142 The United States also sent a small military mission to CCP headquarters in 1944, but support for Mao's forces never approached the level of aid provided to Chiang. 143 Nonetheless, U. S. president Franklin Roosevelt was convinced that U. S. -Soviet cooperation would continue after
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), 17cr89; Tsou and Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy"; and Mao, Selected Works, 4:181-82.
? 140 See Mao, Selected Works, 2:342-47. After the Sino-Soviet split, Chinese commentators em- phasized that "world revolution relies on frhe thought of Mao Tse-tung. . . . [It] belongs not only to China but also has its international implications. " Quoted in Tsou and Halperin, "Mao Tse-tung's Revolutionary Strategy," 82.
141 See Mao, Selected Works, 2:441-49; Armstrong, Revolutionary Diplomacy, chap. 2; and Lyman P. Van Slyke, Enemies and Friends: The United Front Doctrine in Chinese Communist His- tory2(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967).
1 4 See Barbara Tuchman, Stillwell and the American Experience in China, 1 9 1 1 - 1 945 (New York: Macmillan, 1971); Herbert Feis, The China Tangle: The American Effort in Chinafrom Pearl Harbor to the Marshall Mission (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 74-77, 151-54, 187-<JW and Tang Tsou, America's Failure in China, 1941-1950 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963), chap. 4?
143 See David D. Barrett, Dixie Mission: The United States Army Observer Group in Yenan, 1 944 (Berkeley, Calif. : Center for Chinese Studies, 1970).
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? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
the war and envisioned a peaceful resolution of the CCP-GMD conflict that would grant the "so-called communists" a legitimate (albeit minority) posi- tion in a postwar Chinese government. 144
As World War II came to an end, however, U. S. officials became increas- ingly concemed that Communist control of Manchuria would lead to an ad- verse shift in the balance of power in Asia. 145 Truman and his advisors therefore favored the emergence of a strong and unified China that would help prevent Soviet expansion in the Far East, and Truman sent General George C. Marshall to China in December 1945 in a last-ditch attempt to broker a settlement between the rival Chinese factions. Although Marshall's efforts were initially promising, he was unable to overcome the mutual sus- picions between the GMD and CCP, and a full-scale civil war was underway by the spring of 1946. In the meantime, the United States continued to send military aid to Chiang's forces and helped transport GMD units to northern China in an attempt to limit Communist influence there. 146
As U. S. -Soviet relations deteriorated and the CCP gained the upper hand, U. S. officials became even more concerned about the impact of a Communist victory on the global balance of power. Although U. S. officials disagreed over the magnitude of the threat, by 1949 there was a widespread belief that a Communist victory in China would constitute a major gain for the Soviet Union. 147 Truman and Acheson faced growing domestic criticism for having "lost China" after the CCP victory, and though the administration still refused to commit itself to defend Taiwan (where the remnants of the GMD had fled), U. S. policy in the Far East increasingly sought to contain Communist expan- ? ion and "drive a wedge" between the Soviet Union and the PRC. 148
144 See Odd Arne Westad, Cold War and Revolution: Soviet-American ! Rivalry and the Origins of the Chinese Civil War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 24-27.
145 At the end of 1945, U. S. officials feared that Communist control of Manchuria "would . . . place under the control of the Soviet Union the greatest agglomeration of power in the his- tory of the world. " Six months later, a State Department memorandum warned, "Our exclu- sion from China would probably result . . . in an expansion of Soviet influence over the manpower, raw materials, and industrial power of Manchuria and China. The U. S. and the world might then be faced . . . with a Soviet power analogous to that of the Japanese in 1941, but with the difference that the Soviets could be perhaps overwhelmingly strong in Europe and the Middle East as well. " Quoted in Melvyn Leffler, A Preponderance ofPower: National Se- curit-y, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 127-28; and Steven I. Levine, "A New Look at American Mediation in the Chinese Civil War: TheMarshallMissionandManchuria," DiplomaticHistoryJ, no. 4(1979), 354?
146 See Westad, Cold War and Revolu tion, 143-159, and Forrest C. Pogue, George C. Marshall, vol. 4: Statesman, 1945-1959 (New York: Viking, 1987), 54-143.
147 See Leffler, Preponderance ofPower, 246-49. In May 1950, Assistant Secretary of State Dean Rusk concluded that the loss of China "marked a shift in the balance of power in favor of So- viet Russia. " Quoted in Rosemary Foot, The Wrong War: American Policy and the Dimensions of the Korean Conflict, 195o-1953 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985), 52:
148 On U. S. policy in the Far East, see John Lewis Gaddis, 'The Long Peace: Inquiries into the History ofthe Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), chaps. 4 and 6; Warren I.
? ? ? Revolution and War
. Soviet responses to the revolution in China reveal a similar preoccupation with the balance of power. Stalin's diplomacy in the Far East was aimed at securing specific territorial gains for the USSR and preventing either large- scale U. S. intervention or the emergence of a pro-Western Chinese govern? ment. 149 The Soviet Union had already obtained favorable territoriall concessions in China at the Yalta summit, and Soviet troops had occupied\ Manchuria at the end of the war and carried off a substantial quantity of in-
dustrial equipment. Soviet support for the CCP was quite limited during this period, however, and Stalin sought to preserve his gains by signing a friendship treaty with the GMD in 1945. Aid to the CCP rose substantially during the Chinese Civil War, but the Soviets refused to commit themselves to defend the CCP in the event that the United States intervened, and Stalin advised Mao to compromise with the GMD in order to further reduce the danger of a U. S. occupation. 150 Like his U. S. counterparts, in short, Stalin was primarily interested in preventing events in China from causing an ad- verse shift in the regional balance of power. And though U. S. officials be- lieved that Communist ideology created a strong bond between the Soviet Union and the CCP, Marxist solidarity had relatively little effect on Soviet
calculations. 151
PerceptionsofIntent. ThedeteriorationofSino-Americanrelationsalsoil- lustrates the tendency for revolutions to trigger spirals of exaggerated hos- tility. Of course, given the CCP's worldview and the onset of the U. S. -Soviet Cold War, the United States and the PRC were unlikely to es- tablish a close relationship. Yet Mao had predicted that the "international united front" of capitalist and socialist states would remain intact after
Cohen, "Acheson, His Advisers, and China, 1949-50," and Waldo Heinrichs, "American China Policy and the Cold War in Asia: A New Look," in Uncertain Years: Chinese-American Relations 1947-1950, ed. Dorothy Borg and Waldo Heinrichs (New York: Columbia University Press, 198o); Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds. , Sino-American Relations, 1945-1955: A /oint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del. : Scholarly Resources, 1989); Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Patterns in the Dust: Chinese-American Relations and the Recognition Contro- versy, 1949-1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983); and David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith: U. S. Policy Against the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1949-1955 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986).
? ? 149 See Sergei N. Goncharov, John W. Lewis, and Xue Litai, Uncertain Partners: Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), chap. 1; and Westad, Cold War and Revolution, 118-21.
150 See Goncharov, Le? is, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 7, 25-26, 52-53.
151 SeeWestad,ColdWarandRevolution,chap. 2. UsefulaccountsofSovietrelationswiththe rival Chinese factions include Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners; Steven I. Levine, "Soviet-American Rivalry in Manchuria and the Cold War," in Dimensions ofChina's Foreign Relations, ed. Hsueh Chun-tu (New York: Praeger, 1977); and Robert Slusser, "Soviet Policy in the Far East, 1945-1950," in The Origins ofthe Cold War in Asia, ed. Yonosuke Nagai and Akira Iriye (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977).
? ? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
World War II, and several CCP leaders hoped to minimize dependence on the Soviet Union by maintaining cordial relations with the United States as well. As Zhou En-lai told Marshall in 1946: "Of course we will lean to one side. But how far depends on you. "152 CCP officials repeatedly expressed their desire for diplomatic relations with all countries (including the United States), and the CCP made several overtures to U. S. officials in
1949. 153 Similarly, key U. S. officials did not think Sino-American hostility was inevitable (despite the widespread notion that the CCP was under Moscow's tutelage), and Secretary of State Dean Acheson apparently in- tended to pursue better relations with Beijing "when the dust had settled. " Indeed] despite his basic belief in U. S. hostility, even Mao assumed that recognition would be granted eventually and active U. S. opposition would be limited. 154
Unfortunately, a combination of real conflicts of interest and repeated misperceptions magnified each side's suspicions. 155 The idea that capitalist states were inherently aggressive was deeply rooted in Mao's worldview, and with the onset of Soviet-American rivalry he revised his earlier belief in postwar cooperation. Mao now concluded that war between the "two camps" was inevitable, and he predicted that U. S. imperialists would begin by trying to subjugate the "vast intermediate zone" (which included China). Thus, Mao's ideological image of imperialist behavior and his specific
152 Quoted in Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 45? After the arrival of the Dixie mission in 1944, Zhou En-lai told an aide that "with this channel established, future contacts will not be diffi- cult. . . . The prospects for future cooperation are boundless. " Mao declared in 1945 that the wartime cooperation between capitalist and socialist states would conHnue indefinitely, be- cause the Soviet Union was strong enough to deter a challenge and because "progressive forces" in the capitalist world would constrain the reactionary elements. Quoted in Westad, Cold War and Revolution, 61--&}, and Steven I. Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy towards lhe United States," in Borg and Heinrichs, Uncertain Years, 238-45.
153 Mao authorized Huang Hua to begin informal talks with U. S. ambassador J. Leighton Stuart in June, and another CCP official, Yao Yilin, began a similar initiative with Edmund Clubb, the U. S. consul-general in Beijing. U. S. military attache David Barrett also received a conciliatory message, allegedly from Zhou himself, but Stuart was ordered not to meet with Hua and nothing came of these initiatives. See Michael Hunt, "Mao Tse-tung and the Issue of Accommodation with the United States," in Borg and Heinrichs, Uncertain Years, 207-209; and Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 47-48, 57?
For a skeptical appraisal of these initiatives, see Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy," 274-78.
154 At the same time, the United States also began a series of initiatives-including covert actions-aimed at undermining the Communist forces in China. See Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union (Stanford: Stanford Univer- sity Press, 1990), 16; and Thomas J. Christensen, "A Lost Chance for What? Mao, Truman, and the Failure to Avoid Escalation in the Korean War," paper presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Asian Studies (Boston, March 24-27, 1994), 7-9?
155 Summarizing the results of a 1986 conference between Chinese and American scholars, Harry Harding notes that the participants agreed that "each side also made decisions in the late 1940s that magnified the mistrust and skepticism of the other. " See Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, xxi-xxii.
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analysis of postwar international circumstances strongly inclined him to in- terpret U. S. actions in a negative light. 156
U. S. policy in the Far East did nothing to allay Mao's suspicions. The cen- tral problem was U. S. support for the GMD; although U. S. officials saw their earlier efforts to mediate between the CCP and GMD as evenhanded, U. S. policy makers had tried to minimize CCP influence and had consistently fa- vored Chiang. 157 Not surprisingly, Mao concluded that the United States could not be trusted and referred to Marshall's mediation effort as "a smoke screen for strengthening Chiang Kai-shek in every way. "158 Although Ache- son and his advisors eventually concluded that a Communist victory was in- evitable and further U. S. assistance would be counterproductive, pressure from pro-GMD congressmen and his own unwillingness to see China "go Red" prevented Truman from suspending U. S. aid to the GMD. The CCP also accused the United States of helping sink the cruiser Chongqing when its crew tried to defect to the Communists in March 1949, and CCP leaders saw additional evidence of U. S. hostility in Ambassador Leighton Stuart's refusal to meet with Mao, the continued presence of American troops on Chinese soil, the U. S. effort to rebuild Japan, and the growing support in Washington for Taiwanese independence. 159 The CCP also accused the United States of supporting counterrevolutionary activities in China (correctly, as it turned
out), a suspicion reinforced by Acheson's ill-advised statement that "unti- mately the profound civilization and democratic individualism of China will reassert themselves and she will throw off the foreign yoke. "160
156 On the theory of the "intermediate zone" and Mao's suspicions of the United States, see Selected Works, 4:99; Goldstein, "Chinese Communist Policy,'' 238-42, and "Sino-American Relations," 125-26.
157 Roosevelt saw Chiang as "the only man . . . who could hold China's people together"; Truman declared, "My policy is to support Chiang K. C. ," and Marshall agreed that if a set- tlement in China proved elusive, "it would still be necessary . . . to back the Nationalist Gov- ernment of the Republic of China-through the Generalissimo. " U. S. Marine and Air Force
units helped the GMD reoccupy several strategic areas at the end of World War II, and Lend- Lease shipments to the GMD increased after the Japanese surrender. Quotations from Wes- tad, Cold War and Revolution, 1oo-102, 133; Tao Wenzhao, "Hurley's Mission to China and the Formation of U. S. Policy to Support Chiang Kai-Shek against the Communist Party"; iiind William Stueck, "The Marshall and Wedemeyer Missions: AQuadrilateral Perspective," in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, ;78-81, 84-87.
158 See Mao, Selected Works, 4:109. He later remarked, "[Since] it was the first time we had dealt with the U. S. imperialists, . . . we were taken in. Now with the experience we won't be cheated again. " Quoted in Shu Guang Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture: Chinese-Amer- ican Confrontations, 194! r195B (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), 18-19.
159 See William W. Stueck, The Road to Confrontation: American Policy towards China and Korea, 1947-1950 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981), 52-54; Shu Guang, Deter- rence and Strategic Culture, 18-26; Chang, Friends and Enemies, 12-41; and Christensen, "Lost
Chance for What? " 9?
160 This statement appears in Acheson's letter of transmittal to the official State Department "White Paper" on events in China. Acheson added that the United States should "encourage all developments in China which . . . work towards this end. " See The China White Paper, Au-
? ? ? The American, Mexican, Turkish, and Chinese Revolutions
The Chinese Communists had ample grounds for concern, but their per- ceptions of threat rested on a significant misreading of U. S. intentions. U. S. officials were convinced that the CCP was under Soviet influence and would have to be contained, but the Truman administration had no plans for direct intervention. It placed a higher priority on other regions, and sought to curtail aid to the GMD in order to avoid pushing China even closer to Moscow. 161 U. S. officials had already conceded northern China and Manchuria to the CCP by 1948, and the decision to continue a small aid pro- gram to the GMD in 1948 was partly a concession to Republican hard-liners in Congress and partly an effort to bolster the GMD position in southern and central China. 162 Predictably, Mao and his associates saw this decision as a sign of continued U. S. hostility and regarded bellicose statements by pro-GMD congressmen as authoritative expressions of U. S. policy. Similarly,
the lingering American military presence in China was largely a legacy of World War II, and though U. S. forces did aid the GMD on several occasions, these troops were hardly the advance wave of a counterrevolutionary inva- sion. U. S. efforts to rebuild Japan and to keep Taiwan free from CCP control were directed against the Soviet Union rather than China and were not part of a campaign to control the "intermediate zone"; on the contrary, the United States favored decolonization except where it seemed likely to pro- duce a Communist government. Finally, Acheson's statement that China would eventUially "throw off the foreign yoke" was an attempt to deflect right-wing pressure for greater aid to the GMD and not a proclamation of counterrevolutionary ambitions, though it is hardly surprising that Mao in- terpreted it as he did. In short, althoUigh the CCP was correct to regard the United States as hostile, they overstated the U. S. commitment to over-
throwing the regime and exaggerated the threat that U. S. opposition repre- sented. 163
As one woulid expect, Chinese responses reinforced U. S. fears and moved U. S. leaders to take more extensive measures of their own. Relations with
? gust 1949 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967), xvi. The report was intended to prove that the GMD's defeat was due to its own mistakes rather than a Jack of U. S. support, but Mao saw its documentation of U. S. involvement in China as further proof of U. S. hostility. See Selected Works, H25-59?
161 Earlyin1950,theNationalSecurityCouncilandJointChiefsofStaffconcludedthat"the strategic importance of Formosa [Taiwan] does not justify overt military action," and Truman told a press conference, "The United States government will not provide military aid or ad- vice to Chinese forces on Taiwan. " Quoted in Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners,
98. 162 See Gaddis, Long Peace, 75; Stueck, Road to Confrontation, 52-56; and Leffler, Preponder- ance of Power, 248-49.
163 Some CCP accusations were simply wrong; for example, CCP leaders reportedly be- lieved that the U. S. and Great Britain were helping the GMD blockade several Chinese ports in July 1949. Christensen, "Lost Chance for What? " 9-10.
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the CCP had been strained by clashes between CCP units and U. S. Marines in late 1945 and the detention of a group of U. S. diplomats in Shenyang (Mukden) in November 1948, but Acheson had downplayed such incidents as part of the normal disorder accompanying a revolution. In June 1949, however, Mao announced that the threat from U. S. imperialism gave China no choice but to "lean to one side," and China and the Soviet Union signed! a treaty of alliance in January 1950. 164 This development, which discredited! the earlier hope that Chinese nationalism would be a stronger force than Communist solidarity, strengthened the case for a heightened U. S. commit- ment in the region. 165 The Communist victory in China also spawned grow- ing fears of revolutionary contagion throughout Asia; according to the CIA,
"the urgent question of 1950 [was] whether Soviet-oriented, China-based communism can continue to identify itself with nationalism, exploit eco- nomic privations and anti-Western sentiment, and sweep into power by one means or another elsewhere in Asia. "166
To be sure, it is unlikely that the United States and revolutionary China would have become close allies in the absence of these misperceptions. Mao faced a basic strategic dilemma: given his belief that the PRC needed Soviet aid and protection, it was essential that he convince Stalin that China would be a reliabUe ally. Although Mao and other CCP leaders wanted recognition from (and trade with) the United States and its allies, overt efforts to achieve
this goal would only have fed Stalin's suspicions and jeopardized the al- liance. By fthe same logic, Chinese efforts to reassure Moscow merely rein- forced U. S. fears and impeded recognition. Thus, the deterioration of Sino-American relations was partly due to the logic of bipolarity, which forced Mao to choose between the two camps. 167
At the same time, there was more than structural forces at play. Both sides inflated the other's hostility and let slip an opportunity to forge a less acri- monious relationship. In treating the CCP solely as a Soviet puppet, the United States missed a chance to minimize Soviet influence in Asia. By viewing the United States as a rapacious imperialist power, the PRC was forced to rely more heavily on the Soviet Union and was denied potentially beneficial trade relations. Thus, even if close relations were not a realistic
164 See Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 44; Mao, Selected Works, 4:41 1-2. 4; and Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, chap. 3?
165 Pressure to bring Taiwan within the U. S. security umbrella increased throughout the spring, and the commander of U. S. forces in the Far East, General Douglas MacArthur, warned that "the strategic interests of the United States will be in serious jeopardy if [Taiwan] is allowed to be dominated by a power hostile to the United States. " See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 1 56; Gaddis, Long Peace, So-87; and Stueck, Road to Confrontation, 14fr50.
166 Quoted iln Leffler, Preponderance ofPower, 337-38; and see also Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 45, 117.
167 See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 102.
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possibility in the aftermath of the revolution, the exaggerated suspicions that had emerged by 1950 had very real costs. 168
The Korean War
The same dynamics that fueled the Sino-American spiral helped bring the two states into the Korean War, and this unexpected clash offers another ex- ample of the effects of revolutions on perceptions of hostility and on opti- mism about the use of force. 169 The conflict also hardened each state's image of the other and helped keep Sino-American relations in a deep freeze for nearly two decades.
MutualMisperceptions. PriortotheNorthKoreanattack,U. S. policymak- ers believed that Communist military expansion in Asia was unlikely. The invasion seemed to discredit this view completely, and Truman rushed U. S. troops to South Korea under the auspices of the United Nations and sent the U. S. Seventh Fleet to the Taiwan Straits in order to deter an assault on Tai- wan. 170 American intervention soon turned the tide and the UN forces crossed the thirty-eighth parallel in October and headed north to eliminate the Communist government and. reunify the country.
The rapid UN advance raised Chinese perceptions of threat to new heights and prompted extensive military preparations. 171 Truman's decision to inter- pose the Seventh Fleet between Taiwan and the mainland forced Mao to abandon his dream of unifying China under Communist auspices, and Mao now saw U. S. involvement in Korea as "the first step in the whole U. S. Asian scheme of aggression. " Even if the United States did not attack China imme- diately, Mao was convinced that Korea would be the staging ground for an
168 Steven Goldstein likens the Sino-American relationship to a Greek tragedy. : "the result of an interactive process in which the leaders of two nations were so severely limited in their perceived policy options that they were unable to explore meaningfully the possible bases of accommodation or respond to open gestures by the other side. " "Sino-American Relations, 1948-1950: Lost Chance or No Chance? " in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, 12o-21.
1 69 It is worth noting that the North Korean decision to invade (and the Soviet decision to support them) rested on North Korean leader Kim II Sung's erroneous belief that an attack would spark a massive uprising by Communist sympathizers in the south. Thus, the Korean War was caused in part by the (misguided) belief that the "revolution" in the north would be easy to export, consistent with my theory. See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 135? 141-44?
170 On January 5, 1950, Truman had declared that "the United States Government will not pursue a course which will lead to involvement in the civil conflict in China [and] . . . will not provide military aid or advice to Chinese forces on [Taiwan]. " Text in Roderick MacFarqua- har, ed. , Sino-American Relations, 1949-1971 (New York: Praeger, 1972), 70.
171 See Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 174; Jonathan D. Pollock, "The Ko- rean War and Sino-American Relations," in Harding and Yuan, Sino-American Relations, 215-17; and Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 9? 1.
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inevitable imperialist invasion.
