(East-West Question) Zhu Feng: What is the inspiration of the historic "handshake" between China and the United States 50 years ago?

　　China News Agency, Beijing, February 21, Question: Zhu Feng: What is the inspiration of the historic "handshake" between China and the United States 50 years ago?

　　China News Agency reporter Luo Haibing

　　On February 21, 1972, then-US President Richard Nixon arrived in Beijing, opening a "week that changed the world."

With the strategic vision and outstanding wisdom of the leaders of the two countries, China and the United States have broken the 22-year gap and achieved a historic "handshake".

Today, 50 years later, China-US relations are facing major challenges and shocks unprecedented in the past 50 years. How can the two countries seek answers from history?

Looking ahead, how can the two countries continue to write a new chapter of cooperation?

　　Recently, Professor Zhu Feng, Executive Dean of the School of International Relations of Nanjing University and Executive Director of the South China Sea Collaborative Innovation Research Center, said in an exclusive interview with Dongxi Question that 50 years after Nixon's visit to China, Sino-US relations are no longer a simple matter of maintaining exchanges between the two countries. In the future, whether China and the United States can return to a healthy and cooperative development track will determine the future of world peace and prosperity.

China News Service: When Nixon visited China in 1972, China and the United States issued the Shanghai Communiqué under the historical conditions of great differences, realizing a historic "handshake".

From the founding of New China in 1949 to 1972, why did China and the United States suddenly break the 22-year isolated and frozen relationship?

Zhu Feng:

50 years ago, President Nixon broke the hostility and estrangement between China and the United States since 1949 to visit China, which was based on the needs of the United States for the Cold War with the Soviet Union and its judgment on the strategic pattern of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union at that time.

　　During the Prague Spring in 1968, the Soviet Union sent troops to the Czech Republic and the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union intensified.

When Nixon ran for the US president in 1969, he made it very clear that the world has been divided into five major power plates, the United States, the Soviet Union, Europe, Japan and China.

These five power sectors not only represent the Nixon administration's historic attention to China's achievements in socialist revolution and construction since the founding of New China in 1949, but also represent the successful development of New China in the late 1960s and early 1970s. China has become a Western An important force that the country cannot ignore.

　　The fundamental purpose of Nixon's visit to China was that the United States, in the face of the rearrangement of the world's power sector, wanted to unite China with the Soviet Union through closer relations with China.

However, since 1949, China and the United States have been in complete confrontation. How can the approach be achieved?

In April 1971, the United States table tennis delegation visited China, and the two countries launched "ping-pong diplomacy".

Immediately after Henry Kissinger, the national security affairs assistant of the Nixon administration, visited Beijing, the two sides officially started official contacts and agreed on the schedule of President Nixon's visit to China in February 1972.

The "ping-pong diplomacy" 51 years ago gained the reputation of "small ball with big ball".

　　The Shanghai Communiqué signed by China and the US during Nixon's visit to China represents the strategic vision and strategic decision of the leaders of the two countries.

From the perspective of the United States, it must face the founding of New China and the development of China after 1949. China has become an important member of the world's pluralistic forces.

From the perspective of China, it is also necessary to find positive support and cooperation forces in the camp of Western powers.

In February 1972, US President Nixon defended China.

After repeated consultations between China and the United States, the Joint Communiqué was finally signed in Shanghai, marking the beginning of the normalization process between China and the United States.

The picture shows Chairman Mao Zedong meeting with President Nixon.

Photo by Zhong Xin issued by China News Agency

China News Service: Nixon recalled this trip to Beijing fondly in his memoirs.

Looking back on history, what do you think is the most important significance of Nixon's visit to China?

Zhu Feng:

Nixon's visit to China is indeed a historic event.

Nixon later said in his memoirs that he had embarked on a trip to Beijing with a kind of uneasy feeling, and he was not sure enough how to face China's leaders and face such a person. Mysterious Eastern Powers?

Through a one-week trip in China, he not only learned about the country, but also believed that the handshake between the leaders of China and the United States across the Pacific Ocean represents a new force for world cooperation and peace.

　　Nixon's visit to China not only opened the door to the normalization of Sino-US relations, but most importantly, reopened the historical process of handshake and cooperation between China and the United States.

During World War II, China and the United States were allies who fought bloody battles and jointly defeated the forces of Japanese militarism.

When Nixon visited China in 1972, China and the United States overcame the ideological camp confrontation and reconnected the two countries and two great civilizations.

Porcelain plastic gifts presented to Chairman Mao Zedong by former US President Nixon during his visit to China in 1972.

Photo by Zheng Pingping issued by China News Agency

China News Service: Nixon's visit to China is called "a week that changed the world". What are the far-reaching impacts on the world?

Zhu Feng: The

influence is mainly reflected in three aspects.

　　First, China and the United States have finally begun to turn enemies into friends.

Before Nixon's visit to China in 1972, China and the United States had faced each other several times in the Korean battlefield, the Vietnam battlefield, and the Taiwan Strait, and they were the so-called old enemies.

However, with the strategic vision of the leaders of the two countries, they can truly find a pragmatic and reconciled path for the development of relations according to reality.

　　Second, major-country diplomacy needs to continuously promote the reorganization of international forces in accordance with changes in national interests and the international strategic situation, establish a new strategic pattern that is conducive to its own development, and play a positive role in safeguarding world peace and development.

The handshake of the leaders of China and the United States across the Pacific Ocean means that China and the United States can cross the original conflict gap of ideology, including geostrategic, and the two countries can fully contribute to the prospect of common peaceful development and stability of mankind. take responsibility.

　　Third, in the context of the long-term hostile domestic political propaganda and public opinion between the two countries, how to build a relationship between the two countries that can be reconciled and cooperated?

Nixon's trip to Beijing 50 years ago expressed the basic principle of realizing great power cooperation, which is that China and the United States must "respect each other" regardless of historical traditions and ideologies.

During his visit to Beijing, Nixon climbed the Great Wall after the snow, overlooking the magnificent mountains and rivers of China.

On the Great Wall, he once said that China is an ancient civilization with a long history, and the United States needs to have more understanding and more respect for China.

In 2002, Beijing held the "Journey to Peace and Cooperation Exhibition" to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Nixon's visit to China and to review Sino-US relations.

Visitors are stopped by a table set with tableware that was used in Nixon's dinner.

Photo by Chen Yi published by China News Agency

China News Service: Guided by the Communiqué, China-US relations have gone through 50 years.

At present, China-US relations are facing new challenges and impacts. How can the two countries seek answers from history?

Zhu Feng:

Sino-US relations need to "take history as a mirror and face the future".

Nixon's visit to China 50 years ago has important strategic and historical value in further bringing China-US relations back to a healthy and stable track today.

　　From 1979 to the present, China and the United States have moved from hostile relations to normalization. Today, China and the United States are the world's second and largest economies and the world's largest trading partners, and the personnel and social exchanges between the two countries are also very active.

Thirty years after the end of the Cold War, the stability and development of the world has a very important relationship with the cooperation process between China and the United States.

Looking back at all this, half a century ago, the superb strategic vision of the leaders of the two countries and their political skills in handling relations between the two countries laid the foundation for the historic change in Sino-US relations 50 years after Nixon's visit to China .

　　Today, a new complex situation is emerging in Sino-US relations.

The Trump administration, in particular, has emphasized that it regards China as its biggest strategic rival, and it does not hesitate to suppress China in many ways, and its influence still exists today.

Today, China-US relations are facing new challenges. What is needed is not simply and dramatic exaggeration of "Chinese conspiracy theories" or "American conspiracy theories". China and the United States must return to the strategic vision and responsibility of the leaders of the two countries.

In August 2019, Yorba Linda, California, the hometown of former U.S. President Richard Nixon, held a warm welcome dinner and China-US Table Tennis Association table tennis exchange meeting for the Chinese national table tennis players who came from afar.

Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Shuo

China News Agency reporter: Looking ahead, the strategic competition between China and the United States may continue. How can the two countries continue to write a new chapter of cooperation?

Zhu Feng:

China-US relations are already the most important and complex bilateral relations in the world.

How to design, plan and pursue in the future will not only test the vision and responsibility of the leaders of the two countries, but also the most important thing is the society of the two countries. Take responsibility.

　　How to better face the impact and impact of today's strategic competition between China and the United States, we must first return to history, which will always be our most important teaching material.

Back then, after China and the U.S. had faced each other on several battlefields, they were able to open the door and shake hands across the Pacific Ocean. It was not just vision and responsibility. The fundamental reason that led to the historic talks between President Nixon and Chairman Mao Zedong that year was that China and the United States achieved great results. mutual respect between countries.

The United States is still the leader of the world today, but China has a civilization of 5,000 years. No matter how much distance there is between the two countries in the field of ideology, today, when mankind has formed an inseparable community of destiny, both China and the United States need to look for wisdom from history again. Therefore, mutual respect and win-win cooperation remain the most important principles guiding the future development of China-US relations.

　　Second, no matter how many differences there are today, China and the United States still need to sit down and talk through dialogue and exchanges to find ways to jointly deal with problems and disputes, and to manage various potential conflicts and risk points in the relationship between the two countries. Excessive manipulation of interests.

On the Taiwan issue, the U.S. must "stop it in moderation" and adhere to the basic framework of the "one China policy".

　　Third, in the face of the current Sino-US relations, the two countries should continue to maintain mutual exchanges and communication between the people.

Just as the "small ball, big ball" had an important influence and role in the political relations between the two countries, the relationship between the people and the people is a very important foundation for the Sino-US relationship to break the deadlock and achieve a historic breakthrough in the past 50 years.

(over)

Interviewee Profile:

　　Zhu Feng, Executive Dean of the School of International Relations, Nanjing University, Executive Director of the Collaborative Innovation Center for South China Sea Studies, Vice President of the Chinese Society of International Relations, Vice President of the China Japan Society, Chief Expert of the Foreign Affairs Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' key cooperation think tank.

He has served as a visiting scholar in internationally renowned academic institutions such as the Brookings Institution, the Fairbank Research Center at Harvard University, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

Research expertise: Sino-US relations, East Asia regional security and maritime security in the South China Sea.