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Diplomatic Relations during the Postwar Years: 1946–1950 293

Chapter 5 Diplomatic Relations during the Postwar Years: 1946–1950

1 International Context

On 24 October 1945, the United Nations (UN) came into existence, replacing the defunct League of Nations, which was formally dissolved in April the following year. Born from the ashes of World War II, the new intergovernmental organization was intended to secure long-term world peace and stability through institutionalized international cooperation under the leadership of the major powers that had emerged victorious from the war. To this end, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and China – which Roo- sevelt had dubbed the “Four Policemen” – together with France, were given a permanent seat on the UN Security Council (UNSC) and the power of veto. These “Big Five” powers also played an important role during the negotiations on the detailed postwar settlement with the defeated Axis powers in Europe. These talks, held in Paris from 29 July to 15 October 1946, would result in the Paris Peace Treaties of 10 February 1947. Despite the shared ambition of long-term peace, the complex negotiations at Bretton Woods, in San Francisco, and in Paris already revealed the weak ba- sis for cooperation between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, an alliance which had begun to show signs of disintegration even before the end of the war. Several problems regarding the peace settlement in Europe remained unresolved for years to come, as some of the major powers found it difficult to reconcile their political and military ambitions with the UN’s mission statement. Beginning in 1948, the world gradually witnessed the emergence of two competing superpowers – the United States and the Soviet Union – and the division of the global geopolitical scene into two opposing blocs under their tutelage. In the bipolar world of the ensuing “Cold War,” the UNSC would fre- quently be paralyzed by the power of veto reciprocally exercised by the two rival camps. In April 1949, the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations founded the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to provide collective security against the Soviet Union. The pact encompassed and re- placed the collective defense alliance established by the 1948 Treaty of Brus- sels between Belgium, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and the United

Kingdom. The concept of an economically strong, rearmed, and integrated Europe was supported by the United States as a means to prevent Communist expansion across the continent. With this goal in mind, Washington proposed a program of large-scale economic aid to Europe. The resulting European Re- covery Program, known as the “Marshall Plan,” thus not only facilitated Euro- pean economic integration but also promoted the common interests of and close cooperation between the United States and Europe. On 1 October 1949, from the rostrum of the Tiananmen gate in Beijing, Chi- nese Communist Party (CCP) leader Mao Zedong proclaimed the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Two days later, the Soviet Union severed relations with the Nationalists in Taiwan and formally recognized the new gov- ernment at Beijing, an example quickly followed by several other members of the socialist bloc. With the outbreak of the Korean conflict the following year, when the UN – under US leadership – came to South Korea’s aid and the PRC stepped in to support North Korea, the Cold War had spread to Asia. It would take two decades before tensions began to ease somewhat, finally opening the door for a rapprochement in Sino-Western relations in the early 1970s. The Cold War coincided with the process of global decolonization, as dozens of states in Asia and Africa gained autonomy from their European colonial rulers.

1.1 Civil Strife in China The initial postwar years in China were marked by the tremendous challenge of national economic reconstruction and the resumption of civil war. After Emperor Hirohito announced Japan’s unconditional surrender, Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek invited his longtime rival Mao Zedong to Chongqing to discuss postwar reconstruction. During a historic banquet in Chongqing on V-J Day, the two leaders exchanged toasts, congratulating each other on the victorious end to the eight-year War of Resistance. But the “Chongqing Negotia- tions” ultimately failed to yield real results. After six weeks of talks, the two sides agreed on a vaguely worded joint communiqué which was issued on 10 October 1945, the day of the 34th anniversary of the Chinese republic. Mao left Chongqing for Yan’an the next day, where he told his comrades that the “Dou- ble Tenth Agreement” was nothing but “a mere scrap of paper.”1 In December 1945, President Truman sent the former US chief of staff Gen- eral George C. Marshall as his special emissary to China to negotiate a coalition

1 J. Taylor, Generalissimo, 323. For a more diplomatically expressed statement, see Mao, Selected Works, 53: “The agreements reached are still only on paper. Words on paper are not equivalent to reality. Facts have shown that a very great effort must still be made before they can be turned into reality.”