Zürcher Beiträge zur Sicherheitspolitik und Konfliktforschung Nr. 72 Xiaoyuan Liu and Vojtech Mastny (eds.) China and Eastern Europe, 1960s–1980s Proceedings of the International Symposium: Reviewing the History of Chinese–East European Relations from the 1960s to the 1980s Beijing, 24–26 March 2004 Hrsg.: Andreas Wenger Forschungsstelle für Sicherheitspolitik der ETH Zürich Inhaltsverzeichnis Preface 5 The Editors 7 Opening Session 19 Session One: Chinese–Eastern European Relations within the Context of the Sino–Soviet Split 29 Session Two: China, Eastern Europe, and the Vietnam War, 1964–1973 53 Session Three: The Effects of the Cultural Revolution on the Relations between China and Eastern Europe, 1966–1969 81 Session Four: Chinese–Eastern European Relations after Czechoslovakia and the Sino–Soviet Border Clashes, 1968–1972 101 Session Five The Impact of the Sino–American Rapprochement on Chinese–Eastern European Relations, 1968–1972 131 Session Six: The Mutual Effects of the Reforms in China and Eastern Europe, 1978–1989 147 Session Seven: The Road to Normalization in Chinese–Eastern European Relations, 1976–1989 173 Roundtable Discussion 195 Closing Session 221 3 Preface On 24–26 March 2004, the Parallel History Project on NATO and the Warsaw Pact (PHP) held an international seminar on “Reviewing Relations between China and East European Countries from the 1960s to the 1980s” in Beijing. Of particular interest were topics such as the security implications of the US-Chinese rapprochement, China’s policies toward the Warsaw Pact and NATO, Soviet perceptions of China as an ally of the West, bilateral rela- tions between China and the member states of the Warsaw Pact other that the Soviet Union, and Sino-Albanian relations. The seminar brought together a selected group of Chinese and East European officials who were involved in the mutual relations as diplomats or party officials in the 1960–80s. The conference was organized by the Party History Research Center of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Parallel History Project, in cooperation with the Cold War International History Project (CWIHP) at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the George Washington University Cold War Group (GWCW), both in Washington, DC, and the Cold War Studies Centre at the London School of Economics. It was the first time the Chinese Party History Research Center organized an international conference with a foreign partner. The conference proceedings will allow interested scholars and an interested wider public to follow the fascinating roundtable discussion of former Chi- nese and East European diplomats and Western and Chinese scholars. The Center for Security Studies launched the Parallel History Project on NATO and the Warsaw Pact (PHP) in late 1998, together with the National Security Archive at George Washington University and the CWIHP, both in Washington, D.C. The aim of the project is to provide new scholarly per- spectives on contemporary international history by collecting and analyzing formerly secret governmental documents from both NATO and Eastern and Central European archives. Coordinated by Vojtech Mastny, Senior Fellow of the National Security Archive, the Parallel History Project evolved into an international consortium of more than twenty partners, bringing together leading Cold War histori- ans, archivists, and government officials. PHP researchers have collected thousands of pages of material on security related issues from the Cold War period. They present their findings to the academic community at conferences 5 and through print and online publications. The PHP has organized several major international conferences on war planning and intra-bloc tensions. On its website (www.isn.ethz.ch/php), the PHP has published a large number of online documents on central issues such as mutual threat perceptions and alliance management, including a collection on “China, the Warsaw Pact, and Sino-Soviet Relations under Khrushchev and Mao” (October 2002). The Center for Security Studies is very pleased to publish the English version of these important proceedings in its series “Zürcher Beiträge zur Sicherheitspolitik und Konfliktforschung”. Its Chinese version is available in full-text on the PHP website. October 2004 Prof. Dr. Andreas Wenger Director of the Center for Security Studies (CSS) 6 The Editors Xiaoyan Liu ([email protected]) is Associate Professor of History at Iowa State University at Ames. A specialist in Chinese nationalism, ethnic con- flicts in Chinese Central Asia, Chinese- American relations, and East Asian international history, he is the author of Frontier Passages: Ethnopolitics and the Rise of Chinese Communism, 1921–1945 (Woodrow Wilson Center Press and Stanford University Press, 2004). Vojtech Mastny ([email protected]) is a Senior Fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington and PHP coordinator. A specialist in Euro- pean international history, he has been professor at Columbia University, University of Illinois, US Naval War College, Boston University, and the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. His The Cold War and Soviet Insecurity: The Stalin Years (Oxford University Press, 1996) was the winner of the American Historical Association’s 1997 George L. Beer Prize. The proceedings of the seminar, conducted in English and in Chinese, were recorded on tapes and interpreted simultaneously. In addition, a Chinese stenographic record was taken. Xiaoyuan Liu transcribed the English parts from the tapes and translated as well as transcribed the remaining parts of the proceedings from the stenographic record. Vojtech Mastny edited the transcribed text. The Chinese stenographic record of the proceedings is available on the PHP website, www.isn.ethz.ch/php. 7 Beijing Seminar on China and Eastern Europe in the 1960–80s The PHP held its second major international conference on March 24–26, 2004, in Beijing, under the title “Reviewing Relations between China and East European Countries from the 1960s to the 1980s” (see Program). Orga- nized jointly with the Party History Research Center of the Central Commit- tee of the Chinese Communist Party, the seminar brought together former Chinese and East European diplomats for a roundtable discussion with Western and Chinese scholars. The London School of Economics Cold War Studies Centre, Cold War International History Project of the Woodrow Wil- son International Center for Scholars (CWIHP) and the George Washington University Cold War Group (GWCW) were the cooperating institutions. In the early stages of the preparation, the Modern History Research Center and Archives and the School of International Relations, both at Peking University, had also been involved. The seminar was the first time the Chinese Party History Research Center organized an international conference with a foreign partner. One of the participating Chinese diplomats commented that “When I first heard of the proposed seminar I could not believe my ears.” The goal was to engage in a structured and focused open discussion aimed at identifying, analyz- ing, and interpreting the main issues of the relations between China and the Soviet Union’s Warsaw Pact allies during their most turbulent period, as remembered by veteran diplomats from both sides. The seminar achieved that goal beyond expectations. The discussion, arranged chronologically, was moderated by Professor Odd Arne Westad, of the London School of Economics, and Zhang Baijia, Senior Research Fellow at the Party History Research Center and director of its Third Research Department (responsible for research on the period since 1978). The Chinese side was represented by seven former ambassadors, the East Euro- pean side by three former ambassadors and three other high-ranking diplomats (see List of Participants). The countries involved were Poland, East Germany, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Albania. No suitable participant could be located in former Czechoslovakia. 9 In advance of the seminar, the National Security Archive had prepared a CD with a selection of declassified US documents on the American-Chinese rapprochement in the 1970s.1 A further selection of documents, obtained by the PHP from former East German, Czechoslovak, and Romanian archives, had been posted on the PHP website, www.isn.ethz.ch/php;2 a few had been translated with support from the CWIHP, with more translations to be added later. Numerous additional documents had been made available by the GWCW at its landmark November 2003 conference in Budapest, of which the Beijing seminar has been described as a “most perfect follow-up.” Although no new Chinese archival documents had become available for the years covered by the seminar its coincidence with the unprecedented release by the Chinese foreign ministry of about 30% of its records up to 1955 augured well for the future. The proceedings of the seminar were recorded in both Chinese and Eng- lish. Both versions are published on the PHP website. The seminar broke new ground by offering insights into perceptions and assessments of policies, their making and implementation. Following is a summary of some of the most important findings with regard to Chinese-East European relations in their larger historical setting. Ever since the onset of the Sino-Soviet rift, China differentiated between its policies toward the Soviet Union and the East European countries. It acted on the assumption that those countries, though extensively dependent on Moscow, nevertheless had interests of