In spite of all that the Chinese may say and do it is difficult to take at its face value their charge that the Russians provoked the armed clash on the Manchurian border on March 2. Apart from our own bitter experience of dealing with the Chinese, three factors account for this feeling of disbelief.
First, if Moscow had taken the initiative it would almost certainly not have chosen the present location. In all probability it would have preferred Sinkiang where the Chinese lines of communication are far more tenuous than in Manchuria where the local population of Kazakhs and Uighers is known to be disaffected and where the Maoists have met with tough opposition from military commanders and political cadres. Nearly 60,000 tribesmen fled Sinkiang in 1962. The presence of Chinese nuclear installation in the region should be an additional incentive for the Russians to stir up trouble there.
Secondly, if Moscow could choose its own time for stepping up the conflict with Peking, it would not have allowed the border clash to coincide with trouble in Berlin. The fear of Sino-German collusion is an obsession with the Russians and as far as it is within their power they will not allow the two fronts to become active at the same time.
Moscow is not indulging in mere propaganda when it says that Peking might have synchronised the border clash with the West German “provocation” in West Berlin. It is giving expression to one of its worst fears. This facet of Soviet psychology and policy is discussed at great length by Prof. Adam B. Ulam in his remarkable study Expansion and Co-Existence (Frederick A. Praeger, New York and Washington). Leading Sovietologists have hailed it as the best exposition of Soviet foreign policy up-to-date.
No Gain
Finally, the Soviet Union has nothing to gain by provoking trouble with China at this stage. In fact it has much to lose by doing so. Moscow is preoccupied with developments in Eastern and Central Europe and it cannot afford to aggravate border tensions with China. Moreover it is aware that the task of holding the proposed world communist conference in Moscow next May will be greatly complicated by further deterioration in relations with China.
This leaves two possibilities. Either the clash was unpremeditated or the Chinese deliberately provoked it.
The first possibility cannot be ruled out of hand. Such clashes can and do take place when both sides engage in aggressive patrolling. But the fact that Peking has on its own statement involved hundreds of millions of people in anti-Soviet demonstrations tends to strengthen the impression that it has either deliberately staged the incident or it has found it handy. In either case Peking’s objectives and compulsions are not particularly difficult to define.
First, it is not at all inconceivable that in spite of the removal of Mr. Liu Shao-chi and the elimination of a number of other “revisionists” and “capitalist roaders” the Maoist faction is genuinely apprehensive of the strength of its rivals who favour better relations with the Soviet Union and is therefore trying to demoralise them by proving that the quarrel with Moscow is not only ideological but also territorial.
The Maoists have clearly been in a minority in the party hierarchy both in Peking and in the provinces. That is why they have had to carry out a drastic purge of the Politbureau and the Central Committee. Judging by the number of Marshals and Generals who have been disgraced and demoted in the last four years it is equally evident that the opposition to Chairman Mao’s anti-Soviet line has been fairly strong among professional soldiers.
The nature of the political and strategic debate that took place among the top party and army leaders on the eve of the so-called cultural revolution in 1965 has been ably documented by Mr. Uri Ra’anan and Mr. Donald Zagoria in the second volume of China in Crisis (The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London). These and other similar studies leave little scope for doubt that the desire for a rapprochement with the Soviet Union was very strong indeed in 1965. This may partly explain Mr. Mao Tse-tung’s decision to launch the cultural revolution.
Little Option
If Mr. Mao Tse-tung is to make a “success” of the ninth party congress which he is anxious to convene to seek legitimacy for the drastic changes in the party hierarchy and the new programme, he has little option but to continue the systematic anti-Soviet campaign. In any case he has to harness nationalism to the cause of ideological purity if the latter has to have any appeal at all.
The Soviet Union stands for everything that Chairman Mao has come to abhor. The Soviet party is bureaucratic; it is not sufficiently egalitarian; it has lost the revolutionary élan; it seeks compromise with US “imperialism”; it does not in practice concede the right of equality to other communist parties; it regards economic incentives as the most effective method of raising production and so on. The struggle against it must therefore be relentless. Secondly, the Maoist faction has become the prisoner of its own extremist propaganda. It cannot work for the slightest improvement in China’s relations with either Washington or Moscow without exposing itself to attack by its own lunatic fringe.
It is idle to recall that in the past the Chinese leadership did not allow ideological considerations to inhibit it from pursuing a fairly pragmatic policy. This was possible because the leadership was united and could therefore interpret ideology to suit the needs of policy. This is not feasible in the current situation when Mr. Mao Tse-tung has at best succeeded in driving dissidence underground.
The cancellation by Peking of the talks with the United States in Warsaw illustrates the point. The Maoists did not call off the talks just because the Chinese Charge d’Affaires in Holland had defected to America. If Peking regarded it as a sufficiently strong provocation it would have cancelled the talks at once. Instead it waited for several days. Apparently the issue was debated among the top leaders before a final decision was reached.
The initiative for the resumption of the Warsaw talks had obviously come from “moderates” like Mr. Chou En-lai who have been trying to wind up the cultural revolution and restore some measure of sanity in China’s relations with the outside world. It cannot be a matter of surprise that they have been overruled. The Maoists could not but be embarrassed by the impression that they were prepared to soften their hostility towards US “imperialism” in spite of its continuing “occupation” of Formosa, South Korea and South Viet Nam and its naval presence in the South China Sea.
Limited Support
It is perhaps fortuitous that the armed clash with the Soviet Union has come in the wake of the cancellation of the Warsaw talks. But it may be relevant to recall that in 1965 when one powerful group headed by President Liu Shao-chi, Mr. Teng Hsiao-ping, the Secretary General of the party, and the then Chief of Army Staff, Mr. Lo Jui-ching, argued in favour of reconciliation with the Soviet Union and the formation of a united front with all socialist countries in the interest of a joint struggle against the United States in Viet Nam and the other faction led by Mr. Peng Chen advocated an intensification of the ideological struggle against Soviet “revisionism”, Chairman Mao and Marshal Lin Piao opted for limited support to North Viet Nam on the one hand and a propaganda offensive against both Moscow and Washington on the other.
The proposal to resume the Warsaw talks with the new American Administration was the first significant departure from the Mao-Lin line. Since the move has been scotched it will be only realistic to conclude that there is to be no deviation from it in the near future. Recently there have been even some reports that since Chairman Mao has “won” the struggle against his opponents he may be ready to resume the “leap forward” programme.
(To be concluded)
The Times of India 12 March 1969