A collection of documents and articles, published in the Soviet press, dealing with China's policy of annexation and its territorial claims to other countries
Novosti Press Agency Publishing House Moscow, 1075
CONTENTS
KVPCOM nPOBOKAUHPi H SKCllAHCHH
HO amxu&cKOM astute
Uena 63 Ron.__________________________
© Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, 1975 Editing completed on June 27, 1975
Introduction
5
1. THE MAOISTS ARTIFICIALLY RAISE TERRITORIAL ISSUES
18
In Connection with Mao Tse-lung's Talk with a Group of Japanese Socialists
IS
A. Galimarski. In Conquerors' Footsteps
36 }'. Kostikov. Peking's Great-Power Ambitions
and Border Policy
45
G. Apalin. The Maoist Conception of Geography 63 Note of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China
72
2. PROVOCATIONS BY MAOISTS ON THE SOVIET-CHINESE BORDER. PEKING'S ATTEMPTS
TO FALSIFY HISTORY
74
USSR Government Statement of March 29, 1969 74 K. Sinwnoo. How It Began
88
USSR Government Statement of June 13, UMi9 95 Documents Concerning Armed Provocation by I he Chinese on the Soviet Chinese Border
114
Note of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of I he USSR to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China
125
TASS Statement
127
A Statement of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR
128
F. Nikolayev. How Peking Falsifies History
129
3. MAOIST EXPANSIONIST SCHEMING
149 M. Tisoyan. A Policy of Expansion
149
B. Dashtseren. The Peking Chauvinists' Words and Deeds
160 D. Volsky. Who Sows the Wind in the South Seas 178
V. Yarosluvtsev. The World Ocean, International
Law and Maoist Intrigues
'85
4. A HOPELESS POLICY
193
A. Wysocki. The Truth About Soviet-Chinese Ne-
§otiations
193
. Borisov. Who Stands in the Way of Normalising Soviet-Chinese Relations
222
Introduction
Peking's foreign policy has long been a source of justifiable concern and anxiety to the public and the governments of countries seeking to attain a durable peace and security for the world. The Maoist leaders are acting in such a way that not only China's immediate Asian neighbours are forced to be on their guard.
The present Chinese leaders like to pose as great revolutionaries determined to root out the old. In fact, however, their foreign policy, especially with regard to territorial issues, is based on the militant great-power chauvinism taken over from the Chinese Empire and Kuomintang reactionaries.
Contrary to the fundamental principles of socialist foreign policy and elementary norms of international law, the Maoist leaders claim territory belonging to China's neighbours, provoke armed conflicts on the borders and arrogantly intervene in other peoples' affairs. In 1959 and 19G2, for example, there were major incidents on the Chinese-Indian border; in I960, Chinese troops attacked Nepal border guards; and in 1969, Peking provoked clashes that cost lives in several sectors of the Soviet-Chinese border.
Iii January, 1974, the Chinese military clique seized by force the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea. On January 26, 1974, The Japan Times assessed the armed clashes between Chinese and Saigon troops on the Paraoel Islands as a continuation of the belligerence displayed earlier by China in the clashes with the Soviet Union and with India.
The Soviet press has repeatedly pointed out the dangerous nature of the Peking leaders' great-power chauvinistic foreign policy course. It has explained what gave rise to this course, exposed the Maoists' provocative and expansionist behaviour on the Chinese borders, and dwelt at length on the Soviet Union's consistent and principled policy for normalising relations with China and providing a reliable system of collective security in Asia. The aim of this Collection is to acquaint the reader with the more significant official documents and articles, the latter being somewhat abridged.
One sees from the Collection that since the fifties the PRC has been inciting nationalistic feelings over territorial issues. Even then Chinese textbooks, scholarly publications, newspapers and magazines mentioned claims made by "Rightist elements" to territory belonging to the Soviet Union and some other Asian neighbours of China. The Soviet Far East, some parts of Soviet Central Asia and Kazakhstan, SouthEast Asian countries, Korea, Mongolia and the Himalayan slates were described as "Chinese since way back" merely because once upon a lime Ihe armies of Chinese rulers had overrun I hose places.
Subsequently territorial issues became the fa-
vourite topic for Peking foreign policy statements. Mao Tse-tung's talk with a group of Japanese Socialists in July, 1964, helped to incite chauvinist feelings in the PRC and revealed the nationalist nature of the present Chinese leaders' views on China's relations with her neighbours. A fitting answer to this expansionist programme was given in a Pravda editorial of September 2 of that year entitled "In Connection with Mao Tse-tung's Talk with a Group of Japanese Socialists.''
A number of articles from the Soviet press included in the Collection trace the ideological and political roots of Maoist great-power chauvinism. The article by Y. Kostikov entitled " Peking's Great-Power Ambitions and Border Policy" and the one by A. Galimarski, a Polish journalist, entitled "In Conquerors' Footsteps" bring to mind that these roots go far back into antiquity. It is revealing that the Maoists' expansionist ways are quite similar in scope and nature to the great-power ambitions of China's feudal rulers of old and the Chiang Kai-shek reactionary Kuomintang ideologists. Y. Kostikov's article notes that in the past twenty years China's claims to her Asian neighbours' territory total to roughly an area of 3.2 million sq. km, which amounts to one-third of China's territory or the combined territories of India and Bangladesh.
A characteristic example of the Maoist leaders' great-power chauvinist approach is the World Atlas published in Peking in 1972, in which both maps and captions are highly tendentious. This provocative publication which
lays claim to the territory of some countries neighbouring on China while leaving other countries out of the political map of Asia is dealt with in "The Maoist Conception of Geography" by G. Apalin.
Realising that the Soviet Union's peace policy is the chief obstacle to their megalomaniac ambitions, the present Chinese leaders, who are pursuing a course of provocations and expansion, are directing their main fire against the Soviet Union, the world's first state of workers and farmers. Rabid anti-Sovietism is the basis today of practically all Maoist foreign policy actions. For the same reason they concocted the "border issue" in Soviet-Chinese relations. Even though the historical and legal status of the border between the PRC and the USSR provides no grounds for it, the Chinese Government has still put forward its absurd claims for Soviet territory, and ever since the early sixties Chinese servicemen and civilians have crossed the Chinese-Soviet border, some of them attempting to settle without permission in some spots on Soviet territory.
The Maoists, furthermore, openly provoked armed clashes. The events on Damansky Island on the Ussuri River in March, 1969, were not a chance incident but an armed provocation planned in advance and carefully engineered by Chinese authorities.
Even pro-Maoist writers pinpoint Peking's megalomaniac ambitions as the cause of the clash on the Ussuri. Eugene Hon (Hong Kong) writes, for instance, that the event was organised by Chinese leaders so as to strike at Rus-
sian prestige and demonstrate China's role in world politics. '
The reader will get a better idea of how the armed Maoist provocations were planned and carried out on the borders of the Soviet Union from the report "How It Began" by the wellknown Soviet writer Konstantin Simonov. This on-the-spot account reveals the treachery of Ihe Maoists who suddenly opened fire on the unsuspecting Soviet border guards.
The documents in the Collection on the Chinese authorities' armed provocations on the Soviet-Chinese border that fell into the hands of the Soviet border guards when the Chinese border crossers were being driven out shed light on events that occurred in July, 1969, in the Soviet part of Holden (an island in the Amur). The documents make it quite clear tha't the armed provocations staged by the Chinese authorities were intentional and premeditated. The Soviet stand with respect to the Chinese leaders' claims to Soviet territory was set out clearly and precisely in Soviet Government statements of March 29 and June 13, 1969.
The March 29th statement notes that beginning in the early sixties the Soviet Government repeatedly took constructive steps to prevent any worsening of the situation on the SovietChinese border. On May 17, 1963, the Soviet Government proposed to the Chinese Government that bilateral consultations be held between two countries. The consultations, at which the Soviet side submitted proposals making it
~^^1^^ E. Hon Nixon's Peking Trip---the Road lo ChineseRussian War, San Francisco, Hanson, 1972, p. 21.
9feasible to determine the border line more exactly by mutual agreement and in the shortest possible time, started in February, 1964. Nevertheless it was quite clear from the behaviour of the Chinese representatives at the consultations that the Chinese side had no intention of reaching an agreement. The consultations in Peking were not completed. The Statement gives the historical background of establishing the Soviet-Chinese border and shows how SovietChinese relations developed after the 1917 October Socialist Revolution in Russia, also showing how the Maoists began to stir up tension on China's borders with the Soviet Union.
In order to provide some sort of justification for their claims to Soviet territory, Chinese leaders began to circulate the version of so-called unequal treaties whereby Russia, in the latter half of the 19th century, presumably seized some areas from China. Once again showing fully and conclusively that the Soviet-Chinese border is the result of long historical development, the Soviet Government Statement of June 13, 1969, blows sky-high the absurd Maoist "unequal treaty" version. The Statement stressed: "The frontier between the Soviet Union and China, shaped many generations ago, mirrored and continues to mirror the actual settlement of lands by the peoples of these two states along natural mountain and river boundaries. Throughout its length this frontier is juridically fixed definitely and clearly in treaties, protocols and maps.''
It is a well-known fact that immediately after the 1917 October Socialist Revolution in Russia the Soviet Government annulled all unequal
10and secret treaties which the tsarist government had concluded with other countries including China. At one time the leaders of the Communist Party of China and the People's Republic of China recognised this to be so. The Russian-Chinese agreements on the state border were neither unequal nor secret and consequently no question ever arose of annulling or revising them. The Statement of the Government of the USSR of June 13, 1969 notes, for instance, that "None of the Soviet state documents and none of Lenin's statements refer to the border treaties with China as either unequal or subject to revision. At no time, anywhere did Lenin question the validity of the border between the USSR and China.''
It would seem that the problem of unequal treaties between Russia and China had been resolved once and for all and would never again becloud relations between the two great neighbouring powers. Today, however, the Peking leaders are of a different frame of mind. This question, associated with the Maoists' attempts to distort the history of relations between Russia and China, is dealt with in "How Peking Falsifies History" by F. Nikolayev. The article describes the position taken by Lenin, the founder of the Soviet state, on delimitation of frontiers, based on the Marxist doctrine concerning the right of nations to self-- determination.
Although the Soviet Government did everything it could to normalise Ihe situation on the Soviet-Chinese border as soon as possible, the Chinese military clique again, on July 8 and August 13, 1969, staged provocations on
11the border between the USSR and the PRC. A criminal attack was made on Soviet river-- transport workers at Holden, an island in the Amur, and at Zhalanashkol, a Soviet populated area (Semipalatinsk Region, Kazakh SSR), Chinese servicemen, making sallies into Soviet territory, opened submachine-gun fire on Soviet border guards. The Soviet Government resolutely protested against it to Chinese authorities and demanded that they put an end to Soviet border crossings.
The expansionist foreign policy course pursued by the present leaders of the PRC is clearly obvious from their interference in the domestic affairs of China's other neighbours in Asia. The materials printed under the heading "The Peking Chauvinists' Words and Deeds" with commentary by the Mongolian writer B. Dashtseren, show, for example, how, having failed to annex the Mongolian People's Republic to China by force, Peking leaders are increasing tension on the Mongolian-Chinese border and waging a hostile anti-Mongolian campaign for which they use even their diplomats and Chinese citizens residing in Mongolia, grossly violating the sovereign rights of the Mongolian People's Republic.
The areas of South and Soulh-East Asia, previously regarded by the feudal rulers of medieval China as traditional spheres of penetration, now play an important part in the foreign policy pursued by the Maoist leaders of China. They display ever greater interest in the entire basin of the South China Sea which washes the shores of South-East Asian countries. Concealing their intentions, as the imperialist politi-
12cians do, with talk about the ``threat'' from the Soviet Union, Peking is aggravating the situation at major sea-route crossings, seeking to undermine the sovereignty of China's southern neighbours.
To establish their hegemony in these parts of Asia as noted by Soviet journalists M. Tisoyan and D. Volsky in "A Policy of Expansion" and "Who Sows the Wind in the South Seas" respectively, the Peking leaders resort to diverse forms and methods of expansionist policy, from ideological diversions to sparking off border conflicts and instigating internal disturbances. They seize on tribal and religious strife, on separatist tendencies observable among some of the national minority groups in India, Burma and elsewhere. Peking's subversive policy in South and South-East Asia---unbridled during the notorious "cultural revolution"---in effect hinders progressive social and economic reforms in Asia.
Although recently the Maoist leaders have discarded the compromised hungweiping diplomacy, they, M. Tisoyan writes, have not stopped instigating all sorts of seditious demonstrations in India, Burma and other Asian states. The peoples of Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, too, are subjected to constant political and propaganda pressure from the PRC.
The armed seizure of the Paracel Islands in January, 1974, proved once again that Peking is quite determined to use force rather than settle disputes with its Asian neighbours by peaceful negotiation. Lastly, the great-power ambitions and new and far-reaching plans for expansion entertained by the Maoist leaders of China can
13be seen from their attempts to sap the foundations of international law with respect to the use of vast areas of the World Ocean. This aspect of Mao Tse-lung's adventurous foreign policy is dealt with in "The World Ocean, International Law and Maoist Intrigues" by V. Yaroslavlsev.
Although in September, 1969, a Soviet-- Chinese summit was called on the initiative of the Soviet Union, followed in October by SovietChinese talks to reach a border settlement, all further constructive steps on the part of the Soviet Union for normalising relations with China have been blocked by the Maoist leaders.
A long article by A. Wysocki (Poland), entitled "The Truth About Soviet-Chinese Negotiations," exposes all sorts of fabrications and versions which are misleading world opinion with respect to the attitude of the Soviet and Chinese sides at the Peking talks. The Western reactionary press, twisting that kind of " information," has begun to allege, in a decidedly anti-Soviet vein, that, unlike China, the Soviet Union . . . does not want any settlement to be reached with China on the border issue.
Using both the Soviet press and other relia ble sources of information, A. Wysocki writes about the business-like constructive initiative displayed by the Soviet side for achieving an all-round, comprehensive and final solution of all border issues with the PRC, restoring the climate of peace and goodneighbourliness on the Soviet-Chinese border that prevailed there not so very long ago. Yet Peking, A. Wysocki shows, using petty subterfuges, specious arguments, pretexts and excuses of all kinds, stubbornly
14refuses to take up the substance of the issue, i.e., to discuss and give a precise description of the Soviet-Chinese border line, thus holding back the progress of the talks. A. Wysocki writes that when you get to the bottom of Peking's demands, you can't help seeing that the reason for making these demands is not to make it easier to talk but rather to make it impossible to arrive at mutually acceptable solutions.
He also notes that the Chinese leaders turn down all Soviet proposals for China to conclude a treaty with the Soviet Union on banning the use of force or a non-aggression treaty. This in itself is patent proof of the insincerity of the Peking politicians, who cover their far-- reaching home and foreign policy plans by "Soviet threat" talks.
Drawing attention to the obstructionist attitude taken by the Chinese delegation at the United Nations in connection with the Soviet proposal that the principle of the non-use of force in international relations and perpetual prohibition of nuclear weapons acquire the nature of a statute of international law, A. Wysocki writes: "In UN circles this position is regarded as reluctance by the Chinese leadership to commit itself to renounce the use of force and ban nuclear weapons. This stems from China's intent of employing force and the threat of force to further its great-power ambitions whenever it deems fit. This clearly shows how the aforementioned dreams of restoring China's might within the bounds of the former Ch'in Empire are tied in with the outright preparations for war proclaimed to be Peking's underlying
15course and state doctrine." It would be hard to disagree with this.
The Collection ends with an article by O. Borisov, entitled "Who Stands in the Way of Normalising Soviet-Chinese Relations," which shows how methodically the Chinese leaders worsened relations between China and the Soviet Union, shifting the brunt of the struggle against the CPSU and the USSR from the ideological to inter-governmental sphere. Today they try every way they can to instil deep-seated anti-- Sovietism in the Chinese people. Peking propaganda-mongers, playing up the myth of the "Soviet threat," are seeking to justify the extensive measures being carried out for the militarisation of China. They are trying to divert the people's attention from failures in domestic policies and to keep them in constant suspense and fear. It is, however, common knowledge that the Soviet Union does not deal in threats and territorial expansion. "The Soviet Union," General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Leonid Brezhnev said, "has no territorial claims to the PRC and bases its relations with that country on principles of respect for sovereignty and equality, and non-interference into internal affairs." '
While it resolutely and uncompromisingly rebuffs anti-Soviet slander and the hostile intrigues of the Maoists, spearheaded against the CPSU and the USSR, against its friends and allies, the Soviet Union is always ready to conduct business-like negotiations and to restore normal relations with China.
The USSR is concerned about the destiny of socialism in China, and the Soviet people sincerely want to resume their friendship with the People's Republic of China.
B. Pavlov
~^^1^^ Prauda, September 25, 1973.
16J-228
1. THE MAOISTS ARTIFICIALLY RAISE TERRITORIAL ISSUES
In Connection with Mao
Tse-tung's Talk
with a Group of Japanese Socialists
Mao Tse-tung's talk with a group of Japanese Socialists who visited Peking was recently published in Japan. Bourgeois newsmen lauded his statements to the sky: they liked what the Chairman of the Communist Party of China had said. The content of the conversation was such that at first it was difficult to believe its authenticity. Indeed, bourgeois newspapers may write all sorts of things in an effort to poison the international atmosphere, to provoke quarrels between socialist countries.
It was believed that Peking would refute the report but no denial was forthcoming. On the contrary, Qhinese leaders made it clear that Mao Tse-tung's interview published by the Japanese press did actually take place. A Soviet representative in Peking asked Wang Pingnang, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the
18People's Republic of China, for an explanation and the latter declared that "if Mao Tse-tung had said so he agreed with him." On August 1, the Japanese newspaper Asahi published a statement by Chou En-lai. This statement actually contained the same ideas as were expressed in Mao Tse-tung's talk.
Consequently no doubt was left that the Japanese press was really reproducing the statement of the Chairman of the Communist Party of China.
This interview lays bare the aims and positions of the Chinese leadership which hitherto it had only spoken about in whispers. Therefore this talk is worth publishing so that the Soviet people may see how far the CPC leaders have gone in their struggle against our people, the peoples of other countries of socialism, the entire world communist movement.
It is well known that when the Chinese leadership started its attacks on the CPSU and other Marxist-Leninist Parties it tried to present things as if it was coming out in defence of Marxism-Leninism, ``safeguarding'' the interests of the world revolutionary and liberation movement. Moreover, the CPC leaders shamelessly alleged that when vilifying our Party and our country and speaking about the "bourgeois degeneration of the Soviet people" they were showing concern for the interests of our country and of other countries of socialism.
When in 1960 the CPC leaders started a polemic about the character of our epoch, about the possibility of preventing world war, about peaceful and non-peaceful transition to socialism and other questions, one could think that
-*
19
they disagreed with Ihe CPSU and other Marxist-Leninist Parties on ideological issues only. However, the more they developed the polemic, the more doubts appeared: do the CPC leaders really think what they write? The unseemly political aims of the CPC leaders became more and more clearly discernible behind the theoretical controversies. Mao Tse-tung's talk is further confirmation of this.
As follows from the interview of the CPC Chairman, the Chinese leaders are now not even trying to camouflage their expansionist aspirations. According to the Japanese press, Mao Tse-tung does not even mention the ideological issues. There is not a single word in the talk about Marxism-Leninism, about socialism, about the unity of the working class, about the struggle for the interests of the world workers' and national-liberation movement. In it there is not even a hint of any class analysis of the contemporary world, of any class approach to the choice of friends and allies in the struggle against imperialism. Mao Tse-tung's main concern is to whip up anti-Soviet feelings, to speculate on the nationalist sentiments of the most reactionary forces.
Union and other socialist countries. The third zone, as if lying between them (hence---- intermediate)---mainly the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Now Mao Tse-tung is amending this " theory." Slanderously declaring that the USSR has entered into a plot with the United States to struggle for world domination, he actually combines the two main zones into one. This scheme leaves him with two zones: "Soviet-- American" and the so-called ``intermediate'' which actually includes China as well. The division of the world into two opposing social systems, recognised by all Marxists, thus disappears.
According to the Chinese theoreticians, the intermediate zone represents revolution and progress. As regards the Soviet Union and the United States, they, according to this theory, "have entered into a plot" to struggle for world domination. Hence the conclusion is drawn that the peoples of the intermediate zone must fight American imperialism and, at the same go, against the Soviet Union. Such is the main purpose of the theoretical exercises of the Chinese leadership.
To say that the theory of the intermediate zone has nothing in common with Marxism is to say very little. This is not just a non-- Marxist but a militant anti-Marxist, anti-Leninist concept.
The basic principle of Marxism-Leninism consists in a class approach to all phenomena of the life of the society, in the assessment of all these phenomena from the positions of the most progressive class---the proletariat. Precisely such an approach underlies the analysis of our epoch
Mao Tsc-tung began his talk with statements about the so-called intermediate zone. This theory had come into being as early as 1946. In its original form it boiled down to the following: the Chinese leaders split the entire globe into three parts or zones. The first---American imperialism, the USA. The second---the Soviet
given by the Communist and Workers' Parties of Hie world in the Declaration and the Statement of the Moscow Meetings. The contemporary world is divided not into geographical zones but into opposing social systems---the socialist and the capitalist system. Revolutionary transition from capitalism to socialism is the basic content of our epoch: all the revolutionary forces of our time---the world system of socialism, the workers' movement in the capitalist countries, the national-liberation movement---merge into a single front and jointly exert pressure against imperialism, achieving more and more successes in the struggle for peace, democracy and socialism.
But this class approach does not suit the Peking theoreticians. They brush it aside completely. Their "intermediate zones" include on an equal footing both the countries fighting against imperialism, for their national independence, and the imperialist states; both the working class, the working masses of the capitalist countries and the ruling bourgeoisie. In other words, "horses and men all mixed up" as a poet once said. Thus Chairman Mao mixes together in the intermediate zone the exploiters and the exploited, the oppressors and the oppressed.
In the talk it was stated: "All the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America come out against imperialism. Europe, Canada and other countries also come out against imperialism." Note, not the working people of Europe and Canada but the whole of Europe and the whole of Canada, including capitalist monopolies, the reactionary bourgeois parties, the French " ultras," the Bonn revanchists, and the like. All
22these, it turns out, are fighters against imperialism, and the revolutionary movement has no other alternative but to welcome to their ranks Messrs. Krupps, Thyssens, Rothschilds, and, maybe even General Franco himself.
In accordance with the intermediate zone theory the course of events in the world is not determined by the struggle of antagonistic classes and opposing social systems but by the struggle of some powers and geographical regions against others. This theory actually ignores the nature of the social system of this or that country. Not only does it simply ignore the class approach but replaces it by a purely nationalistic approach prompted by the aims of the great-power policy of the CPC leaders.
Guided by such an approach, the Chinese leaders are playing their dangerous political game. Since they regard the socialist camp as an obstacle on the way to the realisation of their hegemonistic schemes with regard to the national-liberation movement they are trying to cut off this movement from the world system of socialism. This is why they build up the first intermediate zone of the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, including China. Since the Chinese leaders are also looking for rich economic partners and potential allies in the international arena among the developed capitalist countries, they include practically the whole of the capitalist world into the intermediate zone and issue it a mandate of "fighter against imperialism.''
Mao Tse-tung described the struggle waged by the CPC leadership against the Soviet Union
23and other socialist countries as a "paper war" and added that such a war does nobody any harm since no one is killed in it. This in the first place contains a recognition of the fact that the Chinese leaders regard their polemic with the CPSU and other fraternal Parties as "a kind of war." Secondly, this clearly reveals the supercilious attitude of the CPC leaders to the interests of the unity of the world communist and liberation movement. The Communists of the whole world express deep concern for the situation that has taken shape in the international communist movement through the fault of the Chinese leaders. The damage they have inflicted to the cause of the people' s struggle for peace, national independence and social progress is obvious to everybody. And here is Mao Tse-tung declaring: no reason to worry, this is a war without any killed or casualties! No, we cannot agree with the Chinese leaders' assessment of their own actions. Their struggle against the CPSU, against the world communist movement, against the USSR and other countries of socialism is not a "paper war." As regards its fierceness, its scale and methods, it does not differ from the "cold war" of imperialism against the countries of socialism.
II
Mao Tse-tung's pronouncements on the territorial issue show clearly how far the Chinese leaders have gone in the "cold war" against the Soviet Union. Mao is not just claiming a particular part of Soviet territory but is portray-
ing his claims as a part of some "general territorial issue.''
We are confronted with an openly expansionist programme with far-reaching claims.
This programme did not appear today or yesterday. In 1954, a textbook on modern history was put out in the PRC with a map of China showing her as she was, in the opinion of its authors, before the first opium war. This map included Burma, Vietnam, Korea, Thailand, Malaya, Nepal, Bhutan and Sikkim as parts of China; in the north the border ran along the Stanovoi Mountain Range, cutting off the Far East territory from the USSR; in the west part of Kirghizia, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan (up to Lake Balkhash) was also included in China. Sakhalin was also shown as Chinese territory. If one is to believe the textbooks all these lands and countries were "state territory of China" and were taken away from her.
At that time it seemed that the publication of such a textbook was the result of an oversight or the provocative activities of nationalistic elements. But subsequent events disproved this assumption. Maps showing various parts of the Soviet Union and other countries neighbouring on China as Chinese territory continued to be published in the PRC.
Chinese representatives have lately begun to mention with increasing frequency hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of Soviet territory which allegedly belong "by right" to China.
A recent issue of the Peking magazine Lishih Yanchiu (No. 4, 1964) contends that " Russia captured vast lands to the north of the River Heilung Kiang (the Chinese name for the
25River Amur---Ed.) and to the east of the River Ussuri". . . "Russia has at various times annexed vast lands in Sinkiang and in the northeast area.''
Now Mao Tse-lung has declared in his talk: "About a hundred years ago the area to the east of Baikal became the territory of Russia and from then on Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Kamchatka and other points are the territory of the Soviet Union. We have not yet presented a bill for this list!''
By what right, however, are the Chinese leaders claiming lands that did not belong to China? They refer to the fact that many hundreds of years ago Chinese troops came to these areas and that once the Chinese Emperor collected tribute from the local people. Indeed, if the question involved were not so serious, such "historic arguments" could not be called anything but childish.
The history of mankind is full of examples of the emergence and fall of states, and the resettlement of peoples in the course of which borders between states have changed repeatedly. By resorting to the method of "historical references" on the question of borders one can prove anything. For instance, one can prove that Britain is French territory because she was once the possession of the Duke of Normandy. One can prove, on (the contrary, that France is British possession because in her time, during the 100 Years' War, she was almost completely conquered by the English. With the help of such arguments one can also prove that the borders of the PRC pass only along the line of the Great Wall of China which is less than 100 ki-
lometres away from Peking. Indeed, the border of China did once pass there and the wall itself is testimony of this.
But even if one takes the reference lo " historical rights" seriously it will come out that in this case they do not correspond in any way lo facts. As is known, in the middle of the 17th century China' s possessions reached only lo the Hingan Mountain Range, that is considerably to the south of the River Amur. The territories to the north of Hingan were populated by local indigenous tribes (Evenks, Daurs, etc.) who were subjected from time to time to raids by the Manchurians and paid tribute to them. There was no indigenous Manchurian and Chinese population in the Amur area. The process of defining the actual borders took place with the development by Russia of the northern part of the Amur basin and of the southern pant by China. More than a hundred years ago this state of the border was endorsed in the Aigun and Peking treaties.
No one is arguing about the fact that the tsarist government carried out a predatory policy just as the Chinese emperors themselves did to the extent of their abilities.
At various times first one and then another was stronger and took the upper hand. This resulted in a certain change in the settlement of the peoples. But the working people did not think about any territorial gains. They worked on the land they had to live on, watering it with their sweat. One can only be amazed that there are people questioning the right of workers and peasants to (the land on which they have been living and working from ancient
27times on the sole grounds that once upon a time one emperor defeated another and then himself suffered defeat.
Do those who question the Soviet Union's ownership of a territory of more than one and a half million square kilometres think of how these claims will be viewed by Soviet people who have been living and working on this land for several generations and consider it their homeland, the land of their forefathers.
That is why we say that the present border has developed historically and has been fixed by life itself, and the border treaties are a basis which cannot be disregarded.
The CPSU headed the struggle of the working class and working masses of Russia against tsarism and routed it completely. It is well known that in the very first years of its existence the Soviet Government abrogated all the unequal treaties with China. Continuing the Leninist policy, the Soviet Government gave up the naval base in Port Arthur and handed over free of charge to the PRC Government all its rights in the joint management of the Chinese-- Changchun Railway with all the property belonging to the railway. V. I. Lenin wrathfully condemned the seizure of Port Arthur by the tsarist government and the infiltration of Manchuria. But it was none other than Lenin who said: "... Vladivostok is far away, but this city is ours.''
The Soviet Union is an absolutely new state formation which emerged as a result of the voluntary unification of Soviet Republics created on the ruins of the tsarist empire. And whereas the borders of tsarist Russia were determined
28by the policy of imperialist invaders, the borders of the Soviet Union were formed as a result of the voluntary expression of the will of the peoples on the basis of the principle of free self-determination of nations. The peoples who joined the Soviet Union will never allow anyone to encroach upon their right to settle their own fate.
In his talk Mao Tse-tung bemoans the fate of Mongolia which, he says, the Soviet Union has placed "under its rule." This can evoke nothing but indignation. Everybody knows that the Mongolian People's Republic has been a sovereign socialist state for more than 40 years now and enjoys all the rights of an independent country. Why did Mao Tse-tung have to make such obviously wild statements? The fact is that the existence of an independent Mongolian state which maintains friendly relations with the USSR and other socialist countries does not suit the Chinese leaders. They would like to deprive the MPR of independence and make it a Chinese province. It was precisely on this that the PRC leaders proposed the "reaching of agreement" to N. S. Khrushchov and other Soviet comrades during their visit to Peking in 1954.
N. S. Khrushchov naturally refused to discuss this question and told the Chinese leaders that the destiny of the Mongolian people was determined not in Peking and not in Moscow but in Ulan Bator, that the question of Mongolia's statehood could be settled only by the country's working people themselves and by nobody else.
As has already been noted above, the Chinese leaders are trying to elevate territorial claims
SI
to the level of some universal principle. But this involves the fundamentals of international relations. What would happen if all states were to follow the Peking recipe and start presenting reciprocal claims to each other for a revision of historically formed borders? There is no difficulty about answering this question. Such a road would mean the inevitable aggravation of international tensions, would be fraught with military conflicts with all the ensuing consequences.
The question of territorial disputes and borders is tremendously complicated. One has to distinguish the nature of territorial issues. It is one thing when it is a question of the just striving of the peoples to liquidate the remnants of the shameful colonial system, to get back ancient territories populated by the nation concerned and held by the imperialists. For instance, the right of the Indian people to restore Goa to their motherland was indisputable. Just as indisputable was Indonesia's right to restore West Irian to the Republic. We have declared and we still declare that People's China has every right to press for the liberation and reunification of Taiwan and Hong Kong which are part of the country and the majority of whose population are Chinese. Such examples are numerous.
Territorial claims stemming from attempts to revise historically formed borders between stales, to force in some form or other a revision of treaties and agreements concluded after World War II as a result of the rout of Hitler's fascism and Japanese militarism are another thing. The nations thai won victory at the price
of millions upon millions of lives will never agree to such aspirations.
In his talk with the Japanese Socialists Mao Tse-tung dismissed with amazing ease the entire system of international agreements which were concluded after World War II and which conform to the interests of strengthening peace and the security of the peoples. He declared: "The places occupied by the Soviet Union are too numerous"---and even named some territories with the obvious aim of adding combustible material to fan nationalistic passions. It is hard to believe that the Chinese leader does not understand the causes and the historical circumstances that led to the establishment of the present borders between states in Europe and Asia. It is hard to assume also another thing---that he is not aware of the most dangerous consequences to which any attempt to recarve the map of the world could lead in the present conditions. Mao Tse-tung pretends to be attacking the interests of our country alone, but it is clear to everybody that such a provocative appeal to revise borders (if taken seriously) would inevitably generate a whole number of reciprocal claims and insoluble conflicts between countries in Europe and Asia. The self-evidence of all this is unquestionable and gives ground to state that only people who find it profitable for some reason to sow mistrust and animosity among the peoples of socialist countries can act in such a manner.
It is precisely with this aim that Mao Tsetung is trying to fabricate so-called territorial issues between a number of socialist countries. But these attempts are doomed to failure in adSi
vance. No one will succeed in undermining the friendship and co-operation of the peoples of socialist countries.
For a long time now the rulers of the capitalist world have been watching the nationalism of the Chinese leaders, their great-power behaviour. It is not fortuitous, therefore, that the representatives of the Right wing of the Japanese Socialists, too, put the question of the Kuril Islands precisely to Mao Tse-tung and received from the Chairman of the CPC exactly the same answer they needed.
It is known that these islands passed into the full possession of the Soviet Union not at all as a result of Soviet expansion, as Mao Tsetung is trying to contend. This act was dictated by the need to cut short the aggressive policy of Japanese imperialism which since 1918 had harboured plans for capturing Soviet territories in the Far East and had repeatedly tried to implement them. The Kuril Islands were given a special role in the aggressive plans of the Japanese militarists---the role of an important beach-head for attacking the Soviet Far East. It is quite understandable that the Japanese military had to be deprived of such an opportunity. This was done and in the past the Chinese representatives more than once expressed approval of this security measure. The statement of the PRC Government of August 15,1951, pointed out: ". . .the Kuril Islands must be handed over, and the southern part of Sakhalin and all its adjacent islands returned to the Soviet Union.''
Can one say that the situation in this area has changed radically since then and that the
threat of aggression against the USSR and the other countries of socialism has finally ceased to exist? Of course not. Militarist forces which would like to lead the country along the old road of military ventures are active in Japan contrary to the will of her people. There are US military bases in Japan which are being kept, not without reason, by the Pentagon near the Soviet Union and other socialist countries in Asia. Only a few days ago the Japanese Government, having succumbed to the pressure of the United States, granted it the right to bring nuclear submarines into Japanese ports, that is permitted the United States to use these ports as its military bases. In these circumstances the statement that the USSR must hand the Kuril Islands over to Japan plays into the hands not only of the Japanese but also the American militarists.
If we proceed from Mao Tse-tung's so-called historical principle then all the rights to this territory belong to the Soviet Union. But Chairman Mao has an absolutely unprincipled attitude to the principles he himself advances. He quotes them when he finds it profitable and flouts them if his political schemes so require.
There are no, nor can there be, any legal or moral grounds for claims to the Kuril Islands. This, however, does not mean that in changed circumstances the search of solutions that would not infringe upon the interests of the USSR and would meet the needs of the Japanese people would be excluded.
Mao Tse-tung cannot fail to realise that the Chinese leadership's position on the territorial question is remote from internationalism. To
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33dampen down this impression he appeals not only to history but also to "justice." His thesis actually boils down to the fact that the population of the globe is distributed unevenly and that justice demands the reallotment of territory.
The demagogic nature of this thesis is clear to everybody. The distribution of people in the world is the result of a long and complicated development due to which different peoples live in different conditions. The Communists are fighting precisely to secure a better life for all peoples. When socialism triumphs throughout the world and the productive forces achieve a high level everywhere, the process of the rapprochement of nations will result in a gradual disappearance of the difference in the living conditions of the peoples of different countries and state frontiers will lose their importance. In these conditions the solution of the problem of a more even distribution of people in the world will become possible.
But this is a matter of the future. To raise this question now, when opposing social systems exist, when an objective process of consolidation of satehood and sovereignty is in train, is extremely harmful.
Incidentally, it should not be forgotten that there are many cases in history of most reactionary wars being started with a view to expanding "Lebensraum." Thus Mao Tse-tung's pronouncements about "unfair distribution of territory" are not so very new. He has predecessors whom he can hardly be proud of.
Nor can one discount Mao Tse-tung's statements about the "grandeur of Japan," state-
ments which are quite surprising coming from a Communist. The great-power views of the CPC leaders and their admiration of brute force in international relations are clearly discernible in these statements.
In what does Mao Tse-tung see the grandeur of the Japanese people? In their industriousness? In the fact that they succeeded in bringing their country up to the level of the foremost powers of the world within a short space of time and creating wonderful material and spiritual culture? No, his attention is not attracted by these facts. With extraordinary inspiration he speaks about the crimes of the Japanese military who in the early forties occupied enormous expanses in South-East Asia and Oceania. That is to say, Chairman Mao declares the aggressive actions of the Japanese samurai to be Japan's national grandeur, a thing the Japanese people themselves regard as their national disgrace.
History teaches that no country has ever achieved grandeur along the road of military gambles and aggressions. True grandeur of the peoples is achieved along the road of social progress, friendship and co-operation. We are convinced that the vital interests of the Chinese people also lie along this path.
No one who cherishes the interests of socialism, the interests of preserving peace and the security of nations can fail to condemn most emphatically the expansionist views of the PRC leaders, their attempt to start a gambling venture around questions which affect the destiny of the peoples.
The true intentions of the Chinese leaders are
35becoming obvious. These intentions have nothing in common with the interests of the struggle for the victory of the cause of peace and socialism. They are permeated through and through with great-power chauvinism and a desire for hegemony. Mao Tse-tung's talk with Japanese Socialists is the most eloquent and graphic evidence of this.
Pravda, September 2, 1964
king---for all the variety of its tactics---steadily pursued its chief objective of becoming a great power. While before 1958 (when the "big leap" was launched) they had hoped to achieve it relying on the strength of the socialist community (whereby territorial issues had been raised on an unofficial basis), after 1960, owing to essential differences between the People's Republic of China and the socialist countries, territorial pretensions proved to be one of the principal aspects of Peking's foreign policy.
Peking's Claims in Asia
Let us turn to the time when all was well between the PRC and the socialist community countries, and China's policy did not seem to differ in principle from the policy of the socialist countries.
The Soviet delegation which arrived in Peking in the autumn of 1954 for the 5th anniversary celebrations of the PRC had talks with Mao Tse-tung and other Chinese leaders. During the talks the Chinese side demanded for the first time that the status quo on the northern border be altered, suggesting that the Mongolian People's Republic be done away with and made a part of China. The Soviet answer was categorical. The destiny of the Mongolian people was not decided either in Peking or in Moscow, but solely in Ulan Bator. Only the working people of that country could determine the question of Mongolia's statehood.
(Mao Tse-tung himself had a very definite opinion on that point long before the PRC was proclaimed. Back in 1936 he had categorically
37A. GALIMARSKI
In Conquerors' Footsteps
Blood-shedding incidents on the Ussuri and Amur and the last Chinese provocations in the vicinity of Kazakhstan have given rise to numerous publications in the world press on the Chinese leaders' attitude to the present borders and certain territorial claims made by Peking.
The object of this article is not to repeat widely known facts. My purpose is to show that long before the Chinese-Soviet dispute became public, the climate in the People's Republic of China lent itself to making territorial demands on its Northern neighbour. I intend to supply facts less known to the world public so as to provide a documentary account of how the bloody incidents which started on Damansky Island were the logical outcome of the revival of national-chauvinism in China by the present leadership of the Communist Party of China.
At different stages of the twenty-year-long history of the People's Republic of China Pe-
stated to Edgar P. Snow, well-known American writer, that after their victory ". . .the Outer Mongolian republic will automatically become a part of the Chinese federation, at their own will.")
In 1954, there appeared in bookshops everywhere in China a second, corrected, edition of Short History of Modern China by Prof. Liu Pei-hua (the first edition was not intended for the public and was not sold in shops).
On page 253 of this book there is a map with the caption: "Epoch of the Old Democratic Revolution (1840-1919). Territory seized from China by the imperialists." The inscriptions are literally as follows:
1. Large North-West Area, ceded to tsarist Russia by the Chuguchak Treaty, 1864. (This implied some Asian republics of the USSR, viz., the Kazakh, Kirghiz and Tajik Soviet Socialist Republics.---Note by the author).
2. The Pamirs, seized in 1896 by secret agreement (on division) between Britain and Russia.
3. Nepal, having become "independent," passed to Britain.
4. Sikkim, occupied by Britain in 1889.
5. Bhutan, passed over to Britain on being granted ``independence'' in 1865.
6. Assam, ceded to Britain by Burma in 1826.
7. Burma, became a part of the British Empire in 1886.
8. The Andaman Isls, passed into British hands.
9. Malaya, occupied by Britain in 1895.
10. Siam, declared ``independent'' under Anglo-French control in 1904.
3811. Annam, occupied by the French in 1885. (This means North and South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.---Note by the author).
12. Taiwan and the Pescadores, annexed by Japan under the Simonoseki Treaty of 1895.
13. The Sulu Archipelago, seized by Britain.
14. The district where the British crossed the border and committed aggression.
15. The Ryukyu Islands, occupied by Japan in 1879.
16. Korea, declared ``independent'' in 1895 and annexed, in 1910, by Japan.
17. A large north-eastern area, made part of tsarist Russia by the Aigun Treaty, 1858.
18. A large north-eastern area, became a part of tsarist Russia by the Peking Treaty of 1860.
19. Sakhalin, divided between Russia and Japan.
The map needs no comment. Nevertheless, the following facts are worth noting. First, Liu Pei-hua's book would never have come out without the approval of high party and government authorities. Second, it is listed as recommended history material for teacher training schools and colleges in the PRC. That is to say, the map is to give teachers and pupils some knowledge of the lost might of feudal imperial China. Third, copies of the book with its map were widely circulated among visitors attending the Chinese trade exhibition in Mexico in December, 1963---January, 1965.
From Threats to Provocations
Another interesting fact is that the book did not get abroad until 1962 when an Indian student at Peking university, J. Mehta, showed the
39map to a fellow-student from Nepal. The latter, in turn, informed the Prime Minister of Nepal, who was on an official visit to Peking. The map was published in India the same year as the Chinese press accused Nehru of trying to restore the great Indian Empire.
In 1956 and 1957, when Peking came up with the slogan "let a hundred flowers bloom," there appeared statements in the Chinese press by people, mostly former Kuomintang supporters, who demanded a revision of borders with the USSR and restoration of areas which several centuries before had nominally belonged to the Chinese Empire or been regarded as being in its zone of influence. The demands were denounced---or so they seemed---by Chinese official circles. E.g., the organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China Jenmin jihpao published an article on June 29, 1957, entitled "Huang Chi-hsiang Is Exposed as a Double-Dealer, as an Anti-Communist and Anti-Socialist Demon," sharply criticising certain utterances of a member of the PRC State Defence Committee, a former Kuomintang general. The same happened with his colleague Lung Yun, whom the press at that time called a "Right-winger." In the provincial press, however, such utterances became quite common. The major paper of Heilungkiang (this province abuts on the Soviet Maritime Territory) openly called for a revision of the border with the USSR, demanding that Sakhalin, which presumably belonged to it, be returned to China.
Although such demands, said at the time to be "spearheaded against the basic interests of socialist China, for the purpose of spoiling re-
40lations with the fraternal Soviet Union," were officially denounced, it still makes one wonder why, after all, such views were freely allowed to be spread far and wide by the mass media.
It is certainly no exaggeration to say that by 1956-57 a nationalistic tendency had become apparent in the PRC, inspired by influential persons from among the higher leadership. This tendency had become so serious a problem that the 8th CPC Congress found it necessary to call attention to the danger of the regeneration of great-power chauvinism in China and the need to wage a determined struggle to suppress it.
Foreign Policy---the Continuation of Home Policy
Differences in the approach to the issue of the Soviet-Chinese border were brought into the open at a press conference given by Chou En-lai in April, 1960, in Katmandu. At it, the representative of the American Broadcasting Corporation asked Chou En-lai whether one was to believe recent reports to the effect that some parts of the Soviet-Chinese border were not firmly established. Chou En-lai answered that there were some slight discrepancies on the maps. "But you needn't trouble your head about them," he added.
So, at that time they merely mentioned "slight discrepancies" that could be "easily removed." One might expect that the Premier's words would be matched by the Chinese Government's actions, although the way in which Peking had presented its territorial claims to
41neutral India somewhat earlier had already aroused some suspicion.
Reality proved less optimistic. In late June, 1960, it led to the first incident provoked by the Chinese side north of Buz Aigyr Pass.
On November 29, the Soviet Ministry for Foreign Affairs delivered a note to the Chinese Ministry for Foreign Affairs informing the Chinese side of its readiness to conduct friendly consultations through normal diplomatic channels, if the Chinese side wishes so, despite the fact that the Soviet Union does not regard as disputable the question of Soviet sovereignty over the area northward of the Buz Aigyr mountain pass.
From then on nationalist tendencies became evident and were openly justified in the home and foreign policies of the PRC. They were expressed in the CPC stand publicly taken by Peking, which is diametrically opposed to the views and policy of the fraternal parties and countries on some present-day major issues, such as war and peace, peaceful co-existence, disarmament, etc.
On the home scene this policy has been expressed, among other things, in the practical measures affecting sixty national minorities living in China, which are being sinified.
At the same time official propaganda underwent a startling transformation: it began to extol the conquests of the feudal emperors, rulers of the Middle Kingdom. This was particularly obvious in the reassessment of the historical roles played by Chinghiz Khan and K' anghsi, an emperor of the Manchu dynasty who ruled from 1662 to 1722. The party press joined
42the campaign. Early in August, 1961, Jenmin jihpao wrote that "Chinghiz Khan in general has played a progressive role in the history of China." This opinion was enlarged upon by Lishih Yanchiu (An Historic Study), a scholarly monthly, which asserted in March, 1962, that Chinghiz Khan had played a similar role "in the history of forty other countries." The journal proudly stressed that Chinghiz Khan " regenerated our multinational state to what it was like under the Hans and T`angs'' (206 B.C. ---220 A. D. and 618-907 A. D.).
Concerning the conquests made by K'ang-hsi the Chinese historian Liu Ta wrote in Lishih Yanchiu: "Then our borders stretched from the Pacific Ocean in the East and the South Sea Islands in the South to the Himalayas in the West and Siberia in the North." The essence of such "historical arguments" is based on the chauvinistic principle that the PRC allegedly has a right to all areas ever seized by the feudal Chinese emperors.
The leadership-conceived campaign of lauding conquests paved the way for laying claims for territory belonging to their neighbours. In 1962, there was an armed border conflict with India. Provocations on the border with the USSR were becoming systematic. According to official sources, the Soviet border was crossed more than 5,000 times in 1962. The decisions of the 10th Plenum of the CPC Central Committee amounted to a programme for splitting the socialist camp.
The practical results of this attitude were not long in coming. In a leading article carried by Jenmin jihpao in March, 1963, attacking the
45Communist Party of the USA, the Chinese leadership for the first time officially pointed out the possibility of making territorial claims on the USSR. On July 10, 1964, Mao Tse-tung, talking with a group of Japanese Socialists, laid claim to 1.3 million square kilometres of Soviet territory.
Birds of a Feather
The great-power stand taken by Chinese leaders is more than similar to the attitude of the reactionary Taiwan regime. Even before his defeat, Chiang Kai-shek held the very same views that he set forth in his book China's Destiny and Chinese Economic Theory.
Border provocations are eloquent testimony of the nationalistic positions of the Chinese Government. Had the Chinese leaders been genuinely interested in finding a common language with the Soviet Government, it would not have been hard to do, and the problem could have been settled even during the first Soviet-Chinese consultations in Peking in the first half of 1964. For the Soviet Government displayed plenty of good will from the very start and would have had the dispute settled in the spirit of mutual understanding and respect, through friendly consultations. Also the Soviet Government repeated in its Statement of March 29 this year that it most resolutely rejected any encroachments on Soviet territory no matter who made them, and the Soviet Government has stuck to this position ever since the earliest memorandums were exchanged on the issue in mid1960.
Za rubezhom, 1969, No. 37, pp. 13-14
Y. KOSTIKOV
Peking's Great-Power Ambitions and Border Policy
The basic trends and principles of China's imperial foreign policy took shape centuries ago, under the influence of Confucianism. China's relations with her neighbours were based on the idea of China's greatness and kingpin position and the superiority of the Chinese to all other nations. Thus even in hoary antiquity, in the Han period, we find this in the emperor's message to Hsiung Nu chieftains: "Han rules through strength and loalty, leading all countries. All living under the Sun and Moon are his servants." '
This cult of the "Middle Kingdom," the centre of the "Celestial Empire," owes its origin to the indisputable historical fact that as far back as 2000 years ago there emerged on the territory of China a viable civilisation that greatly influenced the progress of many neighbouring peoples who were less developed socially and culturally. Brought up on the Confucian Canon for generations, the Chinese were accustomed to view all their neighbours, unfamiliar with Confucian civilisation, as barbarians.
In antiquity and during the Middle Ages China never kept in touch for any appreciable time
~^^1^^ See L. I. Duman. Foreign Relations of Ancient China and Sources of the Tribute System. In the collection China and Neighbours in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, Moscow, 1970, p. 42.
45with civilisations having a similar level of development. That nourished their faith in China's greatness, superiority, perfection and uniqueness, and the habit, too, of looking upon China's neighbours which felt the impact of her civilisation as "potential Chinese" of a sort. Bit by bit, such notions became predominant in the minds of China's rulers. The great Chinese revolutionary democrat Sun Yat-sen pointed out in this regard that "China thought very highly of her own achievements and less than nothing of those of other countries. It became a habit, something to be considered quite natural." '
But China was not the sole maker of history in the Far East. Often enough she fell under the domination of states set up near China by `` barbarians'' (the Kitans, Chin Tatars, Mongols, Manchus). Up to the 19th century China maintained relations mostly with her immediate neighbours with which she had a common border.
The border by no means has always appeared as it does today. Sometimes the bounds of the Chinese Empire's jurisdiction were geographically determined, as is usually the case today, with some natural feature forming the line of demarcation. Or it appeared as a strip of indeterminate width. Often there even were small states in it, a vassal of China, or more often both of China and the other adjoining, state. Such dual dependence, as often as not, became purely nominal, guaranteeing, in fact, complete independence to such vassal states. The numerous Kachin states that lay between China
' Sun Yat-sen. Selected Works, Moscow, 1964, p. 250 (Russ. ed.).
and the Burmese kingdom of Ava are a case in point. British residents in Bhamo (Upper Burma) reported, for example, that Kachin chieftains received titles and badges of office from the governor of Yunnan and the king of Ava. When they came to Bhamo, they sported both, and they wore them simply for ornament, not as insignia.'
As for China, there was a twofold aspect to the border question.
On the one hand, according to the Confucian Canon, the Celestial Empire was comprised of China plus the lands populated by peoples other than the Chinese, by the "barbarians," who were, by definition, vassals of the Son of Heaven, the Chinese Emperor. Since ancient times the Celestial Empire had been divided into socalled "subordinate provinces" or fu.^^2^^ Thus from the official standpoint of all dynastic chronicles and historical notes a boundary was the demarcation line between ``civilised'' China and the ``barbarians'' Or what separated the latter, the vassals of the Emperor, from one another. It did not much matter which, for they were all internal boundaries of the Celestial Empire, the kingdom of the Son of Heaven.
On the other hand, the boundary was a purely practical demarcation line separating the tribute-paying areas from those on which taxes were levied. At the same time, no matter how ``blind'' they might pretend to be to the inva-
~^^1^^ D. Woodman. The Making of Burma, London, 1962, p. 277.
~^^2^^ For further detail see L. I. Duman. Op. eft., pp. 24-25.
46 47sions of China proper by her ``vassal'' neighbours, the authorities had to do something to restrain the invaders and defend China's borders. And they defended China's own borders, not those of what the Chinese described as their "dominions.''
That was the purpose of the Great Wall in ancient times. As the conquering emperors extended the boundaries of the empire, other means of defending its borders were devised. Under the Ch'in dynasty they set up the " willow palisade" in the north-east, fortified gates in the west and south-west, and standing and mobile pickets in the north-west.
The efforts to consolidate, or rather to systematise, the defence of China's borders did not mean that the Chinese emperors had no appetite for expansion. Since ancient times the best monument an emperor or dynasty could wish for was to have joined new territories to China, making them a part of the imperial administrative system. This explains why the conquests of Wu Ti, K'ang-hsi, Chian Lung and others are venerated in China to this day.
Some historians in the PRC---e.g., Liu Tanien---praise K'ang-hsi, who conducted incessant wars to expand his empire, because under his rule China became a powerful country with a "vast territory." '
The Mongol or the Yuan dynasty, founded by Kublai, the conqueror of China, annexed much land in the north and north-west to the empire, routing the states situated on the territory
of what now is Yunnan. The Ming dynasty--- the last national Chinese dynasty under which the formation of the national territory of China was completed---lost some of the land annexed by the Yuan dynasty, in particular Tibet, East Turkestan and Mongolia. In the heyday of Ming China the northern boundary followed the Great Wall.' As a result of long wars of conquest, besides its native Manchuria the Manchu Ch'in dynasty, which replaced the Ming dynasty, included in its empire China, Mongolia, Dzungaria, East Turkestan, and attempted to seize a part of Russian Amur area, the Shan States in the north of Burma, establishing its suzerainty over the countries of Indochina and Korea.^^2^^
It is worth noting that the Chinese nationalists of diverse periods, while condemning the foreign dynasties for their suppression and discrimination of the Han Chinese, at the same time considered their foreign policies, and specifically the expansion of China by additions of new territory, perfectly legitimate.
In present-day China, the predatory policy of the emperors, in particular of the early Ch'in emperors, is described as "unification of the country." Moreover, the Ch'in dynasty is praised for its alleged contribution to the "rubbing off of national borders" between the peoples included in the empire as the result of the sanguinary Manchu-Chinese military campaigns. The contemporary Chinese historian Liu Ta-
~^^1^^ N. F. Demidova and V. S. Miasnikov. Early Russian Diplomats in China, Moscow, 1966, p. 46.
~^^2^^ The last-mentioned point is contested by historians of the countries referred to.
Lishih Yanchiu, 1961, No. 3, p. 7.
4---229
49nien in an article entitled ``K'ang-hsi" even attempted to prove that this predatory policy supposedly "was in the interests of the mass of the people" and therefore "to view the unification of the entire country accomplished by K' anghsi simply as territorial expansion or subjugation of other nationalities is to subscribe to local bourgeois nationalism . . ." ' This view was also reflected in the official attitude of the PRO Government as expressed, for instance, in the so-called "Document of the PRO Ministry for Foreign Affairs" of October 8, 1969. It describes the Ch'in conquest of Dzungaria, in the course of which the indigenous population was killed off, as "suppression (the author's italics) of Dzungaria by the Ch'in dynasty.''~^^2^^
The imperial foreign policy of medieval China may be characterised mainly by two points. Firstly, the practice of territorial expansion, the addition of other lands to the empire. There is nothing unusual about this with regard to international relations in the Middle Ages. Secondly, and quite specifically, it is characterised by the Chinese emperors' persistent and not unsuccessful attempts to ensure at least a semblance of China's preeminence, which might be purely formal so long as it corresponded to the Confucian sinocentrist model of the world.
Periods of China's strength and expansion alternated with periods of decline, when the-- borders contracted under pressure of external forces, as some territories were lost. Therefore it is possible to say that in the course of these
changes, fully in keeping with the Confucian teachings on the need to maintain the status quo, there shaped the basic principle of China's traditional foreign policy. It was the demand for the ``recovery'' of all "lost territory."
The fact that such territories once used to be in contact with China was sufficient reason, for Chinese authorities, to regard them as China's own. That also gave rise to the peculiar method of proving that the territories belonged to China and citing historical precedent as an argument for the reunification of the ``lost'' territories with China. ' It is worth noting that they considered Chinese not only such territories as had indeed been integral parts of China, e.g., the present colonial enclaves of Hong Kong (Hsiang Kang) and Macao (Aomen), but all those through which the imperial armies had once passed or which had been visited by Chinese merchants. ^^2^^
As China was reduced to the position of a dependent state in the latter half of the 19th century, the most advanced section of Chinese society was impelled to look for ways to defend the country from utter enslavement. But even this, the most progressive, section of Chinese society, being completely under the influence of the old ``traditional'' ideology, was far from giving up the sinocentrist Confucian mo-
~^^1^^ Cf., Chang Cheng-sun. China-British Relations Oner the Yunnan-Burma Border, Peiping, 1937, p. 11 (Chinese ed.).
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 72-73.
~^^1^^ Lishih Yanchiu, 1961, No. 3, pp. 7-8.
^^2^^ Jenmin jihpao, October 9, 1969.
50del of the world. It was reflected first of all in the nationalist leaders' stand on what China's relations should be with her neighbours which, to repeat, had been regarded since ancient times as China's vassals, some sort of " practically Chinese" territory.
So, K'ang Yu-wei, a theorist and leader of the movement for reforms in China, wrote: "Foreigners are advancing on us on all sides. The seizure of the Liuchiu Islands and loss of Annam and Burma have clipped our wings and laid the interior of our country (My italics.--- Y. K.), its stomach and heart, open to attack outside." ' From this it follows that K'ang Yuwei regarded the countries referred to at most as the outlying, "exterior regions" of China, not as independent sovereign states.
A similar attitude was shared later on also by some leaders of the revolutionary-democratic republican section of the national bourgeoisie. It is from this standpoint that the bourgeois historians Hua Chi-yun, Hsing Peng-chu and others view the proclamation of independence of Thailand, Nepal and Mongolia, equating these events with the seizure of Burma by Britain, Indochina by France and Korea by Japan.~^^2^^
The ideologists of the reformers and revolutionary democrats, and to a great extent also the leaders of all political movements later-on,
synonymised the notion of saving China from the threat of imperialist enslavement with the idea of restoring her prestige, her former might and leading position in the world, the latter being understood in a very broad sense.
Whereas Sun Yat-sen merely wanted China to end her ages-old backwardness and "spread her wings and stand proudly," ' i.e., join the great powers, K'ang Yu-wei was in a much more militant and aggressive mood. One of his poems, for example, is a frank apology of chauvinism and expansionism. It expressed K'ang Yu-wei's dream of the time when ". . .we shall stride across the five continents where you will see the Yellow Dragon banners fly and dance.''~^^2^^
The changes brought by the 1911 revolution had no effect on the traditional views of Chinese ruling circles on the country's essential foreign policy objectives. Nevertheless, neither the Yuan Shih-kai, nor the militarist cliques, nor the Kuomintang government by which they were superseded had either the strength or means to resume the territorial expansion of the last dynasties.
The Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-shek subsequently wrote on imperialist expansion in China at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries: "The memory of the disastrous loss (My italics---Y. K.) of Ryukyu (Liuchiu Islands), Hong Kong, Formosa, the Pescadores, Indochina, Burma, and Korea was
~^^1^^ In S. L. Tikhvinski. Chinese Reform Movement and K'ang Yu-wei, Moscow, 1959, pp. 58-59.
~^^2^^ Hua Chi-yun. China's Borders, Shanghai, 1932, pp. V-VI (Chinese ed.); Hsing Peng-chu. China's History Ouer the Recent Hundred Years, Shanghai, 1938, Part III, Chapters II and III, pp. 113-168 (Chinese ed.).
52~^^1^^ Sun Yat-sen. Op. cit., p. 122.
~^^2^^ Sophia H. Chen Zen (ed.). Symposium on Chinese Culture, Shanghai, 1931, p. 308.
53still fresh, while the final calamity of the partitioning of the whole country was impending." '
To restore China's territory in the borders of the Taiching Empire in its heyday was something the Kuomintang was unable to do, though it would not strike it off the political agenda. At that time China devised a new way of staking off territorial claims, subsequently referred to by Western writers as "map aggression." The Chinese Government would issue maps showing China's borders not as they were, according to international documents, but as Chinese rulers would have liked to have seen them.
Such maps began to appear after 1925, when, following the patriotic and nationalist upsurge in China, ideologists of nationalism paid primary attention to the territorial question. Take, for example, the map in Hua Chi-yun's China's Borders.^^2^^ According to Hua Chi-yun, the Ch'in Empire stretched to the Hi in the west, Hingan in the north, Sakhalin in the east and South Sea Islands in the south, and "Korea in the north-east, the Kazakhs, Buryats, Khakassians, Bukhara and Afghanistan in Central Asia, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Burma and Annam---all of them defended China's borders...''~^^3^^
Hua Chi-yun's map of "territorial losses" and his conception of the borders, which reflected the views of Chinese rulers, received support from some leaders of the Communist Party of China, Mao Tse-tung above all. In some of his articles and press interviews Mao Tse-tung ex-
pressed certain ideas showing that on the territorial question he supported the traditional great-power foreign policy line.
Talking to Edgar Snow, an American journalist, in 1936 in Yenan, Mao Tse-tung expressed the idea that after a victorious revolution in China, Mongolia would automatically and on her own become a part of China.l Three years later, in an article entitled "The Chinese Revolution and the Communist Party of China," Mao Tse-tung wrote about the invasion of China by the imperialist forces: "Having defeated China in war, they occupied many states dependent on China, and a part of China's territory. Japan occupied Korea, Taiwan, Ryukyu, the Pescadores and Port Arthur; Britain seized Burma, Bhutan, Nepal and Hong Kong; France seized Annam; and little Portugal seized our Macao.''^^2^^
This utterance was not, however, taken seriously while the war against the Japanese was in progress. Its full import became clear only after the Mao Tse-tung group came to power in China.
In 1950, the first edition of the wall map of the People's Republic of China was brought
~^^1^^ Edgar Snow. Red Star Over China, London, 1937, p. 102.
~^^2^^ Mao Tse-tung. The Chinese Revolution and the Communist Party of China, Tungpei, 1949, p. 8 (in Chinese). In all subsequent editions this passage was altered, viz.: "Having defeated China in war, they not only occupied many states bordering on China that were under her protection, but seized or `leased' part of their territory. For example, Japan occupied Taiwan and the Pescadores and `leased' Port Arthur, Britain seized Hong Kong, and France `leased' Kwangchow Wan." Mao Tse-tung. Set. Works, v. 3. London, 1954, p. 78.
5*
~^^1^^ Chiang Kai-shek. China's Destiny and Chinese Economic Theory, New York, p. 58.
~^^2^^ Hua Chi-yun. Op. cit., p. 50.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 5.
54out.l The interesting thing about this map is that sections of China's borders in the area of the Pamirs, in the Himalayas and along Burma are marked on it either as "not fixed" or not as they have been established in international treaties. The map provoked diplomatic protests from China's neighbours, in particular from Burma. At that time, however, the Chinese Government did not choose to state its position on the question pleading that the people's government had merely reproduced the old map prepared under the Kuomintang.~^^2^^
One might accept this explanation but for the repeated publication of similarly ``erring'' maps, which made China's neighbours focus attention to that question.^^3^^
In 1954, Peking put out Short History of Modern China by Liu Pei-hua, which contained a map showing China's "territorial losses" after the Opium Wars.^^4^^ The appearance of this map left no doubt about the real attitude of the Maoist leaders towards traditional foreign policy.
Liu Pei-hua's map in principle coincides with the map in China's Borders by Hua Chi-yun. There is, however, a substantial difference.
While Hua Chi-yun indicates on his map to what extent this or that ``lost'' area was dependent on the Chinese central government, Liu Pei-hua considers it unessential.
The designation of Mongolia on both maps is highly revealing. Neither mentions the existence of the sovereign Mongolian People's Republic. But while Hua Chi-yun indicates Mongolia on his map. even though he joins it to Inner Mongolia, Liu Pei-hua includes the Mongolian People's Republic in China without mentioning its existence.
Incidentally, Mongolia was the touchstone of Maoist great-power foreign policy with regard to the territorial question. After the victorious Chinese revolution Mongolia did not "go back" to China, contrary to what Mao Tse-tung had expected. He therefore decided to speed up developments, taking advantage of the visit to Peking in 1954 of a Soviet Party and Government delegation. Ten years afterwards, Mao Tse-tung told a Japanese Socialist Party delegation that he had demanded from them (the Soviet leaders) that they return Outer Mongolia, but they had not complied.
In the hands of the Mao Tse-tung group "map aggression" no longer looks so harmless. In 1955, soon after the Bandung Conference at which Premier Chou En-lai assured the AfroAsian countries that China had no expansionist plans whatsoever,' Chinese troops ambushed a formation of Burmese troops.~^^2^^ In August, 1959,
~^^1^^ The Map of China, Yahsiya yu tisue she Publishers, Peking, VIII, 1950.
~^^2^^ D. Woodman. Op. cit., p. 523.
~^^3^^ Cf., An Atlas of Provinces of the People's Republit of China, Shanghai, 1951, maps No. 1, 31, 47, 49; An Atlas of the People's Republic of China, Peking-- Shanghai, 1957, maps No. 5-6, 7-8, 44-45, 70-71, 72-73; The New World Atlas (a pocket edition), Shanghai, 1954, maps No. 2, 3, 7, 9, 12.
~^^4^^ Liu Pei-hua. Short History of Modern China, Peking, 1954, p. 253 (Chinese ed.).
56~^^1^^ Chinese Foreign Policy: Collected Documents ( further referred to as Collected Documents), Peking, 1958, Issue No. 3, pp. 248, 251.
~^^2^^ The Nation (Rangoon), July 31, 1956.
57Chinese soldiers ambushed an Indian border patrol in the Himalayas.' In 1960, the Chinese ambushed some Nepal border-guards.^^2^^ In 1962, Chinese troops invaded the disputed areas along the China-India border. Lastly, in 1969, bloodshedding incidents took place on the SovietChinese border, the Chinese troops following the well-practised method of ambush.~^^3^^
All these armed incidents occurred in the territories marked on the Chinese maps as ``lost'' or at sections of the border marked on the Chinese maps as "unfixed.''
Taking a closer look at these events, one is bound to be struck by Peking's refusal to discuss territorial disputes, as is usually done, through diplomatic channels before they have become acute and while they still can be settled quickly and without conflict. A border dispute involving the use of arms from the start naturally becomes extremely acute, affecting relations between two countries in general and often affecting the international situation as well.
At the same time the territorial disputes did not begin with the armed incidents. Not at all. They can be traced to the repeated publication of maps in China designating China's borders in accordance with the conception the Chinese rulers have of them. The incidents themselves marked the start of a new stage in Chinese bor-
der policy, ' i.e., "map aggression" developing into ordinary aggression.
Thus by the mid-sixties it had become clear that the Mao Tse-tung group, contrary to the theory and practice of international law, had refused in fact to recognise the treaties determining China's borders. Peking thereby mooted the question of territories which, after the `` correction'' of the borders, could or should be restored to China. Yes, "restored," because, according to Liu Pei-hua's map, China today is surrounded on all sides by ``lost'' territories allegedly seized from it at various dates.
The question of ``restoration'' of territory was posed by Peking in this order. In 1954, they laid claim to 1.5 million sq. km of Mongolian territory; in 1956, to 70,000 sq. km of Burmese territory; in 1959, they claimed 130,000 sq. km of Indian territory; and lastly, in 1964, they claimed 1.5 million sq. km of Soviet territory.~^^2^^ Roughly, the area which the Maoists have laid claim to in the past twenty years amounts to 3.2 million sq. km, i.e. to a third of China's own territory (9.9 mln. sq. km) or to the combined territory of India and Bangladesh (3.18 mln sq. km).
In its border disputes, the Government of the People's Republic of China reiterates the ar-
~^^1^^ By "border policy" is meant the sum total of special foreign policy moves directly associated with the border-territorial issue.
~^^2^^ China's territorial claims for Soviet territory were first mentioned by Mao Tse-tung in a talk with a delegation of the Socialist Party of Japan on July 10, 1964. See Pravda, September 2, 1964. (Also see pp. 1836 of this Collection.)
~^^1^^ R. Sanghvi. India's Northern Frontier and China, Bombay, 1962, pp. 16-17.
~^^2^^ The Hindustan Times, June 30, 1960.
~^^3^^ See, for instance, Pravda, March 3. 1969.
58 59guments used in Ch'in China, merely insisting that the given place had always belonged to China in the past. In other words, trying to attain the goals of traditional imperial foreign policy the Maoist leadership uses also the traditional arguments based on the principle of historical precedent. This is particularly obvious from Peking's attitude with regard to the border dispute between China and Burma. As is known, in the 19th century China claimed large areas in the north of Burma and along the eastern coast of the river Salween. The reason the Ch'in Government gave for its claim to these areas was that the local tribes had always made up part of the territorial units administered by the governor of Yunnan.J They backed this up by providing information to show it had been necessary for local chieftains to have the approval of the governor of Yunnan from whom they received ranks and titles current in China; that these areas were visited by Chinese officials, and so forth.~^^2^^ No serious written evidence that China had exercised effective control over these areas was ever adduced.
The first official document produced by the People's Republic of China on the issue---- Premier Chou En-lai's speech at the 4th Session of the 1st National Congress of People's Representatives on July 9, 1957---merely referred to the past border incidents as results of Britain's agr gression against China.~^^3^^ The implication was, however, that the incidents had occurred on
Chinese territory, i.e. that the "disputed areas" were China's, not Burma's.
The border dispute between China and Burma was the first of a series of disputes. In the course of the conflict and subsequent exchange of letters and talks Peking diplomatic service tested different tactical methods of border policy. Judging from what followed, they must have found it best to use the ``traditional'' arguments plus actual physical pressure, i.e. force.
In the border dispute with India the Chinese side also made much of ethnography, geography, linguistics, etc., which were to support the chief argument that all "disputed areas" historically belonged to China, that in the past there had been Chinese authorities there and China had levied taxes on the population, and so on.
So long as there are merely historical arguments---which the other side can also come up with---it means that in order to find a mutually acceptable solution to the border, and therefore territorial, dispute, all facts that can help two countries to reach a settlement must be painstakingly and thoughtfully elucidated. It is, however, obvious that Peking simply disregards the arguments supplied by the other side, rejecting them beforehand as wrong, falsified, antiChinese, etc. Nor do they bother to observe the elementary rules of diplomatic behaviour that are customary in international relations.
This position led British sinologist C. P. Fitzgerald to the legitimate conclusion that the Confucian sinocentrist conception, whereby the ruler of China alone may be the interpreter of truth, has been preserved intact in present-day
61~^^1^^ Chang Cheng-sun. Op. cit., p. 137.
~^^2^^ D. Woodman. Op. cit., p. 277.
~^^3^^ Collected Documents, Peking, 1958, Issue No. 4, pp. 343-344.
60China. The interpretation given by Chinese leaders is, in spite of all, always correct, and truth is always just the way they view it. '
It is apt to recall at this point that back in November, 1937, Mao Tse-tung said: "Our nation has a history of several thousand years, a history which has its own characteristics and is full of treasures.. . We must make a summing-up from Confucius down to Sun Yat-sen and inherit this precious legacy.''~^^2^^
Today there can be no doubt that the Maoist grouping has picked out all that was evil and reactionary in Chinese history and is making use of it.
Just as many centuries ago, "Chinese schoolchildren are taught that China is the hub of the world, that their empire was founded by Heaven, that all foreigners are barbarians who can be saved only by recognising the supremacy of the leader of the Celestial Empire, the all-- powerful leader of mankind.''^^3^^ This idea permeates the policy articles recently carried by Hungchi magazine in an attempt to reassess world history from a sinocentrist viewpoint.^^4^^
The Peking diplomats today are using many methods and tactical tricks borrowed from the diplomatic stock-in-trade of the Ch'in dynasty and the Kuomintang regime. Among them is the "map aggression" technique, developed by
the Kuomintang and repeatedly resorted to by the Maoists. A few months ago Peking again demonstrated its willingness to go on using it. Titu Chupanshe press has brought out a new World Atlas l which repeats the ``inexactitudes'' of the previous cartographic publications.
The printing of the atlas demonstrates once again that in the matter of border and territorial claims the Maoist diplomats do not intend to pay heed to the international treaties and agreements on borders, sticking mainly to the point of view they have borrowed from their political predecessors.
All these facts show that the present leaders of the People's Republic of China continue the border policy of the Ch'in China and Kuomintang regime based on great-power imperial ambitions.
Problemy Dalnego Vostoka (Far Eastern Affairs), 1973,
No, 1, pp. 53-62
G. APALIN
The Maoist Conception of Geography
Peking's State Publishing House, Titu Chupanshe, has put out a new World Atlas that is being widely circulated. This seemingly harmless Atlas goes far beyond the customary conception of geography. Studying it, one is amazed at the tricks tried by Chinese propaganda
~^^1^^ For a detailed discussion of this Atlas see the next article.
~^^1^^ C. P. Fitzgerald. The Chinese View of Their Place in the World, London, 1964, p. 41.
~^^2^^ Mao Tse-tung. Sel. Works, London, 1954, v. 2, p. 260.
~^^3^^ Le Monde, November 26, 1963.
~^^4^^ See, e.g. Hungchi, 1972, No. 4, pp. 16-21; No. 5, pp. 18-24; No. 6, pp. 33-40; No. 7, pp. 5-11.
62 63to "back up" and to put across (this time in a geographical package, in the guise of explanations of the maps) its great-power view of the world, its interpretation of the events and the situation in one country or another---an interpretation which is often far from the real state of affairs.
The Atlas reflects Peking's contempt for certain states and for their history, and great-- power arrogance: Peking has been establishing political and trade contacts with Malaysia and emphasising that it is eager to increase trade with Singapore, but it behaves as though these two countries were not independent states. The authors of the Atlas cannot bear to call Malaysia by its official name and insist on calling it "Malaya," thus making it clear that it does not recognise its sovereignty. And the material on Singapore is presented in such a way as to make it difficult to determine if it is an independent state or part of some country.
The Peking leaders have tried repeatedly to create the impression that they have changed their attitude towards Burma. They declared they intended to normalise relations with that country which were very strained as a result of Chinese interference in the internal affairs of Rangoon in 1967. Yet Peking failed to provide assurances that it would not interfere in the future, that it would stop supporting anti-- government forces in Burma. By following this line, the authors of the Atlas clearly express their admiration for the "great success" (so they imagine) of the "armed struggle" waged by these forces against the Revolutionary Council of Burma.
64The history of Mongolia's struggle for national liberation is outlined in, to say the least, a disrespectful way. Peking wants the Chinese people to forget that right from the first it has been the policy of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party and the Mongolian People's Republic to support the struggle of the Chinese working people for a new life, that the Soviet people sent help to the Chinese people through Mongolia. The leadership of the People's Republic of China seems to be unable to forgive the Mongolian people for having cast off the yoke of Chinese colonialism sixty years ago. According to the authors of the Atlas, it was not the protracted struggle of the Mongolian people that liberated their country from the yoke of the Chinese emperors in 1911, but what they call the "instigation of tsarist Russia." They arbitrarily delete the historic victory of the anti-imperialist, anti-feudal popular revolution of 1921 from the history of Mongolia.
The whole section of the Atlas dealing with the MPR once again bears out the appraisal given by Comrade Yumjaagiyn Tsedenbal at the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties held in 19(59: "The Mongolian People's Republic, one of China's neighbours, is directly affected by the Mao group's anti-- socialist policy, being exposed to its hostile attacks all down the line. . . The Mao group's anti-- Mongolian policies and actions are based on its great-power chauvinist claims to our country, which they picked up from the Chinese militarists and the Chiang Kai-shek clique. As you know, Mao Tse-tung's latest statement of intention to annex Mongolia was made as recently as
5-2S9
«
1964 in a talk with a group of Japanese Socialists.''
In keeping with Peking's present doctrines Ihe authors of the Atlas refuse to recognise the existence of the socialist system. They do recall, however, 'that after the Second World War, China, Korea and Vietnam scored victories in the people's revolution and in the anti-imperialist struggle in Asia and took the socialist path, and that most of the states in Central and SouthEastern Europe broke away from the capitalist system and became socialist-oriented. But then the Atlas goes on to say that China is the only "great beacon of socialism" in Asia, and Albania in Europe.
For some reason or other the compilers of the Atlas have forgotten to mention the emergence and consolidation of Latin America's first socialist state---Cuba.
Peking's present desire to go to any lengths to pit some countries against others and arouse distrust between them is reflected in the Atlas. It supplies wrong and provocative information about the socialist countries and their history, about the nature of their foreign economic relations and so on.
In the section on Europe, the Atlas criticises the nature of relations among the membercountries of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance. For a long time Peking kept muni about major steps taken by these countries to further enhance and improve their co-operation. The Atlas seems to have tried to compensate for the period of "restraint." In this publication Chinese propaganda has done its best to slander CMEA activity.
M
Obviously socialist economic integral ion, the co-ordination of national economic plans, and specialisation and co-operation in the production of the fraternal countries are not to Peking's liking. Seeking to discredit the socialist countries' co-operation, the compilers of the Atlas accuse the CMEA members of having set up some sort of "supranational structures" in the fields of finance, industrial production and power engineering, of practising non-equivalent exchange and the like. Not knowing how to go about discrediting the advantages that the socialist countries gain by co-operating, the Atlas has stooped so low as to groundlessly blame CMEA activity for, as it says, "today in 'the CMEA member-- countries many branches for which there is an abundance of raw materials have not been developed as yet." No wonder the Atlas, which contains numerous figures, does not supply data on the level of economic development of the CMEA countries; and it refrains from furnishing facts showing that in economic growth they are developing at a faster pace than the capitalist countries. Fearing that the correct figures would completely refute their inventions, the compilers have omitted them.
Against this background, the Atlas is clearly sympathetic to the desire of a number of capitalist states to widen the Common Market and attain economic integration in Western Europe. In regard to Western Europe, the Atlas does not put the words ``integration'' in inverted commas, as it does when it refers to the socialist countries. This, in itself, clearly shows just where Peking stands. The processes taking place in Western Europe are presented as an instrument
6*
67
for the struggle against "interference and control on the part of the two superpowers." Incidentally, this geopolitical concept, devoid of class content and suited to the hegemonic goals of Picking, keynotes all sections of the Atlas.
The Maoists have come up with the "two superpowers" doctrine to justify their struggle against the Soviet Union. In the Atlas it is mainly used to turn the reader against the Soviet Union. Peking's new geographical `` research'' contains no end of blatant distortions and slander, and is very anti-Soviet. In a way it is a collection of the usual anti-Sovietisms that Chinese propaganda has been coming out with in recent years and which the radio stations and press of the imperialist states gladly take up. It goes in for such propaganda cliches as " social-imperialism," "division of the sphere of influence" and "plunder of the peoples" of the whole world.
But this is not the only thing that catches the eye in the sections of the Atlas on the Soviet Union. The authors falsify the history of relations between Russia and China so as to justify the Chinese leadership's territorial claims to one and a half million square kilometres of Soviet territory. They use the ``arguments'' of "unequal treaties" between Russia and China on frontier issues, about Chinese lands allegedly ``seized'' by Russia, and so on. All this amounts to an out-and-out claim to Soviet territory, an attempt to question the validity of the existing frontier between the USSR and the PRC.
The ``arguments'' cited are taken from official slatements issued by the Chinese leadership
68when it embarked upon open hostility against the Soviet Union and stated its foreign policy expansionist ambitions, when it made unlawful territorial claims on the USSR and went so far as to organise armed conflicts on the SovietChinese border. The Soviet Government has repeatedly particularly in its statements of March 29 and June 13, 1969, shown to the fullest extent the utter inconsistency of Peking's claims to Soviet lands. Everybody knows that there are no "unequal treaties" defining the present frontier between the USSR and the PRC---a frontier that was historically established and legally formalised in Russian-Chinese treaties.
Immediately after the Great October Socialist Revolution, Lenin's decrees annulled all unequal and secret treaties that tsarist Russia had concluded with foreign states, including China. The Soviet Republic officially renounced what had been tsarist Russia's sphere of influence in China, exterritorial rights and consular jurisdiction. The Appeal of the Soviet Government to the Chinese people and to the governments of North and South China enumerated the treaties considered to be unequal by the Soviet Government. The abrogation of the unequal treaties was legally formalised in the May 31, 1924 agreement on general principles regulating issues between the USSR and the Chinese Republic.
Neither the Appeal of 1919 nor the 1924 agreement between the Soviet Union and the Chinese Republic designated (nor could they do so) what would come under the category of unequal or secret treaties that define the present Soviet-Chinese frontier. So naturally there was
69no question of abrogating or revising them. In no document of the Soviet Government, in no statement of Lenin are the treaties on the frontier with China regarded as unequal or as subject to revision. Nowhere and never did Lenin doubt the validity of the border between the USSR and China.
This was perfectly clear to the Chinese revolutionaries, who, relying on the Soviet Union's help and support, led the struggle for the national and social emancipation of the Chinese people. It is pertinent to recall that the leaders of the Communist Party of China, and later the PRC Government as well, repeatedly emphasised that after the October Revolution, the Soviet stale based its relations with China on equality and respect for the sovereign rights of the Chinese people. In 1945, Mao Tse-tung told tha Seventh Congress of the CPC that "the Soviet Union was the first to renounce the unequal treaties and to conclude new, equal treaties with China." He said the same thing in Moscow on December 16, 1949. Under the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance between the USSR and the PRC of February 14, 1950, the two sides committed themselves to build their relations on the principles of " mutual respect for national sovereignty and territorial integrity.''
Everything would seem to be clear. Why, then, did the Chinese authorities, by publishing the World Atlas, made a new attempt to cast doubt on the historically established and legally endorsed frontier between the USSR and China? Why have they been claiming territory belonging to the USSR and occupied by Soviet
70people? Are they not out to fabricate a " territorial problem" which would complicate relations between the neighbours for years to come?
As a matter of fact, the People's Republic of China is the only large state whose leadership is instigating territorial disputes with its neighbours in the north and south, east and west. But those who make absurd claims on the USSR and cast doubt as to whether a specific part of Soviet territory really belongs to the Soviet Union ought to bear in mind how Soviet people would feel about such claims.
In seeking to put across Maoist political concepts, the authors of the Atlas make many geographical blunders. They say that the Soviet Union is a purely "European country." But their arguments do not hold water. After calling the Soviet Union a purely "European country," they start naming the bordering countries. It turns out that of the 12 countries bordering on the USSR, six are Asian states, and the land border with just one of them---China---is nearly 7,500 kilometres long. Moreover the Atlas deliberately fails to mention that two-thirds of the USSR's territory is situated in Asia. It just does not suit the Peking politicians and geographers that, by virtue of its location, the USSR is both a European as well as an Asian country. The reason for wanting to deny this has nothing to do with geography.
Taking all this into account, one might say what Peking has put out is not a World Atlas but a "hostility Atlas." The purpose of such books is to kindle enmity between the Chinese and Soviet peoples, to get the Chinese people to hate other nations, especially their neigh-
71hours, and to revise China's frontiers with adjacent countries. It is dangerous to act in this way and it could have serious consequences.
Izveslia, July 7, 1972
the People's Republic of China through the Chinese Embassy in Moscow on March 29, 1969, the Soviet Government declared it was in favour of the Soviet and Chinese official representatives resuming in the near future the consultations which had begun in Peking in 1964.
``The Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR proposes to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China that consultations be resumed between government spokesmen for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the People's Republic of China and expresses its readiness to start such consultations in Moscow, on April 15, 1969, or at any other dale in the near future convenient to the Chinese side.
``In view of the importance of the question, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR hopes to receive an early reply to this note.''
Pravdn, April 12, 1909
Note of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's
Republic of China
On April 11, 1969, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the USSR sent the following note to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China through the Chinese Embassy in Moscow:
``The Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics hereby informs the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China of the following:
``In the autumn of 1964, during the consultations in Peking the delegation of the Soviet Union headed by P. I. Zyryanov and the delegation of the People's Republic of China headed by Tseng Yung-chiuan reached agreement that these consultations would be continued iu Moscow. The Soviet delegation suggested October 15, 1964, as the date for resuming the . consultations, but the consultations were not resumed on that date through no fault of the Soviet side.
``In its statement sent to the Government of
722. PROVOCATIONS BY MAOISTS ON THE SOVIET-CHINESE BORDER. PEKING'S ATTEMPTS TO FALSIFY HISTORY
Well known. These were intentional actions planned in advance.
On the morning of March 2, 1969, a Soviet observation post discovered the violation by some 30 Chinese servicemen of the Soviet border at Damansky Island. A group of Soviet frontier guards, led by an officer, headed for the violators with the intention, as was the case in the past, of making a protest and demanding that the latter leave Soviet territory. The Chinese servicemen let the Soviet frontier guards advance to within several metres and then suddenly, without any warning, opened fire at them point-blank.
Simultaneously from ambushes on Uamansky Island, to which the Chinese soldiers had earlier advanced under cover of darkness, and from the Chinese bank fire was opened by artillery, mortars and automatic weapons at another group of Soviet frontier guards stationed near the Soviet bank, who went into action and with the support of the neighbouring frontier post drove the violators from Soviet territory. This perfidious attack resulted in casualties on both sides, in dead and wounded.
Despite the Soviet Government's warning and appeal to abstain from such provocations, the Chinese side, on March 14-15, in this same district made new attempts at armed intrusion into Soviet territory. Sub-units of the regular Chinese Army supported by artillery and mortar fire attacked Soviet frontier troops guarding Damansky Island. The attack was resolutely repulsed and the violators were driven off Soviet territory. This provocation by the Chinese side resulted in new casualties.
75USSR Government Statement of March 29, 1969
Recently on the Ussuri River in the Damansky Island area there had been armed border incidents provoked by the Chinese side. The Chinese authorities did not have, nor can they have any justification for organising such incidents, for engaging in actions leading to clashes and bloodshed. Such events can only bring joy to those who would like by any means available to create deep enmity between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China. Such events have nothing in common with the interests of the Soviet and Chinese peoples.
I
The circumstances of the armed attacks on Soviet frontier guards on the Ussuri River are
74Today the Chinese authorities in their statements attempt to disclaim responsibility for the armed clashes. They assert that Soviet frontier guards, not the Chinese, violated the state border and that this island does not belong to the Soviet Union. The Chinese side does not contest the fact that its servicemen acted in accordance with a plan prepared beforehand, although it attempts, by making false statements, to present the Chinese violators' use of weapons as a "forced measure.''
It is clear from the Chinese statements that the question of Damansky Island is only part of the alleged territorial problem inherited from the past and which still awaits its solution and is connected with the recarving of state frontiers. The Chinese Government shows no desire to take into account the existing treaties between China and the USSR, ignores the practice of Soviet-Chinese inter-state relations which had existed for many years and juggles with history, adapting it to its territorial claims.
Obviously, all this stems from the radical changes that have taken place during the last few years in the policy pursued by the PRC Government with regard to the Soviet Union and the Soviet people.
As is known, Chinese official propaganda in general raises questions concerning the present borders of China with her neighbouring countries where the inhabitants had long ago through historical processes become a united population. Claims are being made on neighbouring territories under the pretext that at one time or other 'there had been disputes about them between some feudal rulers, emperors and
76tsars, or that Chinese conquerors or merchants had been in those places.
History is replete with examples of those who coveted alien territories: some feudal conquerors of the past were declared as ``just'' and others as being ``unjust''. Such an approach to invaders and oppressors of the peoples is alien to the Leninist policy.
II
The Soviet-Chinese border in the Far East, as it exists today, was established many generations ago and stretches along natural frontiers separating the territories of the Soviet Union and China. This border was officially recognised by the Aigun (1858), the Tientsin (1858) and the Peking (1860) treaties. In 1861, the two sides put their signatures and affixed their state seals to a map on which the demarcation line in the Ussuri territory was drawn. In the Damansky Island area this line passes directly along the Chinese bank of the Ussuri River. Both the Soviet and the Chinese states have the originals of the above-mentioned documents.
The status concerning territorial questions established in these treaties as well as in the protocols, maps and descriptions is fully valid to the present day. The Soviet Government takes the position that these principles are to be strictly and unswervingly observed by the two sides. If the PRC Government adheres to a similar position on this question, then there are no grounds for friction and conflicts on the Soviet-Chinese border.
Following the victory of the Great October
n
Socialist Revolution in Russia, the Soviet Republic solemnly renounced the inequitable and secret treaties with China, the spheres of influence of tsarist Russia in China, exterritorial rights and consular jurisdiction. It turned over for China's educational needs the Russian share of the indemnity forced upon China by the imperialist states after suppressing what is known as the Boxer Rising, liquidated former Russian concessions in China, gave China back the right of way to the Chinese Eastern Railway. The nullification of the above-mentioned treaties was made official by the Agreement on general principles for settling questions between the Soviet Union and China as of May 31, 1924. This Agreement did not consider Russian-- Chinese treaties defining the state border to be among the inequitable or secret agreements. There was no talk of their being annulled or revised.
Sun Yat-sen, the great Chinese revolutionary and democrat, had time and again pointed out that the Soviet Government had voluntarily annulled all inequitable treaties and had rejected all unjust claims and rights of the tsarist government in China. In his political testament of March 12, 1925, Sun Yat-sen, addressing the Soviet and Chinese peoples, expressed the hope that the USSR and free China would unite and form a powerful alliance and that in the great struggle for the liberation of the oppressed peoples of the world they would advance side by side towards victory.
It should be recalled that the leaders of the CPC and later also the PRC Government had repeatedly rioted that after the October Revolu-
78tion the Soviet state based its relations with China on the principles of equality and respect for (he sovereign rights of the Chinese people. Mao Tse-tung at the 7th CPC Congress in 1945 pointed out that "the Soviet Union was the first to renounce inequitable treaties and conclude with China new equal treaties." Mao Tsetung also spoke about this in Moscow on December 16,1949.
And thus the question of one-sided treaties in Soviet-Chinese relations about which Chinese propaganda today keeps clamouring is an utter fabrication. The sole idea behind Peking propaganda is to incite among the Chinese people enmity and hostility towards our country, towards the Soviet people.
Historically the picture would be incomplete if no mention is made of the heroic struggle of the Soviet people led by the Communist Party and Lenin personally for the liberation of the Soviet Far East from foreign interventionists in 1918-22, who attempted to tear away from the young Soviet Republic the Maritime and Khabarovsk territories, and Eastern Siberia. The Soviet people defended their Far Eastern lands at the cost of enormous efforts and sacrifice.
Later the Japanese militarists and their accomplices time and again attempted to test Soviet border defences in the Far East. After occupying Manchuria they tried to capture islands on the Amur and the Ussuri belonging to the Soviet Union. These islands became at times the scene of serious armed encounters where the Japanese aggressors were given a crushing rebuff.
Obviously this was not a matter of islands
711only but of more serious claims by the Japanese imperialists to the sacred and inviolable borders of the Soviet Union and its ally, the Mongolian People's Republic. It is well known how matters ended: at first at Khasan and later at Khalkhin Gol the aggressors were completely routed and thrown back.
In 1945, after militarist Japan was defeated by the Soviet Army, for the first time in many years a calm situation prevailed on the Ussuri and Amur rivers.
The victory of the Chinese revolution and the establishment of the People's Republic of China created all requisites for developing goodneighbourly relations, for ensuring a stable peace on the Soviet-Chinese frontiers. In accordance with the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance concluded in 1950 between the USSR and the PRC, both sides built their relations on the basis of the principles of "mutual respect of state sovereignty and territorial integrity." In early 1950s, at the request of the Chinese side, the Soviet Union turned over to the PRC complete sets of topographical maps showing the frontier line. At that time the Chinese authorities made no remarks with regard to the border line on the maps, and this line was observed in practice.
Taking into account the economic needs of both countries, a Soviet-Chinese agreement was signed in 1951 on the procedure for navigation on the Amur, Ussuri, Argun and Sungacha border rivers and on Lake Khanka and on regulating shipping on these waterways. The agreement on this particular economic problem fully proceeds from the above-mentioned treaties
which established the borders between the two countries. On the basis of this agreement normal shipping along these waterways was conducted in a spirit of co-operation.
The people living on both sides of the frontier maintained good friendly relations with one another, developed border trade, cultural and other ties. Soviet and Chinese frontier guards settled all questions that arose in a business-like manner; there had been no misunderstandings that required the interference of central organs.
The Chinese authorities showed interest in using several Soviet islands on the Ussuri and Amur Rivers for economic and production purposes (the procuring of hay, wood, etc.), in providing Chinese fishermen with the opportunity of fishing in the Soviet part of the rivers. For this they addressed competent Soviet authorities for permission. Their requests were favourably considered and satisfied by the Soviet side. The procedure of asking for the use of Soviet islands and the Soviet part of the rivers which was observed by the Chinese authorities for many years is one of the proofs that the Chinese side never questioned the fact that the above islands, Damansky Island included, belonged to the Soviet Union.
Ill
The Soviet Government, true to Lenin's behests, did everything depending on it to strengthen Soviet-Chinese friendship and co-operation.
The foundation for this friendship was already laid during the years when the Soviet Union rendered the Chinese people large-scale
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and all-round assistance in their struggle for national and social liberation. The help given by the Soviet Republic to the revolutionary forces of China in 1923-27, the political, economic and military support rendered China by the Soviet Union in repelling the aggression of Japanese imperialism in 1937-45 are bright pages in the history of Soviet-Chinese relations, of the friendly ties between the working people of our two countries. It was precisely the Soviet Army which inflicted a crushing defeat on the crack Kwantung grouping of the Japanese militarists and thus made an outstanding contribution to China's liberation from Japanese occupation.
The extensive and all-round assistance given by the Soviet Union to the people of China and to the Chinese Communists in scoring the victory of the people's revolution that led to the establishment of the People's Republic of China was a genuine manifestation of proletarian internationalism. Mao Tse-tung declared in December, 1949: "The Soviet people and the Soviet Government for almost 30 years have again and again given assistance to the cause of liberating the Chinese people. This fraternal friendship extended by the Soviet people and the Soviet Government to the Chinese people in their period of trial will never be forgotten.''
It can be said without any exaggeration that the Soviet Union---its credits, delivery of modern industrial equipment, provision of enormous scientific and technical know-how free of charge, at the request of the Chinese Government---helped China to create the basis of modern industry, to lay the economic founda-
82tion of socialism. Thousands of Soviet specialists worked in China side by side with Chinese workers and engineers in building up a number of industrial branches completely new for China---the aircraft, automobile, radio engineering and many other branches. Thousands of Chinese citizens received professional training in educational establishments of the Soviet Union, in Soviet plants and laboratories,
Jenmin jihpao, the organ of the Central Committee of the CPC, in February, 1959, when it still wrote the truth about our country, pointed out that Soviet assistance to China "is unprecedented in scale. The Chinese people will always consider Soviet assistance one of the most important factors in our country's rapid progress.''
During that period Soviet-Chinese trade also developed on a most extensive scale, and its annual turnover by 1959 reached almost 2,000 million roubles. This was equitable and mutually advantageous co-operation. If not for the position of the Chinese side, trade, economic and scientific-technological co-operation between our countries could undoubtedly develop further and successfully. This still holds true today.
In the international sphere the Soviet Union and China jointly waged the struggle against imperialism, for strengthening world security. When a threat to the security of the PRC arose, the Soviet Union, true to its obligations under the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance, invariably came out in support of People's China and together with the latter defeated the aggressive designs of imperialist quarters.
IV
This good-neighbourly co-operation, embodying the principles of socialist internationalism, was violated following a change in both the domestic and foreign policy of the Chinese Government in the early 1960s. It was also then that the situation on the frontiers became tense. At first these were small, insignificant violations of the existing border regime, committed as a rule by the civilian population, or, at any rate, by people not in military uniform. In separate sectors Chinese servicemen attempted to violate openly the state border of the Soviet Union. Simultaneously air fields, access roads, barracks and dumps were built in districts bordering on the USSR.
Official Chinese propaganda started to hail openly the predatory campaigns against the peoples of Asia and Europe launched by Chinghiz Khan who was declared "the emperor of China," K'ang-hsi, the Manchurian Emperor, Chinese emperors and feudal rulers who conducted a policy of conquest. School books and other PRC publications were refashioned in the same spirit; maps were published on which vast territories of the Soviet Union were marked as being Chinese. On some of the maps showing China "in the period of its greatest power," the borders were marked in such a way that the land on which today almost all the peoples of Asia and even many peoples of Europe live was shown to be part of China.
During that period the Soviet Government took quite a number of constructive steps to avert the sharpening of border friction, to les-
84sen tension. Wilh ilheso aims in view the Soviet Government on May 17, 1963, proposed to the PRC Government that bilateral consultations be held between our states. These consultations began in February, 1964, in Peking. The Soviet delegation was headed by Deputy Minister P. I. Zyryanov, a plenipotentiary representative of the USSR, the Chinese---by Tseng Yungchiuan, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs.
The Soviet side submitted proposals whose adoption would have made it possible within the shortest period to carry out by mutual consent the specification of individual sectors of the Soviet-Chinese state border line. The Soviet delegation was guided by the consideration that the successful completion of consultations would be an important contribution to maintaining friendly relations between our peoples and states.
The conduct of the Chinese representatives at the 1964 consultations showed, however, that the Chinese side had no intention of reaching an agreement. The PRC delegation attempted to question the state border, which had been historically formed and confirmed by treaties. The Chinese side regarded the idea of the consultations as an opportunity of artificially creating "territorial problems" that would complicate relations between our peoples and countries for many years to come.
The consultations in Peking were not completed. Agreement was reached in principle to continue them in Moscow on October 15, 1964. However, despite numerous reminders from the Soviet side during that period and in the follow-
85ing years, the PRC Government evaded'the completion of these consultations.
Incidentally, it should not have been difficult to reach an agreement and rule out in the future false rumours and misunderstanding. Only one thing was required to achieve this---good will on the part of the Chinese side, for the Chinese representatives to act in the spirit expressed by Premier Chou En-lai when he declared on April 28, 19(50, at a press conference in Katmandu, capital of Nepal, in replying to a question by one of the correspondents whether there were "sectors of a non-established border between the USSR and the PRC": "There are insignificant discrepancies on maps. They can be easily solved peacefully." Nevertheless, this statement was not substantiated by practical measures. Violations of the border by the Chinese side not only continued, but the number of them increased.
tualion on Ihe Soviet-Chinese border. It calls upon the PRC Government to abstain from actions on the border which could lead to complications, calls for solving differences, if they arise, in a calm atmosphere and by negotiation.
The Soviet Government is also in favour of resumption in the near future of consultations which started in Peking in 1964 between Soviet and Chinese official representatives.
The Soviet Government is firmly convinced that in the final analysis the basic interests of the Soviet and Chinese peoples will make it possible to eliminate and overcome the difficulties in Soviet-Chinese relations.
The USSR Government has declared and considers it necessary to declare once again that it resolutely rejects any encroachments on Soviet territory from any side. And attempts to talk with the Soviet Union, with the Soviet people in the language of guns will meet with a firm rebuff.
The Soviet people unanimously support the Leninist foreign policy of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the USSR Government, the measures taken to ensure the inviolability and security of the sacred borders of our socialist land.
March 29, 1969
Thus, the armed provocations of the Chinese authorities on the Ussuri River in the Damansky Island area are not accidental. These actions, like the creation of tension on the Soviet Chinese border in general, cause serious harm to the cause of socialism and peace, to the common front of the anti-imperialist struggle, to the friendship of the Soviet and Chinese peoples.
Guided by a constant desire to ensure a stable peace and security, to maintain friendship and co-operation with the Chinese people, the Soviet Government considers it necessary to take urgent practical measures to normalise the si-
86The above Statement of the Soviet Government to the Government of the People's Republic of China was handed in at the Chinese Embassy in Moscow on March 29.
Pravda, March 30, 1969
K. SIMONOV
geant Vasily Kanygin and Sergeant Yuri Kozus. Here is a record of my questions and their answers.
Question: What was your schedule for that day? What were you planning to do before the alarm signal sounded?
Kanygin: It was a Sunday. I had been to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk for a ski contest. I am a skier. I had been given leave to rest that morning and go on duty later in the day. And there I was lying in bed, looking at my watch and thinking it was about time /to get up and get something to eat. Just then the door bursts open and the officer on duty shouts: "Border post, to arms!''
Kozus: I had been on night duty at the radio station and went off to the line in the morning. When I got to the radio station I heard the alarm had been given. We have another radio operator named Kozyrev. I said to him: you go on the air for an hour and I'll go to the island.
Bubenin: I had just got back to the post when the officer on duty told me there'd been a phone call from Nizhne-Mikhailovka. I at once alerted my men and we drove off.
Babansky: All the information we had then was that the Chinese had started out, but there was nothing about any shooting. Just the usual observation report that they were coming. Strelnikov drove ahead, we couldn't make the same speed and fell behind. We didn't hear any shooting, and we didn't know anything yet. We got out and ran along the shore of the island. And we were no more than thirty metres from them when I saw our men who were standing
89How It Began
How the first and the second clashes on Damansky Island ended is now common knowledge. Both ended in the defeat of 'the Chinese army units that attempted in both instances to take possession of the Soviet Island of Damansky and were driven back both times to Chinese territory.
Nevertheless, in view of the Chinese propaganda attempts to absolve the Chinese side of all responsibility for the outbreak of this border conflict I should like to cite some documentary evidence showing how it all really began.
Ivan Strelnikov, the chief of the border post, and those who were with him during the first few moments of the conflict cannot tell us what happened because the Chinese killed them precisely in those first few seconds and minutes.
But I flew out to the Far East and talked with some of the border guards who had rushed to the aid of Strelnikov and who saw what happened and who later took part in the first battle fought on Damansky Island. I recorded their accounts and should like to cite those sections of my notes which directly answer the two principal questions in the given case:
(1) who started the shooting, and
(2) which side had prepared in advance to resort to arms.
I talked to four of the participants in the fighting---Junior Sergeant Yuri Babansky, Senior Lieutenant Vitaly Bubenin, Junior Ser-
on the ice. But those who were on the island I didn't see.
Question: Plow many of our men were there on the ice?
Babansky: I didn't count them at the time. Later on, when we brought them out, there were seven, with the senior lieutenant.
Question: And where were the Chinese standing?
Babansky: The Chinese were standing right next to our men. A group of about fifteen Chinese. I ran towards them. I felt there was going to be a fracas. We never thought there'd be any shooting, but we did expect a fist fight. And then, bang! a shot rang out on the island. Another. .. A short burst, two bullets from a submachine-gun. And then the real shooting started! Our men and the Chinese had been facing each other. And then I saw them separate, and at once our men began falling onto the ground. The Chinese had begun by talking, they were right close up to our men, and then all of a sudden they fell back and formed a line. Ours and theirs. Our men didn't even have their magazines attached to their submachine-guns, nothing was loaded and they simply didn't have time to answer the Chinese fire.
Question: When did you open fire?
Babansky: I was running ahead of the other men, Kuznetsov and Kozus were behind me, I was lightly dressed---in a padded jacket and felt boots. When I saw our men falling I pulled out a magazine, snapped it on and loaded. Our men were already lying on the ice. The Chinese were standing. Standing and shooting at them. Our men had already fallen. I couldn't see them
90just then behind the bend in the shore line, but I could see the Chinese, from the waist up. They were standing and shooting down. Well, I fired several bursts at them, at those who were shooting.
Question: When did you personally first hear the shooting and when exactly did you yourself begin shooting?
Kozus: When we ran on to the island. That was when the shooting started. Babansky was running a little ahead, I was third. The Chinese saw us coming from the other bank and started firing at us from machine guns. Babansky threw himself to the ground straight away and started shooting. I looked around and saw over to one side of the field, on the island, some figures in camouflage suits. At first I thought they were our men from the Kulebyakino post. I asked Babansky: "Who are those men?" " Chinese," he shouted. So I fired some bursts at them right away.
Bubenin and Kanygin came over from another post. From their answers to my questions it was clear that despite the alarm they didn't believe until the last moment that there would be bloodshed here.
Question: When and where did you hear the first shots?
Kanygin: There were twenty-three of us on the armoured carrier. Half of our number were sitting down below, and those of us who were wearing sheepskin jackets were on the outside. As we drove past we waved to the sentry on the watchtower. I turned up the collar of my buddy's jacket. ``You'll catch cold," I said ... He was killed soon after. As we approached the is-
91land we heard heavy firing and bullets whizzed over our carrier. "Shooting!" we yelled down to the others. But they couldn't make out what we were saying. "Who's shooting?" We said the Chinese were shooting. We thought they were trying to scare us.
Bubenin: The fellows on top of the carrier were saying: "There's shooting on the island!" I listened, and it sounded pretty heavy.
Question: What did you do when you heard the shooting?
Bubenin: We stopped by the shore and ran onto it in a skirmish line. And there we saw a whole group of Chinese, about thirty of them in camouflage suits. We had already fanned out. We saw them coming towards us. Then they turned and ran. Some of our soldiers called out: "Hey fellows, wait for us," they thought the men we could see were our men from NizhneMikhailovka. Then we saw they were shooting. Somehow even then I didn't believe they were shooting. They were running away from us, and turning to fire as they ran.
Kanygin: When Senior Lieutenant Bubenin ordered us out of the carrier, we deployed and ran forward. As I ran, I was thinking: "Now why are they shooting at us?" I thought they were firing blanks, trying to scare us. Crazy idea! I ran until I heard Bubenin shout: ``They're surrounding us!" The Chinese had ne' ver worn camouflage suits before. I thought they must be our men, though since they were shooting something was obviously wrong. When a machine-gun burst ripped through the snow right next to me, I dropped down, thinking: "What are they doing using live ammunition!''
92I raised my head to take another look at them. What's the idea, I thought, why the shooting! At that moment a single bullet whizzed so close over my head that the air shook. "Looks bad!" I thought. I saw Puzyrev lying nearby. I said lo him: "Crawl over here." He came over. "What's all this about?" he asked. ``Can't you see?" I said. "It's all over. Peacetime's ended. See, they're shooting at us!" "What about us?" he asked, "are we allowed to shoot?''
Question: And when did you finally open fire?
Bubenin: When one of my men fell beside me. Even then I still couldn't believe they were shooting. But the bullets were already whistling about our ears. So I gave the order to fire. In the beginning I had said: "Wait a while, don't shoot yet." I still didn't believe it. But after that, I gave the command and we opened fire.
Kanygin: They kept on firing and trying to outflank our group. Well, I saw it was no use waiting any longer. So I loaded up and opened fire.
Later on, after the battle, when the Chinese were driven off the island, Babansky and Kozus went out to look for the bodies of our border guards who had been killed.
Question: Where did you find the bodies of the killed men and how did they look?
Babansky: We found Senior Lieutenant Strelnikov right on the ice where he'd been shot. The others were all lying there too. All in a row! They had fallen where they had stood.
Kozus: Strelnikov and the others, seven of them, were lying on the ice. And we found another twelve men on the shore at the edge of the ice. All the other men who had been in
93the first group . . . Strelnikov had gone forward to do the talking and the others had remained standing in line and they'd all been shot down at once . . . Babansky and I began looking to see if we could identify anyone. But we could not because the faces were mutilated. The men could only be identified by their papers. You'd find their papers and then you'd know who it was. Davidenko, he was a radio operator in my unit. His neck had been pierced by a bayonet, his arm was pierced too and twisted out of shape. Strelnikov wasn't so bad, because Babansky hadn't let the Chinese get close to him, he'd kept the ice under fire. But those who were on the shore were all mutilated. The ones who were on the ice the Chinese had just shot them.
Question: Do you think any of the men who were with Strelnikov on the ice had time to fire?
Kozus: No, they hadn't time for anything.
Question: And those border guards who were on the shore, did they have time to fire?
Kozus: I don't think so. Because it takes 45 seconds to attach your magazine to your submachine-gun, and several more to get it out of the case. You need about a minute for it, and in that minute they were all shot down. We never thought it would come to actual shooting. After all, it's China. The People's Republic of China! I didn't think anything like that was possible. But later on when we started carrying out our wounded and the dead . . . more and more . .' .
believe that this sorrowful job had to be done. People must have a clear idea, not only in our own country where there are no doubts whatever about what happened, but also abroad where some may still have doubts on that score, as to exactly how the Damansky incident started. There must be absolute clarity on both the points I raised at the beginning of these notes:
Who began the shooting and which side had prepared in advance to resort to arms?
I believe that the answers given by the four border guards are sufficiently conclusive in this respect.
Noiwye Vremya, 1969, No. 20, pp. 14-15
USSR Government Statement of June 13, 1969
On March 29, 1969, the Government of the USSR proposed to the Government of the PRC that practical steps should be taken without delay 'to normalise the situation on the Soviet-- Chinese frontier. In its Statement it called upon the Government of the PRC to refrain from action on the frontier which might cause complications such as have taken place in the region of Damansky Island, and to settle differences, if they should arise, in a calm atmosphere through negotiation.
The Soviet Government suggested resuming consultations with the purpose of specifying the demarcation of the frontier in individual sectors which were begun in 1964 in Peking and cut short by the Chinese side. As the possible
95It was painful indeed for me to listen to these answers to my questions, and even more painful, of course, for the men I questioned. But I
94date for the first meeting of representatives of the USSR and the PRC, the Soviet side named April 15 or "any other early date convenient for the Chinese side.''
The Government of the People's Republic of China replied on May 24, 1969. From this reply it follows that the Government of the PRC accepts the proposal to hold talks, states that it is prepared to agree on the time and place through diplomatic channels, and declares it is against the use of armed force.
It thus would seem that the way to the negotiating table is opening.
The present aggravation between the Soviet Union and the PRC has been called forth solely by the actions of the Chinese side. If the Chinese Government likewise bases itself on the need for maintaining normal relations between the USSR and the PRC, on recognition of the principle of non-interference in each other's internal affairs and on respect for territorial integrity and inviolability, the situation on the frontier will return to normal. This would accord with the vital interests of the Soviet people and, we are convinced, the interests of the Chinese people as well.
I
In the opinion of the Soviet Government the fact that in the Statement of the Government of the PRC a series of claims and demands are made on the Soviet Union for which not the least grounds exist and which can have only one purpose, that of adding new complications to those already created by the Chinese side,
96does not tend to create a favourable atmosphere for negotiations.
The Chinese side has evidently decided to give its own interpretation of some facts from the history of the relations between Russia and China in the hope of creating, by means of exaggeration and distortion, a picture of how the frontier between our two countries took shape which, though at variance with the facts, would suit the purposes of the Chinese side.
Once more the question of "unequal treaties," as the Government of the PRC calls the treaties defining the present frontier between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China, is brought to the fore. On the far-fetched pretext of rectifying the ``injustices'' committed in past centuries, the Chinese Government tries to substantiate its claim to a million and a half square kilometres of traditionally Soviet territory.
The Chinese Government would like the USSR-PRC discussions to deal not with precise demarcation of the frontier line, which was discussed at the 1964 consultations, but with a new Chinese-Soviet frontier in the light of the present Chinese interpretation of history and treaties.
The fact cannot be ignored that territorial claims on other countries occupy a very large place in China's present foreign policy and propaganda. Today the Chinese leaders claim lands into which Chinese conquerors once intruded or intended to intrude.
Propaganda of this kind was not started today or yesterday. It was launched gradually with the glorification of the predatory policy
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of the feudal lords of the past, with the publication, after 1949, of textbooks and maps showing territories of other countries as belonging to China. Then territorial claims began to be made officially.
Since the 1960s the expansionist aspirations have been openly spearheaded against the Soviet Union as well. Manipulating with historical facts or with the absence of such facts the Chinese side seeks to create at all costs a so-- called territorial problem between the USSR and the PRC, and question the frontier existing between them. This circumstance prompts us to trace the factual aspect of the question.
As the Soviet Government pointed out in its Statement of March 29, the Soviet-Chinese frontier is the result of long historical development. When relations between the Russian state and China w-ere only just beginning to be established, vast sparsely populated or practically uninhabited semi-desert and taiga expanses lay between them. At the time China's northern frontier, for example, ran along the almost 4,000-kilomelre-long Great Wall, more than 1,000 kilometres southwest of the Amur and Ussuri rivers.
At the time the Amur region was settled by Russians in the first half of the 17th century, the state of Manchuria was independent of China and inhabited by a people ethnically different from the Chinese (Hans.) Moreover, in that period China herself lost her independence, becoming part of the Manchu state after the Manchus captured Peking (1644) and forced the Ch'in dynasty on the Chinese people. Up to the close of the 19th century Manchuria in effect
remained a separate entity, an imperial possession where Chinese were not allowed to settle or engage in economic activity.
At the end of the 17th century the Manchu emperor K'ang-hsi organised a series of military campaigns against the Russian settlements of the Albazino voyevodstvo on the Amur. In a report of the Manchu generals to their emperor it was noted in this connection: "...The lands lying to the northeast for a distance of several thousand li and which have never belonged to China are now incorporated in your possessions." For some time these Russian lands were ruled by Manchu invaders.
At the close of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century the Manchu rulers conquered Mongolia, destroyed the Dzungar Khanate of the Oirats, killing more than a million people--- most of its population---and subjugated the Uighur state in East Turkestan (Kashgaria). In this manner the rule of the Ch'in emperors spread to vast regions known to this day as Sinkiang, which means "new frontier." These regions are populated by Uighurs, Kazakhs, Kirghiz, Dungans and other nationalities. At the same time, Manchu-Chinese expansion developed southwestward and southward.
That is how things really stand if the facts are respected and not used arbitrarily. Ch' inruled China was by no means only the object of some foreign aggression. The Manchu-Chinese emperors, sitting on the necks of the Chinese people, pursued a colonialist policy of pillage, annexing territories of other countries and peoples one after another. The formation of the territory of China within its present boundaries