This book is the sequel to Mao and the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1945–1959: A New History. Making use of newly available declassified and published Chinese and Russian sources (in particular, recently declassified documents from Russian State Archive of Contemporary History on Sino-Soviet relations from 1965 to 1973, which only became available to researchers in August 2015), and...

The preceding volume, Mao and the Sino-Soviet Partnership, 1945–1959: A New History ends in 1959 when the Sino-Soviet alliance was left in disarray as a result of conflicting foreign and domestic policies of China and the Soviet Union. The divergences between China and the Soviet Union soon evolved into the Sino-Soviet polemics of 1960–1964, manifesting itself in the rivalry for...

AAPSO

Divergences between the Chinese Communist Party1 and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the late 1950s over both foreign policy—China’s bombardment of Jinmen in 1958 and border clashes with India in 1959—and domestic policy—the Great Leap Forward and the People’s Commune Movement2—provoked a more contentious ideological dispute:...

In a 2011 article, Li Mingjiang argued that “an ideological dilemma was in play” in the early 1960s amid the deepening Sino-Soviet rift. According to Li, China’s “domestic priority became class struggle and preventing revisionism” when Mao reasserted his paramount leadership role in the summer of 1962.1 Li concluded that “China could not go...

The great polemics caused the breakdown of the Sino-Soviet party-to-party relationship. Because state-to-state relations within socialist countries hinged upon close party-to-party relations, it was not surprising that the rift in party-to-party relations would invariably lead to the collapse of state-to-state relations. Starting from mid-1964, Mao modified China’s foreign and defense...

During the period when the CCP and the CPSU were moving closer to a split, the rupture in the Sino-Soviet alliance could only be partially observed in the public. Much of the conflict was not taking place openly. During this process, two phenomena were occurring simultaneously. First, against the backdrop of the Sino-Soviet ideological polemics, there was also a split in the...

By 1965, the CCP and the CPSU entered into a new phase of conflict, centered on the March 1965 Moscow Conference and the issue of aid to Vietnam. This again reflected the rivalry for leadership in the international Communist movement. This conference signaled the official split in that movement. In March 1966, the CCP CC turned down an invitation to attend the 23rd...

During the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, officially launched in May 1966, the Soviet Union was systematically demonized and public discussion was strongly anti-Soviet. After the breakdown of the first round of border negotiations in 1964, the border issue was politicized. Territorial disputes became a new source of military conflicts and bargaining chips for leaders in both countries. It...

The study of Sino-Soviet relations occupies a special historical place in the study of Cold War international history as well as the history of the post-WWII Communist movement. Changes in Sino-Soviet relations determined the fate of the socialist bloc, and had a deep and lasting impact on the course of international politics. The demise of the Sino-Soviet alliance offers important lessons for the...

People’s Republic of China

Danhui Li is professor of history at the Institute for Studies of China’s Neighboring Countries and Regions, History Department, East China Normal University, and editor-in-chief of two academic journals: Lengzhan guojishi yanjiu (Cold War International History Studies), and Bianjiang yu zhoubian wenti yanjiu (Journal of Borderlands and Asian Neighborhood...