Covert Negotiations
The Chinese had kept news of Kissinger's visit secret until after he left, but word began to spread in the inner circles of government. Zhang Hanzhi was a young official in the Foreign Ministry. She and her colleagues sensed that something was happening. Government ministers looked excited. Two of the top interpreters had disappeared. At lunchtime they reappeared and broke the news. "It was like a bomb exploding in the foreign ministry," Zhang recalled.
That first day, Kissinger and Chou talked until nearly midnight. Chou started the deliberations by explaining that the United States was no longer as powerful as it had been at the end of the Second World War. It had lost ground economically, and its involvement in Indochina, in particular, had done its position in the world much damage. The Americans' anxiousness to extricate themselves from a hopeless struggle made them need contact with China, and this was China's opportunity to promote its own security and the reunification of China by "peaceful means".
For China, Taiwan was the most important issue, while for the United States, getting out of Vietnam was of equal importance. Chou made it clear that China wanted the United States to recognize that Taiwan was part of China and to set a timetable for withdrawing American forces. The United States, Kissinger hinted, expected that one day there would once again be a united China but could not say so right away for political reasons. In any case, it intended to withdraw its troops, but that was linked partly to what happened in Indochina. Once the United States was safely out of its wars there, it could dismantle many of its bases in Asia. Kissinger also devoted considerable effort to reassuring the Chinese that the United States had no intention of colluding with other powers against China. Indeed, Nixon later promised Mao in person that the United States would not take any major steps affecting China without discussing them with the Chinese first.
The following afternoon, Kissinger and Chou resumed their tough debate. Indochina and the American presence there, Japan, Korea, the Soviet Union, the tension between India and Pakistan - these subjects were to become staples of their discussions over the next years. Of more immediate concern was the question of Nixon's visit. The Chinese, Chou said, were prepared to issue a formal invitation, but they had a concern about the timing. Would it not be better for Nixon to meet the Soviet leaders first? China did not want to create any more tension with the Soviet Union. Kissinger said that the United States expected to have a summit with the Soviet Union, possibly within the next six months.
In fact, he had learned in Bangkok that the Soviets had postponed the summit indefinitely, so he decided to push for an early Nixon visit, partly as a way of putting more pressure on the Soviet Union.