Word: nixonization
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...details of the Nixon trip were settled very rapidly. We proposed two dates, Feb. 21 and March 16; Chou chose the earlier. Problems solved themselves as easily as was compatible with the obsessive single-mindedness of the advance men. The head of our security detail distinguished himself by requesting a list of subversives in each locality the President was likely to visit. This raised an interesting problem; in China conservative Republicans would undoubtedly be classed as subversives, and if we asked how many Communist sympathizers there were we would get the unsettling answer of 800 million...
Chou and I spent over 25 hours together reviewing the world situation, another 15 working on a statement that later came to be known as the Shanghai Communique. Nixon had seen and approved a draft communique prepared by me and my staff. It followed the conventional style, highlighting fuzzy areas of agreement and obscuring differences with platitudinous generalizations. Quite uncharacteristically, the Premier made a scorching one-hour speech?at the express direction of Mao, he said?declaring that our approach was unacceptable. The communique had to set forth fundamental differences; otherwise the wording would have an "untruthful appearance." Our present...
...Nixon's huge presidential party reached Peking at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, Feb. 21, 1972. Nixon, Kissinger and most of their staffs were quartered in a large guesthouse near the old Imperial Fishing Lake, Secretary of State William Rogers and his entourage in a smaller one a few hundred yards away. "The Chinese had well understood the strange checks and balances within the Executive Branch," Kissinger notes wryly, "and had re-created the physical gulf between the White House and Foggy Bottom in the heart of Peking." Barely three hours after his arrival, Nixon received a sudden invitation...
...delicately placed the issue of Taiwan on a subsidiary level, choosing to treat it as a relatively minor internal Chinese dispute. What concerned him was the international context ?that is, the Soviet Union. To a long disquisition by Nixon on the question of which of the nuclear superpowers, the United States or the Soviet Union, presented a greater threat, Mao replied: "At the present time, the question of aggression from the United States or aggression from China is relatively small ... You want to withdraw some of your troops back on your soil; ours do not go abroad...
Meanwhile, the Peking summit unfolded on other levels as well. Sightseeing trips went off as magnificent spectacles. Hordes of television commentators and journalists converged on each set piece, eager to record the profound thoughts of the leading actors. "This is a great wall," said Nixon to the assembled press at the Great Wall, placing his seal of approval on one of mankind's most impressive creations...