In July 1971, the American " Washington Post " published an editorial, and the theme of the editorial was called " Nixon shocked" by Americans at that time. The editorial reads:
If Nixon wants to go to the moon, I'm afraid the world audience won't care, but if Nixon wants to visit China, it's incredible!
However, in the face of various doubts from the American media and the public, Nixon seemed very relaxed. He proudly said:
My visit to China this time is no less than a moon landing!
Why did Nixon say that? 50 years ago, when Nixon visited to visit in China, what unknown details were there? How did Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou receive Nixon?
1. Table Tennis Diplomacy, Nixon Visits to China
In the 1960s, the international situation was turbulent. After the Zhenbao Island incident, Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated sharply, and the two major socialist countries in the world began to move towards opposition. At that time, the United States still failed to escape from the Vietnam War. The years of overseas wars caused the United States' national strength to decline. In the 1970s, under the general environment of , the situation of the Soviet Union's attack on the United States and the Soviet Union's defense became increasingly obvious.
It is in this international context that Sino-US relations have shown signs of easing. At that time, US President Nixon said: "China cannot be excluded from the world by us forever. Such a country with a population of 1 billion cannot be isolated on the earth!"
Although the United States is still a hostile policy toward China, the newly appointed Nixon also appropriately adopted the policy of living peacefully with China.
Faced with the ambiguous attitude of the United States towards China, Chairman Mao proposed: "Continue to struggle, seek easing relations in the struggle, and wait for the easing opportunity!"
The Zhenbao Island incident in 1969 gave Americans an opportunity. If we can win over China, it will inevitably compress the strategic space of the Soviet Union and the pressure the United States will face will also become smaller. China has been facing the Soviet Union's nuclear deterrence for a long time and urgently needs to use external forces to resolve the threat from the north and ensure the security within the country.
In March 1971, Nagoya, Japan hosted the World Table Tennis Championship , and both China and the United States sent table tennis players to participate.
At that time, the Chinese player had just won the championship. The American player said admirably: "Your table tennis is great. Have you invited the UK and Canada to visit China? When will our country visit China?"
Chinese player said with emotion: "There will be a chance in the future!"
When the championship was halfway through, American player Cohen mistakenly got into the Chinese player's car. An embarrassing scene was staged between the players of the two countries. Cohen felt helpless.
Chinese player Zhuang Zedong was very smart. He hurriedly walked up to help Cohen take his seat and allowed Cohen to go to the arena with the Chinese player, which moved Cohen very much.
The next day, Cohen presented Zhuang Zedong with a friend's relationship, and the Chinese and American players have established a deep friendship since then.
Not long after this incident, the deputy head of the US delegation visited directly at the residence of the Chinese delegation. He sincerely invited Chinese players to visit the United States.
The leaders of the Chinese delegation did not dare to make a decision without authorization and immediately called the State Sports Commission. Soon, Premier Zhou and Chairman Mao learned about the matter, and Chairman Mao believed that this move could ease Sino-US relations.
In order to express our country's sincerity, Chairman Mao made a decision that influenced the historical process: "Invite the American table tennis team to visit China!"
This matter is the famous "small ball promotes big ball", and the relationship between China and the United States has also opened a new chapter due to "table tennis diplomacy".
In July, Kissinger came to China secretly for a visit. Not long after, he even visited China directly and publicly. In a few months, Kissinger met with Premier Zhou 10 times and finally finalized the relevant matters of Nixon's visit to China.
At noon on February 21, 1972, Nixon, then-US President, appeared at Capital Airport in Beijing. After Nixon and his wife walked down the escalator, they moved forward and took the initiative to extend their friendly hands.
Then, the two went to the Zhongnanhai conference room where Chairman Mao was. On the way, Premier Zhou said with emotion: "You floated across the sea to shake hands with me. This not only crossed the distance of space, but also crossed the time interval. China and the United States have not been dating for 25 years!"
After hearing this, Nixon couldn't help but nodded with emotion. However, he was more looking forward to meeting with Chairman Mao, but when Nixon met Chairman Mao, he was stunned.
On the same day, Chairman Mao was wearing extremely simple clothes, a light gray and gray Zhongshan suit , a pair of navy blue pants, and there were traces of sewing on it, and a pair of handmade cloth shoes were on his feet.
Nixon was very confused and thought to himself: "Where is this the dress of a national leader?"
Chairman Mao and Nixon talked a lot about the topic, including politics, art, diplomacy and philosophy. The meeting was originally scheduled to take an hour.
This hour of contact, Nixon was impressed by the charm exuded by Chairman Mao’s conversation, especially when Chairman Mao talked about philosophy, Nixon couldn’t even interfere.
2. Giving gifts to each other, Chairman Mao gave tea
At the end of the meeting, Nixon took out the "national gift" he brought, a pair of beautiful porcelain swan , and he also introduced to Chairman Mao enthusiastically.
is different from our country with a long history. At that time, the United States was only 200 years old and there were no cultural relics representing ancient art. However, in order to demonstrate the United States' attention to this meeting, Nixon brought this pair of modern crafts. This is not useless for porcelain swans. It was carefully made by Edward, a famous American fire master. Nixon highly praised porcelain swans, which is why he regarded porcelain swans as a national gift in the United States.
In the eyes of Europeans and Americans, the white swan represents blessing and purity, is a sacred existence, and the porcelain-shaped swan brought by Nixon this time is even more exquisite.
It’s a pity that when this pair of porcelain swans was shipped in the United States, one of the swans’ wings was knocked off, and the staff could only use glue to glue the broken wings back on.
Nixon apologized for this, but when Chairman Mao learned about it, he didn't mind. He said humorously: "It doesn't matter, the Sino-US relations have been linked now!"
According to Chinese traditional culture, since the other party gave a gift, he would have to return the gift. So, what gift should Nixon be given? After thinking about it, Chairman Mao decided to send out Dahongpao tea from Wuyi Mountain.
At that time, many people didn’t understand why Chairman Mao chose tea as a return gift? Looking at the puzzled people, Chairman Mao told the reason.
It turns out that Chairman Mao sent Nixon tea to him was related to the history of the United States. In 1773, the eastern United States was still a British colony. In order to exploit the people of the colonies, Britain decided to increase taxes on the Americas, including the tea tax . When the British Parliament passed this resolution, the people of the American colonies opposed the resolution on the grounds that "no representatives will not pay taxes." In order to fight the " Tea Tax Law ", protesters in the American colonies directly disguised themselves as Indians and sneaked into the East India Company's merchant ship under the night. Then, these protesters poured the tea leaves from the ship into the waters of the Persian Gulf to express their resistance to the British government. This is the "Boston Tea Pour Incident" that shocked the world.
Later, the British Parliament issued five consecutive decrees to force the American colonial people to pay the "tea tax", which was regarded as an intolerable decree by the American people. In the end, the American colonial people decided to launch a resistance, and the American independence movement began.
In the Boston tea dumping incident, the tea that the demonstrators poured into was the black tea from Wuyi Mountain in Fujian. Speaking of which, China's black tea is also the "witness" of American independence .
It is precisely for this reason that Chairman Mao gave the Dahongpao tea from Wuyi Mountain to the visiting Nixon as a return gift. The meaning of it is self-evident.
It’s like this. The black tea, which was related to the independence of the United States 200 years ago, is now witnessing the peaceful establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, which is like a cycle of history.
However, Chairman Mao’s “return gift” caused dissatisfaction among Nixon and others, because Chairman Mao gave too little tea, only four taels, and it was a little "humble".
As a major country with rich resources in the world, Siliang tea is indeed not like a gift from national leaders, but more like a gift from close friends.
When Nixon received these four taels of tea, a hint of anger surged upwards. Nixon mistakenly thought that Chairman Mao did not pay attention to this diplomacy, which made him feel very failed. The angry Nixon used this to question the relevant staff.
Premier Zhou, who was standing by, saw Nixon's thoughts. In order to resolve the misunderstandings, Premier Zhou patiently explained to Nixon: "This is not a simple four-liang tea leaf. The Chairman has given you half of the country!"
Looking at the puzzled Nixon, Premier Zhou smiled and explained the source of these four-liang tea leaves. All the four-liang tea leaves sent by Chairman Mao came from the "mother tree" of Dahongpao . The amount of tea produced by the mother tree is extremely rare, only about eight taels a year.
In this way, the Dahongpao tea sent by Chairman Mao was not "shrimp" at all. Instead, as Premier Zhou said, Chairman Mao gave Nixon "half the country".
After listening to Premier Zhou’s explanation, Nixon realized his sloppy and expressed his gratitude to Premier Zhou and others. An embarrassing misunderstanding was resolved.
As the first prime minister of the new China, Premier Zhou’s diplomatic wisdom is unparalleled, and he is often polite in his funny words. This is Premier Zhou’s charm.
3. Diplomacy wisdom, Details of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States
Before Nixon left, Chairman Mao also wrote a special letter to him, which contained three Chinese idioms and allusions, a total of 12 words.
Nixon did not understand Chinese culture very much. Regarding the words given by Chairman Mao, Nixon specially found professionals to understand the meanings. Unfortunately, they all understood the mysteries.
Today, many scholars in China and the United States have studied these 12 words by Chairman Mao, but it still cannot explain why Chairman Mao chose these 12 words at that time.
In addition, there are many evocative scenes on Nixon's visit. Whether it is facing Nixon's aggressiveness or the harmonious dinner that entertains Nixon and his group, Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou can respond ingeniously.
Before meeting with Chairman Mao, Nixon was still full of concern, fearing that etiquette would arise. Nixon thought Chairman Mao would greet him on a high building.
If this is the case, as the national leader of the United States, meeting Chairman Mao with such a low attitude will definitely be under pressure from domestic and foreign public opinion.
After all, in the United States, there are many forces opposing Nixon's visit to China. Nixon is under tremendous pressure. If you cannot give an explanation to the people in the country, Nixon's ending can be imagined.
However, when Nixon came to the conference room in Zhongnanhai, he saw a study filled with books and manuscripts, which made Nixon feel strong admiration for Chairman Mao.
When the two sat down to talk, Nixon found out the remarks of Chairman Mao’s “overthrow US imperialism”. Chairman Mao smiled indifferently and said, “I think you and Kissinger are not among us. I am empty-handed. I am empty-handed. Isn’t this just air-to-air!”
Chairman Mao’s tricky explanation made it difficult for Nixon to refute. In order to win back a city, Nixon asked tightly: “Taiwan’s Chiang Kai-shek called you “bandit”, what do you call him?”
In fact, Nixon’s question was hidden ill-intentioned. Although Nixon sincerely wanted to establish diplomatic relations with China, at the same time, he also wanted to continue to recognize Taiwan’s status.
Interactions between countries have always put interests first, and Nixon is no exception. His move is also to fight for the greatest national interests for the United States.
Chairman Mao is naturally very clear about this. Chairman Mao, who has a tough attitude, said: "The Taiwan issue is still a small problem, and the world's problem is the big problem!"
Premier Zhou cleverly added: "In most cases, we call him "Cheng Gang" and occasionally call him "bandit". He also treats us with courtesy and calls us "bandit"!"
Premier Zhou's clever answer not only shows my country's attitude on the Taiwan issue, but also resolves the crisis that Nixon wants to provoke cross-strait relations.
Then, Chairman Mao was not willing to be outdone. He said meaningfully: "I voted for you in the last election of your country. Everyone said that you Republican is a rightist, and I personally like the rightist!"
In the face of Chairman Mao's joke, Nixon just said awkwardly: "Yes, our rightist is really doing things, and the leftists are always empty talk!"
That night, Nixon and his group attended the dinner held in Great Hall of the People . The scale of this dinner was very grand. In order to entertain Nixon, Moutai was also taken out by Premier Zhou.
In order to introduce Nixon to China's Moutai, Premier Zhou took out a match and lit the Moutai in the wine glass, which surprised the Nixon and his wife. Later, Nixon personally imitated Premier Zhou in White House , but the fire almost broke out.
However, Nixon's wife was very puzzled by Premier Zhou's behavior, and even mistakenly thought that Premier Zhou wanted to ask Nixon and his wife to smoke. She quickly asked Premier Zhou why.
Premier Zhou pointed to the two pandas on the matchbox and said, "In order to show friendship with the people of China and the United States, we decided to send the two pandas to your United States!"
So, the two pandas called " Lingling " and " Xingxing " were brought to the United States. As China's national treasures, these two pandas were immediately warmly welcomed by the American people after they were sent to the United States. This incident was later called " Panda Diplomacy ".
Nixon visited China for a whole week. At the end, the Sino-US Joint Communiqué signed and published, and China and the United States have since entered their honeymoon period.
Just like Nixon said the famous saying of the century: "I travel thousands of miles to shake hands with the Chinese leaders, an era ends here, and a new era begins here!"
Then, the two went to the Zhongnanhai conference room where Chairman Mao was. On the way, Premier Zhou said with emotion: "You floated across the sea to shake hands with me. This not only crossed the distance of space, but also crossed the time interval. China and the United States have not been dating for 25 years!"
After hearing this, Nixon couldn't help but nodded with emotion. However, he was more looking forward to meeting with Chairman Mao, but when Nixon met Chairman Mao, he was stunned.
On the same day, Chairman Mao was wearing extremely simple clothes, a light gray and gray Zhongshan suit , a pair of navy blue pants, and there were traces of sewing on it, and a pair of handmade cloth shoes were on his feet.
Nixon was very confused and thought to himself: "Where is this the dress of a national leader?"
Chairman Mao and Nixon talked a lot about the topic, including politics, art, diplomacy and philosophy. The meeting was originally scheduled to take an hour.
This hour of contact, Nixon was impressed by the charm exuded by Chairman Mao’s conversation, especially when Chairman Mao talked about philosophy, Nixon couldn’t even interfere.
2. Giving gifts to each other, Chairman Mao gave tea
At the end of the meeting, Nixon took out the "national gift" he brought, a pair of beautiful porcelain swan , and he also introduced to Chairman Mao enthusiastically.
is different from our country with a long history. At that time, the United States was only 200 years old and there were no cultural relics representing ancient art. However, in order to demonstrate the United States' attention to this meeting, Nixon brought this pair of modern crafts. This is not useless for porcelain swans. It was carefully made by Edward, a famous American fire master. Nixon highly praised porcelain swans, which is why he regarded porcelain swans as a national gift in the United States.
In the eyes of Europeans and Americans, the white swan represents blessing and purity, is a sacred existence, and the porcelain-shaped swan brought by Nixon this time is even more exquisite.
It’s a pity that when this pair of porcelain swans was shipped in the United States, one of the swans’ wings was knocked off, and the staff could only use glue to glue the broken wings back on.
Nixon apologized for this, but when Chairman Mao learned about it, he didn't mind. He said humorously: "It doesn't matter, the Sino-US relations have been linked now!"
According to Chinese traditional culture, since the other party gave a gift, he would have to return the gift. So, what gift should Nixon be given? After thinking about it, Chairman Mao decided to send out Dahongpao tea from Wuyi Mountain.
At that time, many people didn’t understand why Chairman Mao chose tea as a return gift? Looking at the puzzled people, Chairman Mao told the reason.
It turns out that Chairman Mao sent Nixon tea to him was related to the history of the United States. In 1773, the eastern United States was still a British colony. In order to exploit the people of the colonies, Britain decided to increase taxes on the Americas, including the tea tax . When the British Parliament passed this resolution, the people of the American colonies opposed the resolution on the grounds that "no representatives will not pay taxes." In order to fight the " Tea Tax Law ", protesters in the American colonies directly disguised themselves as Indians and sneaked into the East India Company's merchant ship under the night. Then, these protesters poured the tea leaves from the ship into the waters of the Persian Gulf to express their resistance to the British government. This is the "Boston Tea Pour Incident" that shocked the world.
Later, the British Parliament issued five consecutive decrees to force the American colonial people to pay the "tea tax", which was regarded as an intolerable decree by the American people. In the end, the American colonial people decided to launch a resistance, and the American independence movement began.
In the Boston tea dumping incident, the tea that the demonstrators poured into was the black tea from Wuyi Mountain in Fujian. Speaking of which, China's black tea is also the "witness" of American independence .
It is precisely for this reason that Chairman Mao gave the Dahongpao tea from Wuyi Mountain to the visiting Nixon as a return gift. The meaning of it is self-evident.
It’s like this. The black tea, which was related to the independence of the United States 200 years ago, is now witnessing the peaceful establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, which is like a cycle of history.
However, Chairman Mao’s “return gift” caused dissatisfaction among Nixon and others, because Chairman Mao gave too little tea, only four taels, and it was a little "humble".
As a major country with rich resources in the world, Siliang tea is indeed not like a gift from national leaders, but more like a gift from close friends.
When Nixon received these four taels of tea, a hint of anger surged upwards. Nixon mistakenly thought that Chairman Mao did not pay attention to this diplomacy, which made him feel very failed. The angry Nixon used this to question the relevant staff.
Premier Zhou, who was standing by, saw Nixon's thoughts. In order to resolve the misunderstandings, Premier Zhou patiently explained to Nixon: "This is not a simple four-liang tea leaf. The Chairman has given you half of the country!"
Looking at the puzzled Nixon, Premier Zhou smiled and explained the source of these four-liang tea leaves. All the four-liang tea leaves sent by Chairman Mao came from the "mother tree" of Dahongpao . The amount of tea produced by the mother tree is extremely rare, only about eight taels a year.
In this way, the Dahongpao tea sent by Chairman Mao was not "shrimp" at all. Instead, as Premier Zhou said, Chairman Mao gave Nixon "half the country".
After listening to Premier Zhou’s explanation, Nixon realized his sloppy and expressed his gratitude to Premier Zhou and others. An embarrassing misunderstanding was resolved.
As the first prime minister of the new China, Premier Zhou’s diplomatic wisdom is unparalleled, and he is often polite in his funny words. This is Premier Zhou’s charm.
3. Diplomacy wisdom, Details of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States
Before Nixon left, Chairman Mao also wrote a special letter to him, which contained three Chinese idioms and allusions, a total of 12 words.
Nixon did not understand Chinese culture very much. Regarding the words given by Chairman Mao, Nixon specially found professionals to understand the meanings. Unfortunately, they all understood the mysteries.
Today, many scholars in China and the United States have studied these 12 words by Chairman Mao, but it still cannot explain why Chairman Mao chose these 12 words at that time.
In addition, there are many evocative scenes on Nixon's visit. Whether it is facing Nixon's aggressiveness or the harmonious dinner that entertains Nixon and his group, Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou can respond ingeniously.
Before meeting with Chairman Mao, Nixon was still full of concern, fearing that etiquette would arise. Nixon thought Chairman Mao would greet him on a high building.
If this is the case, as the national leader of the United States, meeting Chairman Mao with such a low attitude will definitely be under pressure from domestic and foreign public opinion.
After all, in the United States, there are many forces opposing Nixon's visit to China. Nixon is under tremendous pressure. If you cannot give an explanation to the people in the country, Nixon's ending can be imagined.
However, when Nixon came to the conference room in Zhongnanhai, he saw a study filled with books and manuscripts, which made Nixon feel strong admiration for Chairman Mao.
When the two sat down to talk, Nixon found out the remarks of Chairman Mao’s “overthrow US imperialism”. Chairman Mao smiled indifferently and said, “I think you and Kissinger are not among us. I am empty-handed. I am empty-handed. Isn’t this just air-to-air!”
Chairman Mao’s tricky explanation made it difficult for Nixon to refute. In order to win back a city, Nixon asked tightly: “Taiwan’s Chiang Kai-shek called you “bandit”, what do you call him?”
In fact, Nixon’s question was hidden ill-intentioned. Although Nixon sincerely wanted to establish diplomatic relations with China, at the same time, he also wanted to continue to recognize Taiwan’s status.
Interactions between countries have always put interests first, and Nixon is no exception. His move is also to fight for the greatest national interests for the United States.
Chairman Mao is naturally very clear about this. Chairman Mao, who has a tough attitude, said: "The Taiwan issue is still a small problem, and the world's problem is the big problem!"
Premier Zhou cleverly added: "In most cases, we call him "Cheng Gang" and occasionally call him "bandit". He also treats us with courtesy and calls us "bandit"!"
Premier Zhou's clever answer not only shows my country's attitude on the Taiwan issue, but also resolves the crisis that Nixon wants to provoke cross-strait relations.
Then, Chairman Mao was not willing to be outdone. He said meaningfully: "I voted for you in the last election of your country. Everyone said that you Republican is a rightist, and I personally like the rightist!"
In the face of Chairman Mao's joke, Nixon just said awkwardly: "Yes, our rightist is really doing things, and the leftists are always empty talk!"
That night, Nixon and his group attended the dinner held in Great Hall of the People . The scale of this dinner was very grand. In order to entertain Nixon, Moutai was also taken out by Premier Zhou.
In order to introduce Nixon to China's Moutai, Premier Zhou took out a match and lit the Moutai in the wine glass, which surprised the Nixon and his wife. Later, Nixon personally imitated Premier Zhou in White House , but the fire almost broke out.
However, Nixon's wife was very puzzled by Premier Zhou's behavior, and even mistakenly thought that Premier Zhou wanted to ask Nixon and his wife to smoke. She quickly asked Premier Zhou why.
Premier Zhou pointed to the two pandas on the matchbox and said, "In order to show friendship with the people of China and the United States, we decided to send the two pandas to your United States!"
So, the two pandas called " Lingling " and " Xingxing " were brought to the United States. As China's national treasures, these two pandas were immediately warmly welcomed by the American people after they were sent to the United States. This incident was later called " Panda Diplomacy ".
Nixon visited China for a whole week. At the end, the Sino-US Joint Communiqué signed and published, and China and the United States have since entered their honeymoon period.
Just like Nixon said the famous saying of the century: "I travel thousands of miles to shake hands with the Chinese leaders, an era ends here, and a new era begins here!"
