China as a Factor in the Collapse of the Soviet Empire Author(s): Nancy Bernkopf Tucker Source: Political Science Quarterly,

Vol. 110, No. 4 (Winter, 1995-1996), pp. 501-518 Published by: The Academy of Political Science Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2151881 Accessed: 30/05/2009 14:11
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aps. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

The Academy of Political Science is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Political Science Quarterly.

http://www.jstor.org

Chinaas a Factorin the Collapse of the SovietEmpire

NANCY BERNKOPF TUCKER MikPartyGeneralSecretary On 15 May 1989, SovietCommunist betweentheSovietUnion relations in arrived Beijingto normalize hailGorbachev and the People'sRepublicof China(PRC). This was to have been the crowning in career-a reflectionof his accomplishments of achievement Deng Xiaoping's to geopoliticsanddomesticreform.Havingbroughtprosperity the countryside, to international standing to a degreeof modernization the cities, andheightened on the nation, he looked forwardto celebratingMoscow'scapitulation the soborder- a capituand Cambodia, thenorthern Afghanistan, calledthreeobstacles: journey possibleandthatGorbachev's rapprochement lationthatmadeSino-Soviet to Beijing aptly symbolized. For China, the cold war epoch was ending; the years of externalthreatwere over. of Squarewere thousands But waiting for the Soviet leader in Tiananmen upon China'sgovernment. urgingdemocracyand moral reformation protesters Deng in his hour of triThey appealedto Gorbachevfor help, they humiliated umph, and finally they were crushedby the tanks of the People's Liberation Russia that backfromthefuture wouldsoonembrace Army(PLA).Chinastepped in and EasternEurope, shunningparticipation the liberatingevents that swept worldin 1989. Ironically,afterhavingcontribmostof the restof the communist and to utedovertheyearsmodestlybutcontinually Sovietdifficulties afterhaving for communism institutedreformsthat revealedthe road to possible salvation how in Europe,in June1989theChinesedemonstrated notto dealwiththe forces unleashedby reform.

NANCY BERNKOPFTUCKER is professor of history at Georgetown University and in the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. Her most recent books are Taiwan, Hong Kong and the UnitedStates, 1945-1992; UncertainFriendships;and the co-edited volume to which she also contributed, LyndonJohnson Confrontsthe World. She is currentlya fellow at the United States Instituteof Peace in Washington, D.C.
Political Science Quarterly Volume 110 Number 4 1995-96 501

502

| POLITICAL SCIENCE QUARTERLY

To understand China'srole in the collapse of the Soviet empire requires consideration three factors:the Chinese securitythreat,the economicchalof lenge, and the Tiananmen model of politicalrepression.In none of these areas could the China factor be consideredprimary.U.S. militaryspendingunder Jimmy Carterand RonaldReaganfueled Soviet determination invest in a to multioceannavy and to expandICBM capabilities.Similarly,in both Eastern Europeand the Soviet Union, experimentation with reformantedated China's innovations. Finally,neitherimpulsestoward nor to brutality resistance it needed to be learnedfromthe Chinese. Nevertheless,in the complexenvironment that produced collapseof the Soviet empire, the problemsand challengesposed the by the People'sRepublic oughtnot to be ignoredif a comprehensive nuanced and of understanding these events is to be reached. THEGEOPOLITICAL DIMENSION The Chinese menace to Soviet securityand Moscow'sintimidation Beijing of were both the longest standingand clearestproblemsbetween the two states. TheirlengthycommonborderandSovietfearof a two-front madeit virtually war inevitable.Whenthe UnitedStatesand Chinabegan normalization the early in 1970s, apprehensions amongthe men in the Kremlinmounted. Concernamong Soviet leaders stretchedback to the earliest days of the Chinesecivil war. They preferred weak dependent a neighborto a strongone withits own agenda,andtheyentertained underlying an racialfearof thevolatile barbarian hordesin the east-a fearthathadcharacterized Russianregimeslong before the adventof communism.JosephStalinopposedMao Zedong'seffort to unify China;his successorssoughtjoint militaryfacilitiesandtriedto punish Mao for ideologicalinnovation. Duringthe ChineseCultural Revolution (19661976), Soviet anxietyrose in responseto China'sinstabilityand fanaticism.' TheSino-Sovietsplit, whichbecamepublicin the 1960s,madeclearnotonly thatmonolithic communism an illusionbutthatbipolarity an inadequate was was organizingprinciplefor the international system. The Chinesedecisionto seek support againstthe Soviet menacefrom their erstwhileenemies in Washington confirmedthatthe cold war was no longera strugglebetweencommunism and forced Moscow to take defense of its capitalism.U.S.-China rapprochement Asian borderseriouslyat the same time as Washington,althoughaugmenting its militaryprowess, could stop worryingaboutan Asian threat.The need to devoteever largerportionsof Soviet gross nationalproduct(GNP) to weapons intensified economicweakness.ForMoscow,deterioration living of procurement
' Murray D. Zinoman, "Soviet Security Policy Toward China: The Limits of Change,"Pacific Regional Security(Washington,DC: National Defense University Press, 1988), 59-60, 62; Seweryn Bialer, "The Sino-Soviet Conflict: The Soviet Dimension"in Donald Zagoria, ed., Soviet Policy in East Asia (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982), 109; 0. B. Borisov and B. T. Koloskov, Soviet-ChineseRelations, 1945-1970 (Bloomington:IndianaUniversity Press, 1975), 291-322.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

503

of standards, infrastructure, evenof life expectancy and necessitated turntoward a reformandabandonment thecold war. ThustheSino-Sovietsplithadimplicaof tions for the global balanceof power that rangedfar beyondthe substanceof disagreements betweenMoscow and Beijing. Precipitating China's decisionto seek rapprochement the UnitedStates with was its fearof a Sovietinvasion.In the mid-1960stroopconcentrations escalated along the Sino-Soviet boundary.Tensions heightenedin 1968, when Leonid Brezhnev usedforceto smashCzechoslovakia's PragueSpring,claimingMoscow hadtheright,indeedtheobligation, intervene communist to in countries restore to orderandpreserve socialism.ChineseleaderssawSovietintrusion "fascist. as and reports banditry" fearedtheirborderclashes would lead to war.2European that Moscow contemplated strikesagainstChinesenuclearfacilitiesstimulated alarm.3U.S. Secretaryof State William Rogers estimatedduring the Nixon that administration the Russians couldseize a largeportionof the northincluding Beijing.4To China'srelief, in spite of past hostility, the UnitedStatesproved unwillingto tolerateSoviet aggressionagainstthe PRC. Moscow sharplydenounced anti-Sovietthrustof the Sino-American the acin cordreachedin Shanghai February 1972.5LeonidBrezhnevhadhimselfbeen lookingto negotiations withWashington reduceburgeoning to expendimilitary tures and secure trade in foodstuffsand technology. Even after Shanghai,he believed that if the United States understood that it had the option of dealing with Russiainsteadof China,the SovietUnion"wouldremainthe UnitedStates' and adversary-partner."6 UnitedStatescapitalized SoThe on primary preferred viet anxietyto get a summit a strategic and armslimitation treatyin 1972, despite escalationof the VietnamWar. In June 1973, BrezhnevwarnedRichardNixon not to negotiatea U.S.-China militaryaccord,and in June 1974 he offeredthe presidentan allianceagainstthe PRC.7
2 ThomasM. Gottlieb,ChineseForeignPolicy Factionalismand the Originsofthe StrategicTriangle, Rand R-1902-NA, 1977, 115-118; Roger Glenn Brown, "ChinesePolitics and American Policy: A New Look at the Triangle,"Foreign Policy 23 (Summer 1976): 3-23; Thomas Robinson, "TheSinoSoviet BorderDispute,"AmericanPolitical Science Review 66 (December 1972): 1175-1202; Borisov and Koloskov, Soviet-Chinese Relations, 219-25, 239-42, 322-28. 3Bernard Gwertzman, "A Chinese Youth Writes to Soviet," New YorkTimes, 28 August 1969; Hedrick Smith, "U.S. Doubts Soviet Will Bomb China,"New YorkTimes, 29 August 1969; Arkady Shevchenko, Breaking with Moscow (New York: Knopf, 1985), 164-66; HarryGelman, The Soviet Far East Buildupand Soviet Risk-Taking Against China, Rand R-2943-AF, August 1982, 29-48. 4 BenjaminWelles, "RogersTerms Czechoslovakia'GrimReminder,'" New YorkTimes,21 August 1969; Langer, "Soviet Military Power in Asia" in Zagoria, Soviet Policy, 272. s Georgi Arbatov, The System (New York: Times Books, 1992), 180-82; Chi Su, "U.S.-China Relations: Soviet Views and Policies," Asian Survey, 23 (May 1983): 560-61; Seweryn Bialer, "The Soviet Union and the West: Security and Foreign Policy" in Bialer and Michael Mandelbaum,eds., Gorbachev'sRussia and AmericanForeign Policy (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1988), 473. 6 Robert Legvold, "The 26th Party Congress and Soviet Foreign Policy" in Seweryn Bialer and Thane Gustafson, ed., Russia at the Crossroads (Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1981), 160. 7 WilliamHyland,MortalRivals (New York: Random House, 1987), 11,60,63-64; RichardNixon, RN (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1978), 1030; John Newhouse, Cold Dawn (New York: Holt, Rinehart& Winston, 1973), 188-89.

504

| POLMCAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

Moscow, however, lost the competitionfor Washington's favor. Not only did Nixon rebuffa possiblealliance,Washington beganto contemplate military cooperation withChina.Americans hopedto forceever greater expendimilitary tureson the Soviets, createdeployment problemsfor the Red Army, constrain Soviet expansion,and precludeSino-Soviet reconciliation.8 Rapprochement worked.Moscow felt constrained further increaseborder to deployments, which hadclimbedfrom fifteendivisionsin 1965 to forty-four in 1972 andto fifty in 1982, complemented one quarter the Soviet air force. of by As much as one-seventhof all Soviet militaryresourcesfueled the Far East
expansion.

Brezhnev's initialdecisionto investheavilyin conventional well as nuclear as capabilities come in 1965, beforeSino-American had It cooperation. constituted a returnto a tradition that saw more as better, but also reflectedmaneuvering to assuremilitarysupport againstrivalssuchas Alexi KosyginandNikolaiPodgornyy, as well as to respondto the growing U.S. commitment Vietnam.9 in Most urgent,however,was offsettingthe breakdown effortsat reconciliation in withtheChinese.Vigorousfrontier defensecharacteristic a beliefin "asymmetof '0 rical security" necessitated overawingChineseforces. Moscow also launched the ill-fatedandcostly Baikal-Amur of railwayprojectto expeditedevelopment the Soviet Far East-an effort that need not have involvedan entirelynew rail line well northof the frontier officials not wantedto protectit fromBeijing. had Withrapprochement betweenWashington Beijing, Soviet leadersfaced and the specterof Americanforcesjoined with those of Japanand China.This led themdramatically increasedeployment intermediate to of nuclearmissiles;modernizethe Pacificfleet; andupgrade troops,communications, fortifications. and In 1978 Moscow createdan independent theatercommandin the region conthe of firming permanency its expensivenewdefenseposture.GeorgiA. Arbatov, of director the U.S.A. andCanada Institute warnedthatif Chinawere"tobecome somesortof military to theWest . .. thereis no placefor detente."" ally Analysts havearguedpersuasively fearof Chinese-American that collusionin Afghanistan contributed althoughit did not determine,the Soviet decisionto invadethat to,
8 Banning N. Garrettand Bonnie S. Glaser, "FromNixon to Reagan: China'sChanging Role in in AmericanStrategy" KennethA. Oye, RobertJ. Lieber,and DonaldRothchild,eds., Eagle Resurgent? (Boston: Little, Brown, 1987), 256-63. 9 Bialer, "The Soviet Union" in Bialer and Mandelbaum,Gorbachev's Russia, 461-62. 10 HarryGelman, TheBrezhnev Politburoand theDecline of Detente(Ithaca,NY: CornellUniversity Press, 1984), 38-41, 80-81, 94; RajanMenon, Soviet Power and the Third World(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986), 99. " Avigdor Haselkorn, "Impactof Sino-Japanese Treaty on the Soviet Security Strategy,"Asian Survey19 (June 1979): 561, 565; JonathanPollack, "Chinaandthe Global StrategicBalance" Harry in Harding,ed., China'sForeign Relationsin the 1980s (New Haven: Yale UniversityPress, 1984), 164; BanningGarrettand Bonnie Glaser, Warand Peace (Berkeley: Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1984), 14.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

505

countryin 1979, beginninga war which would furtherdrainthe USSR as well 12 as burydetente. Herethenwas the fulfillment the classic Russianmilitarynightmare-the of frightfulby Americanand possibilityof a two front war-made particularly Japanese willingnessto armthe Chinesehordes.'3 And not only wouldMoscow have to expandand diversifymilitarycapabilities,the United Stateswould be able to focus its attention Europeleaving Asia to China.In 1970 the Nixon on of administration made public its reconfiguration strategicplans, eliminating in budgetsfor fightingsimultaneously EuropeandAsia. The Sovietsplaintively warnedthe unwitting Americans Chinawouldtry "tocause a clash between that the U.S. and the USSR, in orderto dominatethe worldaftera nuclearconflict which ... wouldreduceAmericaandEurope asheswhile sparing... millions to of Chinese."'4 Thegrowthin Sovietmilitary powerduring 1970sdidnotpromote the national it together powerfulcoalitionof forcesagainst a security.Paradoxically, brought an isolatedSoviet government whose militaryachievements,while substantial, cloakedprecipitous economicdecline. Addedburdensfromwar in Afghanistan, to commitments Cuba and Vietnamas well as a resurgentarms race with the UnitedStatesmadeSovietoverextension debilitating. Insteadof reflectinggenuine preeminence, on militarization the Soviet model seemedto Deng Xiaoping to conflict with modernization prosperity.As he remarked Germanexand to Chancellor HelmutSchmidt,"oneof the reasonswhy the Sovieteconomysuffers from paralysisis thatthe Russiansspendtoo much money on the military."'5 By 1982 Moscow had recognizedthat its policies had createda hazardous anti-Soviet that alignment.Assumptions it could sustaind6tentewith the United Stateswhileprojecting powerintotheThirdWorldhadprovenwildlyinaccurate. Moscow's conviction survival that dictated offensiveposture an provedincompatible with Washington's view of detenteas superseding With 10-15 competition. percentof GNP going to the military,Soviet leadersfoundthey still could not 16 intimidate UnitedStates,Japan, China. InMarch1982,therefore, the or Brezhnev
Raymond Garthoff, Detente and Confrontation(Washington, DC: Brookings, 1985), 921-22, esp. n99. 13 MarshalN. Ogarkov, Kommunist, July 1981, Joint PublicationResearchService (JPRS)79074 PREX 7.21/11:981, 25 September 1981, 90; A. Gromyko, Kommunist,January1981, JPRS 78106 PREX 7.13:78106, 18 May 1981, 16. 14 Garrett and Glaser, Warand Peace, 28; Philip Taubman,"U.S. and ChinaForging Closer Ties," New YorkTimes, 8 December 1980, Serge Schmemann,"RussianScornsChinese as 'Agents'of U.S.," 19 June 1981, and BernardNositer, "BrzezinskiPraises White House," 2 July 1981. Is Thomas Bernstein,"DomesticPolitics"in Steven Goldstein, ed., ChinaBriefing, 1984 (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1985), 9; Samuel S. Kim, "Chinaand the Third World: In Search of a Peace and DevelopmentLine"in Kim, ed., Chinaand the World(Boulder, CO: Westview, 1989), 169; Banning Garrettand Bonnie Glaser, "ChineseEstimates of the U.S.-Soviet Balance of Power," Paper #33, 1988, 28, Wilson Center, Washington, DC. 16 Alexander Nagorny, Sergei Tsyplakov, and Usman Usmanov, "The PRC: The First Decade of the Policy of Reforms,"International Affairs1 (January1989): 29; Alexei G. Arbatov,"ArmsLimitation
12

506 | POLITICAL SCIENCE QUARTERLY

took the major step of acceptingthe legitimacyof Chinese socialism, which Subsequent low-level removeda majorideologicalbarrierto reconciliation.'7 exchangesin science, education,culture,and tradestabilizedcontacts."8 Then under Mikhail Gorbachevthe pace accelerated.His "new political thinking" recognizedthat the correlationof forces was no longer workingto Moscow'sadvantageand thatthe new situationfavoredeconomic cooperation budgetsandreassignfundsto thedomestic overmilitary coercion.To cutmilitary withthe United sphere,Gorbachev soughtto end the cold war, improverelations States,and minimizethreatsof nuclearwar. At the same time, if costs were to imperative eliminateregional to be reducedand securityenhanced,it appeared conflicts.19 Lukin,"animprovement Thus,according SovietanalystAlexander to in relations withChinawas indispensable the successof Gorbachev's to policy."20 Among other initiatives,Gorbachev's speech at Vladivostokin July 1986 suggested concessionson two of the three obstaclesto Sino-Soviet reconciliation: from Afghanistan. reductionof forces along the borderand withdrawal a alteration Militaryconcernson the SovietAsianborderproduced profound in Moscow'sview of its place in the world and the possible fruitsof its foreign withtheSino-Sovietrift, Chinahadbeenperceivedas a threat, policy. Beginning complicating defense planningand escalatingdefense spending.Reconciliation with the UnitedStatesrendered Chinastill moredangerous.But the policy that equipped Soviet Asia for war alienatedpeople in the Pacific area, isolated PRC-U.S.-Japaneseties. The Soviet Union found Moscow, and strengthened itself less, not more secure. The time had come to rethinkits strategicposture.
CHINESE ECONOMIC REFORM

to of If theborder withChinagaveimpetus thereconfiguration Moscow's problem the securitystructure, economicchallengearisingfrom the East also had a role in hastening uponseriouseconomic changein theSovietempire.Chinaembarked
and the Situationin the Asian-Pacific and IndianOcean Regions,"Asian Surgery24 (November 1984):
1110.
1" M. S. Ukraintsev[M. S. Kapitsal, "USSR'sCooperationwith Asian Socialist Countries, Kampuchea," Far Eastern Affairs 1 (January-March1986), JPRS-UFE-003, 18 June 1986; Chi Su, "Soviet China-Watchers'Influenceon Soviet China Policy," Journal of NortheastAsian Studies 2 (December 1983): 44; Kenneth Lieberthal, Sino-Soviet Conflict in the 1970s, Rand R-2342-NA, 1978. 18 Carol Hamrin, China and the Challenge of the Future (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1990), 93 and 84-90; John W. Garver, "The 'New Type' of Sino-Soviet Relations,"Asian Survey 29 (December 1989): 1137. '9 HasegawaTsuyoshi, "Gorbachev,the New Thinkingof Soviet Foreign-Security Policy and the 'New Thinking'and the and Military: Recent Trends and Implications" KimuraHiroshi, "Gorbachev's Asian-Pacific Region" in Peter Juviler and Kimura, eds., Gorbachev'sReforms (New York: Aldine De Gruyter, 1988), 115-47, 149; Stephen M. Meyer, "Sourcesand Prospects of Gorbachev'sNew Political Thinking on Security,"Asian Survey 13 (Fall 1988): 128, 142. 1 Alexander Lukin, "The Initial Soviet Reactionto the Events in China in 1989 and the Prospects for Sino-Soviet Relations,"China Quarterly 125 (March 1991): 120.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

507

reformin 1978. Facilitated partby the increasedconfidencefollowing from in Sino-American the rapprochement, new orderalteredthedomesticeconomyand expanded commercialties with the West. In subsequent years, it revolutionized agricultural production raisedthe level of ruralprosperity and significantly. Althoughindustrial changescame moreslowly, the production consumer of goods in increasedmarkedlyand the living standards cities also improved.These advancessometimesinspired generally and encouraged reformsin theSovietUnion unworkable andEastern Europe,wheretheexistingsystemincreasingly appeared and the leadershipincompetent.Particularly China'sability to attractforeign investment embodiedlessons for capital-and technology-starved governments. for Enthusiasm reform along Chinese lines did not develop rapidly. The Soviets disparaged the Deng Xiaoping'searly efforts, denouncing new policies that as anirresponsible flightfromsocialism.Commentaries suggested theSoviets assumedandhopedthatChina's effortswouldfail.21 Identifying themas a threat, 0. B. Rakhmanin the Communist of Partyof the Soviet Union (CPSU)Liaison Department, amongthe most influentialand hard-lineof the long-termChinawatchers,chargedthatthe changesaimedat strengthening Beijing'santi-Soviet policy.22 ManySoviet leaderscould not imaginethatMoscow could learnfrom a backward statewhose previouseconomicinnovations, such as the GreatLeap Forward,hadbeen so catastrophic. Othersresistedanything mightimprove that to Sino-Sovietrelations."One becomesaccustomed a quarrel," Sovieteconomist Lev Deliusinobserved."Onecan make a profit out of it, and that'swhy some people were interested in resolvingdifferences,but in rousingthemto new not heights."23 the extent thatBeijing'sprogramreceived serious attention,the To focus invariablyseemed to be its shortcomings inequities. Commentators or of stressedcorruption, inflation,inequality, the deterioration publicworks.24 and Those interested Soviet applications constrained silence or to air ideas in felt to in surreptitiously obscurepublications. Ideologicalcurbsfinallyeased with the 1982 deathsof LeonidBrezhnevand partyideologicalpuristMikhailSuslov.25 Beginningwith the accessionof YuriAndropov,discussionsof Chinesereformsbecamemoreobjectiveand informative. assertedthatMoscow Andropov into must"take fraternal the countries' Even experience account."26 deputyforeign
21 GilbertRozman, "Moscow'sChina-watchers the Post-Mao Era: The Response to a Changing in China," China Quarterly94 (June 1983): 236-37. 22 Chi Su, "Soviet China-Watchers," 42-43. 2 Lev Petrovich Deliusin, 'The People's Republic of China: The Domestic Policy Influence on Foreign Policy Activities"(paperdelivered at Conferenceon Chinese and East Asian Implicationsfor American Policy, 1991), 8. 24 MarshallI. Goldman, Gorbachev's Challenge:EconomicReformin the Age of High Technology (New York: Norton, 1987), 200-201. 2 Rozman, The Chinese Debate, 370; Gilbert Rozman, "Stagesin the Reform and Dismantlingof Socialism in Chinaand the Soviet Union"in Rozman,et al., ed., DismantlingCommunism (Baltimore; Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), 40; GilbertRozman, A Mirrorfor Socialism (Princeton,NJ: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1985), 43-44. 26 Gelman, 7he BrezhnevPolitburo, 256 n18.

508

| POLITICAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

ministerM.S. Kapitsa,ordinarily inflexiblecritic of the Chinese, saw fit to an call attention important to in developments the PRCin 1982. Missionsto China by Aleksandr Bovin,aninfluential columnist Izvestiya, 1983,andby Deputy for in PrimeMinister IvanArkhipov, 1984, appear haveencouraged leadership in to the to study China. By mid-1985 the Instituteof the Far East, a researchgroup closely tied to the ForeignMinistry,began a dispassionate monthlyfeaturein its journalon economic reformsin China. And also during 1985, the Central of Committee theCPSUestablished own office to evaluatethe Chinesereform its
program.27

Economic change,however,stalledunder Andropov. government The proved unable galvanize population, to the eliminate corruption, increaseeitherindusor trialor agricultural output,and seemedequallyunableto acknowledgethatthe systemrequired In fundamental transformation. contrast eitherChinaor East to Europe,entrenched interests traditions and a maintained tightgripon the institutionsthatgovernedeconomicperformance the imagination a publicwhich and of would have to respondto new departures. The roots of such immobilityin a centuries-old authoritarian Russianpoliticalculturethatemphasizedhierarchy, of centralism more far deference,andloyaltymadethe preservation communist logical thaninnovation.28 only were Andropov's Not own mildlyliberalinclinations thwarted,buthis regimeactuallysoughtto restoreideologicalconformity amongthe intelligentsia. By thetimeMikhail Gorbachev tookcontrolin March1985, theimpossibility of just muddling had The through becomepainfullyapparent. impetusto reform came froma combination dire domesticcircumstances, thorough of the discreditingof theStalinist growthmodel,theexhaustion fromwarin Afghanistemming stan,andthe emergenceof a generation leadersreceptiveto a policy of peresof troikaor restructuring.29 As Gorbachev's government moved towardreform, it began to look more carefullybothat domesticprecursors, especiallyLenin'sNew EconomicPolicy in (NEP), and at what had begun elsewhere, particularly Hungaryand China. discussionof the Chinese experienceawaited Gorbachev's Significantpublic 1986 call at the CPSU's27th Congress,whichhe thenreiterated his in February important Vladivostokspeech in July.30
27 Lowell Dittmer, Sino-Soviet Normalizationand Its Intemational Implications, 1945-1990 (Seattle: University of WashingtonPress, 1992), 291 n30, 292 n53. 28 Archie Brown, "Ideology and Political Culture"in Seweryn Bialer, ed. Politics, Society, and NationalityInside Gorbachev's Russia (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1989), 19; KonstantinV. Pleshakov andDimitryV. Furman,"China the Soviet Union:CommonandSpecific Featuresof theirSociopolitand ical and Ideological Development,"Mirovaya EkonomikaI Mezhdunarodnyye Otnosheniya 12 (December 1989): JPRS-UWE-90-004, 2 April 1990. 2 Charles Gati, The Bloc That Failed (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990), 107-08; Shigeki Hakamadaand Gilbert Rozman, "The Soviet Union and China: Coping with Modernity"in Rozman, Dismantling, 160. 3 Sheila Fitzpatrick,"TheSources of Change in Soviet History: State, Society, and the Entrepreneurial Tradition" Bialer and Mandelbaum,Gorbachev'sRussia, 52-53; MartinMalia, TheSoviet in

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

509

economybegan Soviet economistslookingfor ways to invigoratea stagnant No our to see in "China main foreignreformlaboratory." longercriticizingthe Chineseprogramas heresy, they recognizedthat what had been happeningin for Chinacould be "vitallyimportant us." As Evgenii Konovalov,head of the asserted,"wenow lookattheirreforms at Chinadepartment theFarEastInstitute, the And as if it were our personalbusiness."3" Arbatov,who along with running member government and Committee U.S.A./CanadaInstitute servedas a Central spokesman,observedthat since "we were becomingincreasinglyinterestedin
the problem of reform . .. successful reforms in China . . . made that country's

agendaa factorin our internalpolitics."32 Accordingto the WallStreetJournal a "broadspectrumof Soviet Chinawatchersare saying openly thatthe economicpathtakenby the Chineseplays as the a role-in fact a centralrole-in determining policies of Mr. Gorbachev Indeed,Alexander he strivesto stir his own nationfrom its economictorpor."33 "one-sided for Lukinsubsequently Sovietofficialsandscholars purveying indicted that in information the late 1980s so as to "givethe Soviet government positive" Economistsat many extrapush neededfor the adoptionof similarmeasures."34 to of the majorresearchinstitutesvied for the opportunity travelto China. In July 1987, even formerForeignMinisterAndreiGromyko,notedfor his long in modernizato to indifference Asia, attested Moscow'sinterest China's standing tion program.35 Opinionremaineddivided as to the relevanceof Chinese reformsfor the Soviet Union. Some Soviet analystscontendedthat China had little to teach the Soviet Union'smore advancedindustrialeconomy. Contrastsin political of structures seemedto interfere also and environment the strength bureaucratic to prepared grant withapplyinglessons. Whereasthe Sovietleadership appeared caste more extensive politicalfreedoms,it had to contendwith a bureaucratic been in existencefar longer, and thatat eighteenmillionwas muchlarger, had in groupof administrators China as hadnotbeendestabilized hadthecomparable duringthe CulturalRevolution.Chinaalso benefitedfrom the largesse of the havenof Hong Kong for overseasChinesecommunityand the entrepreneurial criticsinsistedthatDeng'swillwhichno Soviet parallelsexisted. Furthermore,
Tragedy(New York: Free Press, 1994), 456; StephenM. Young, "Gorbachev's Asian Policy: Balancing the New and the Old," Asian Survey28 (March 1988): 323. 31 MarkD'Anastasio,"SovietsNow Hail Chinaas a Source of Ideas for Reviving Socialism," Wall StreetJournal, 18 September 1987. 32 Arbatov, 7he System, 103. 33 D'Anastasio,"Soviets Now Hail China," WallStreet Journal, 18 September1987. On influence of instituteanalysts, see Chi Su, "SovietChina-Watchers," 25-49; John J. Stephan,"Asiain the Soviet Conception"in Zagoria, Soviet Policy, 30-31. 3 Lukin, "The Initial Soviet Reaction," 124. 35 Author's interview with Vladilen Vorontsov, editor-in-chief Far Eastern Affairs, Washington, DC, February 1991; "Forthe FurtherDevelopmentof Soviet-PRC Relations,"Pravda, 15 July 1987, Foreign BroadcastInformationService (FBIS)-Sov-International Affairs-China, 15 July 1987, B1.

5 10 I POLMCAL SCIENCE QUARTERLY

ingnessto slash militarybudgetsand demobilizea million soldierscould not be At copied by Moscow with its defense commitments. bottom,historianMartin Maliaargues"Stalin beena 'success,'in ... creatinga mammoth had industrial
plant and building a superpower; Mao had been a failure.... Gorbachev thus

had to liquidatemuchof whathis countryregarded its glory; Deng only had as to overcomepolicies thatmost in his countrywantedto be rid of."36 Thoseattracted the Chinesereformexperiment to the emphasized extraordinarytransformation the agricultural of sectorandthe lessons to be learnedfrom Deng'sdaringdecisionto eliminatecollectivization. LeonidAbalkin,director of the Instituteof Economicsand a close aide to Gorbachev,averreda "special in interest" "thefast and successfuldevelopmentof agriculture throughbroad application the family-responsibility of system."37 Tat'iana Zaslavskaia, ecoan nomic sociologist, publicizedthe efficacy of Chinese rural reforms for land management cropselectionin theofficialgovernment partyorgansIzvesand and tiya andPravda.38 FedorBurlatsky similarlypraisedthe responsibility system's abilityto doubleproduction. Editorof the popularweekly Literaturnaia gazeta and TV personality well as adviserto Andropovand Gorbachev,Burlatsky as stressed his largeaudience to decentralized of management enterprises, privatizaof tion, and attraction foreigncapitaland technology.In Novyi mir as early as 1982 Burlatsky used Chinesereforms"as a blueprint changesin the Soviet for His to economy." readiness considerChinesereformas instructive, havingonce been a harshcritic of China, renderedhis views even more influential.39 Foodshortages distribution and problems undermined some of the resistance to experimentation theSovietUnion.Chineseexpertson rural in changeincluding of He Minister Agriculture Kangandmembers ZhaoZiyang'sstructural of readthinktankreceivedinvitations lecturein the USSR.40In 1987 Acadeto justment mician Oleg Bogomolovof the Instituteof Economicsof the World Socialist to Systemtraveled Chinato examinereformpolicies. Uponhis return,he pressed the CentralCommittee adoptelementsof the Chineseapproach.4' private to In
Malia, The Soviet Tragedy, 454. D'Anastasio, "Soviets Now Hail China," Wall Street Journal, 18 September 1987, 8; Michael Kaser, "Soviet Restructuringin Relationshipto the Chinese Reform," in Stanislaw Gomulka, YongChool Ha, and Cae-One Kim, eds., Economic Reformsin the Socialist World(Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1989), 100. 38 Pravda, 25 October 1984, and Izvestiya, 1 June 1985; E. A. Hewett, Reformingthe Soviet Economy (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1988), 276. 3 Fedor Burlatsky, "Interregnum, or a Chronicle of the Times of Deng Xiaoping,"Novyi mir 4 (April 1982), JPRS80807, PREX7.21/5:1250, 13 May 1982, USSR Report,57-83; and"Conversations About Economic Reforms in China," Literaturnaiagazeta, 11 June 1986, 14, FBIS Ill, USSRInternational Affairs-China, 18 June 1986; B 1-9; Rolf H. W. Theen, "Reform:Perspectives, Problems and Prospects"in Jane Shapiro Zacek, ed., The GorbachevGeneration(New York: Paragon, 1989), 256; ShimotomaiNobuo, "The Reform Movement: Power, Ideology, and Intellectuals" Juvilerand in Kimura, Gorbachev'sReforms, 73. 4 Hamrin, Challenge of the Future, 34-35, 231, 234. " Ronald D. Asmus, J. F. Brown, and Keith Crane, Soviet Foreign Policy and the Revolutionsof 1989 in Eastern Europe, Rand R-3903-USDP, 1991, 6nl0; InternationalAffairs 10 (October 1988): 39.
37

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

511

consultations with Gorbachev,he stressedthe usefulnessof China'sexperience to the USSR. Gorbachev,however, provedexceedinglycautious.Bogomolovfoundthat despitehis earlyspecialization agriculture perhaps in or becauseof his familiarity withpeasant abilitiesandattitudes, Gorbachev approached ruralexperimentation warily.He considered Russia's agricultural lobbymoreformidable thananything facedby Chinesereformers.42 Given thatSoviet agriculture, strikingcontrast in to China's,basedproduction large-scalemechanization, on conservatives argued thata return familyfarmswouldbe uneconomical. to Whereas Chinesepeasants in overwhelming numbers welcomedtheresponsibilities independent of production, to the Sovietsclungdesperately guaranteed rations,assignedtasks, security,and predictability.43 Moreover,farmingin the USSRinvolvedonly 20 percentof the as population a resultof Stalin's successfulurbanization, thateven werepublic so pressureto grow in the countrysidein favor of change, it would not constitute the spur to reformthat it had in China." Nor, indeed, would ruralprosperity of give a vast proportion the populacea stake in changeas it had done among the Chinese. Gorbachev's hesitation may also havebeen fosteredby developments during the Brezhnevyears. Confrontedby productionshortfalls, Brezhnev invested heavilyin agriculture refusedto introduce but reform.InthePolitburo, Gennadiy Voronovcalled for the returnof decision makingto small teams and payment aide V. A. accordingto output.ButBrezhnevfollowedhis harshlyconservative and whoupheld collectivization warned Golikov, againstsacrificing tightpolitical command.45 like Gorbachev, Brezhnev, instinctively sought greater centralization, launching
perestroika with efforts to reinforce inefficient existing structures, in contrast

inherent decentralization to Chinawherethekeyto progresshadbeenintensifying in the economy. Gorbachev, however,worriedaboutloss of controlandregionruralconstituency, and alism. Givenpoliticalopposition the absenceof a natural he preferredpiecemealefforts such as modest land leasing programsinspired
42 Oleg Bogomolov interviewwith the author,21 March1991; Bogomolov, "TheWorldof Socialism 64 Kommunist (November 1987), JPRS-UKO-88-003,2 February1988, on the Roadof Restructuring," 61-68; Anders Aslund, Gorbachev'sStrugglefor Economic Reform(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1989), 100, 179-80; Jerry F. Hough, "Changesin Soviet Elite Composition"in Bialer and Gustafson, Crossroads, 43; Robert F. Miller, "The Soviet Economy: Problems and Solutions in the GorbachevView" in R. F. Miller, J. H. Miller, and T. H. Rigby, eds., Gorbachevat the Helm (New York: Croom Helm, 1986), 125; TsuneakiSato, "EconomicReforms in China in Light of Soviet and EasternEuropeanExperiences"in Kinya Niiseki, ed., The Soviet Union in Transition(Boulder, CO: Westview, 1987), 91. Post, 20 February 1994. 43 MargaretShapiro, "HardTimes on the Farm," Washington 4 PadmaDesai, Perestroikain Perspective (Princeton, NJ: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1989), 3637, 105; Goldman, Gorbachev'sChallenge, 190-200. 4S Gelman, The BrezhnevPolitburo, 239-40 n24.

512

| POLITICAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

by Lenin'sNEP as well as by China.46 assertedhis "intention see to it that He to the entire agrarian of sector, takes this path,"but in 1987 complained the inadequate spreadof the contractsystem.47 Soviet reformwould, instead,come in the industrial sector. enthuSpecialeconomiczonesandjointventures similarly generated guarded siasm. Sovietwritersfearedpossibleaggravation regionalandethnicdispariof ties. Some economistsand officials who visited PRC zones rejectedthem as akinto nineteenth-century treatyportconcessions.Furthermore, questioned they whetherlarge-scaleforeigninvestment technologytransferwouldbe faciliand tated. Nevertheless,China'sburgeoning of economy, especiallythe abundance consumergoods, promotedpositive reviews. The Soviet journalFar Eastern Affairs heralded Moscow'sdecisionto trythejoint-venture conceptin thesummer of 1986. Burlatsky Literaturnaia in gazeta suggestedmore seriousexamination of the specialzone model. And IvanIvanov,deputychairman the StateComof mitteefor ForeignEconomicRelations,confirmed effortsto adoptbothmodels.48
As Konovalov noted, "Ourofficials are being much more selective.
. ..

Still,

we can'thelp admirewhatthey have done in China."49 Chinesereformalso encouragedEast Europeans,from whom the Chinese in turnlearned aboutmodifications socialism.Similarexchangeshadoccurred of in the 1950swhenBulgaria,for instance,adopted ill-fatedgreatleap forward an "the strategyat the behestof domesticplannersnicknamed Chinese."50 Contacts betweenBeijingand EasternEuroperesumedin the 1970s aftera fallow period of followingthe shattering the communist bloc. Having"noreasonto vilify the
PRC other than . . . to manifest solidarity with the Kremlin," they now saw

Chinaas a counterweight Soviet pressure.5' to

46Seweryn Bialer, "Gorbachev's Programof Change: Sources, Significance, Prospects"in Bialer and Mandelbaum,Gorbachev'sRussia, 294; Nicholas Lardy, "China:Sustaining Development"and TsuyoshiHasegawa,"TheConnectionBetweenPoliticalandEconomicReformin CommunistRegimes" in Rozman, ed., Dismantling, 78-79, 220-23. 47 Herbert Ellison, "Perestroika J. andthe New Economic Policy (1921-1928): The Uses of History" in Mel Gurtov, ed., The Transformation Socialism (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1990), 30; Kaser, of "Soviet Restructuring," 100. 48 Aslund, Gorbachev's Struggle, 141, 183; V. Portyakovand S. Stepanov, "China'sSpecial Economic Zones," Far EasternAffairs 2 (1986), cited in Goldman, Gorbachev'sChallenge, 216; Fedor Burlatsky,"International Panorama,"4May 1986, FBISIII, USSR-International Affairs-China,15 May 1986, B 1-3; Fedor Burlatsky,Literaturnaia gazeta 24 (June 1986): 14; J. RichardWalsh, "Developing Socialism in the Soviet Union and China"in CharlesBukowskiandWalsh, eds., Glasnost, Perestroika, and the Socialist Community (New York: Praeger, 1990), 52. 4' D'Anastasio, "Soviets Now Hail China," Wall StreetJournal, 18 September 1987, 8. s J. F. Brown, EasternEuropeand Communist Rule (Durham,NC: Duke UniversityPress, 1988), 321. s' VladimirSobell, "TheReconciliationBetweenChinaand EasternEurope,"Washington Quarterly 10 (Spring 1987): 100; Charles Gati, "The Soviet Stake in EasternEurope"in Bialer and Gustafson, BalkanStrategy," Crossroads, 183-84; David A. Andelman,"China's InternationalSecurity4 (Winter 1979/1980): 60-79.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

513

of The reestablishment linksmadeit possiblefor analyststo exploreparallel reformprograms.The Chineseinitiallyfocusedon Yugoslavia,thenbrieflyon in on There,beginning 1968, Romania,andfinallywithmoreintensity Hungary. market socialism, New EconomicMechanism institutionalized had JanosKadar's in and a degree of independence allowing small-scalecooperativeproduction industrial output,foreigntrade,andgeneral settingprices. GrowingHungarian A PRCattention. reviewof the 1977-1981 periodby analyst prosperity attracted reforms appeared that NinaHalpern suggested "noseriousstudyof EastEuropean strategies But until afterthe decisionto carryout reformsin China." thereafter were borrowed.52 1984 delegationof Chineseeconomists A for implementation localpractices couldnotbe "indiscrimithat visitingHungary concluded although natelycopied" given the differencesin context,culture,andscale, usefullessons JanosKornaion enterprisereform, could be learned.The work of Hungarian and for one, becamewidely disseminated, as earlyas 1981 Polisheconomist0. Sik helpedto persuadeBeijing to establisha Price ResearchCenterunderthe as State Council. Negativeexamplesalso provedimportant, when the director of of the Institute Economicsat the ChineseAcademyof Social Sciences, Dong becauseof discouraging developFureng,rejectedthe ideaof workerownership ments in Yugoslavia.s3 leadersand economistsmadenuDuringthe mid-1980s, EasternEuropean reformandspecialeconomiczones. meroustripsto Chinato discussagricultural Polish politicalscientistJerzyWiatrsaw Chineseinfluenceas one of the three main catalystsfor reformalongsideeconomiccrisis and Moscow'ssupportfor in change.Innovations joint venturelegislationin Poland,Hungary,and Yugoslavia drew on Chinesemodels and tradeburgeoned.54 Europeans came provedmixed.SomeEastern Theresultof theseinteractions celebrated elements Chinawas simplytoo aliento imitate.Others to concludethat of Chinesereforms.While the East Germansfocusedon the socialistnatureof mechamutual commitment market to China's emphasized plans,the Hungarians economic nisms.Chineseeclecticismin takingideasfromvariousEastEuropean and models invitedincompatibility incoherence. partyleaderKaroly Theremayalso havebeen politicalpenalties.Hungarian GroszandChinesePremierZhaoZiyangechoedeach others'wordsin calls for change. "Itwas,"BritishanalystGeraldSegal observed: thoroughgoing
52 from Abroad:ChineseViews of the East EuropeanEconomicExperiNina P. Halpern,"Learning ence, January 1977-June 1981," Modem China 11 (January1985): 103. 53 Robert C. Hsu, Economic Theories in China, 1979-1988 (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 23-24, 74, 87-88. in 5 Ming Chen, "Sino-EastEuropeanRelations" Hao Yufanand HuanGuocang,eds., TheChinese Viewof the World(New York: Pantheon,1989), 269; FBIS-EEU-89-080, BULGARIA,27 April 1989, 13; Jerzy J. Wiatr, "Economic and Political Reforms in Socialist Countries of Eastern Europe: A ComparativeAnalysis"in Gomulka et al., Economic Reforns, 123; Marcin Sar, "The Evolution of CentripetalFraternalism:The Soviet Union and Eastern Europe,"Annals of the AmericanAcademy (September 1985): 103.

514

| POLITICAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

this kind of mutuallyreinforcingdialogue . . . as well as specific visits and borrowings,whichChinesehard-liners probably in mindwhentheycriticizedZhao had Ziyang'sschool after June 1989 for being over-influenced an EasternEurope by intellecalreadysuborned the West. It was also thebasis for some EastEuropean by tuals'feelingsof regret,almostguilt, afterJune 1989 abouthavingurgedon China ideas of reformwhich provedto be too advanced."

Perestroikain the Soviet Union and in EasternEuropebenefitedfrom the in impetusgiven by Chinato the reformist atmosphere the socialistworld, even when the particular detailsof Deng'sachievements appeared irrelevant.Gorbachev may have movedaheadin politicalreformmore vigorouslythaneconomic reform.He experimented industrial with innovation moreoftenthanagricultural, becauseof his more formidable problemsin buildinga constituency overand comingRussia's communist legacy. But China's bold program,which so clearly demonstrated advantages change and modernization, the of served as a useful stimulus.56Moreover,Chinaprovideda handyvehicle for relativelyrisk-free criticismof the Soviet system for those who might otherwisehave been constrainedto remainsilent. As a State Department analyst observed, "if China hadn'texisted they would have had to inventit."57
TIANANMEN

In 1989Chinamadeits finalcontribution shapingthe way in whichthe Soviet to empirecollapsed,the destruction the Chinesedemocracymovementat Tiaof nanmenSquarein Beijing. The event proved inspirational the people and to inhibitingfor politicalleadersconfronting theirown surge towarddemocracy. The roots of the crisis at Tiananmen could be foundin the reformprogram launched Deng and his allies in 1978. By eliminating communesystem, by the class discrimination, attacking permitting urbanization, absorbing foreigntechnology, andcondoning consumer a culture,the government transformed society. It did not providefor comparable politicalchangebut did encouragea degree of intellectual independence. Deng understood to emancipate that ChinafromCultural Revolution disillusionment,radicalMaoism would have to be repudiated.He urged his people insteadto "seek truthfromfacts."In 1980he initiated modesteffortto overcome a bureaucratism, revitalizelow-level electionsand People'sCongresses,andto to make the press more responsiveto the public.58 Studentswere encouragedto
ss GeraldSegal, "ForeignEconomic Policy" in Segal, et al., Opennessand Foreign Policy Reform in Communist States (New York: Routledge, 1992), 33-36. S6 Letter from Lev Petrovich Deliusin to author, March 1991. S' Author's interviewwithWayneLimberg,StateDepartment IntelligenceandResearchStaff,Winter 1991; Rozman, "Moscow'sChina-watchers," 238. 58 Andrew J. Nathan, Chinese Democracy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986); Rozman, "Stages,"42.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE | 515

studyabroaduntilupwardof 40,000 couldbe foundin the UnitedStatesalone. Scholarsbegan to examinelong taboo issues in Chinesehistory. Glasnostor opennessin China, however, stoppedshortof even the limited political diversity and freedoms of expressiongiven Soviet citizens. China's pollution" leaders condemnedcalls for pluralismand democracyas "spiritual from the West. In 1978-1979, in 1983-1984, and again in 1986-1987, writers and protesterswere silencedor arrestedand sentencedto prisonterms. the couldnotbe so easily The dissatisfaction underlying 1989demonstrations exacereliminated.Popularangerover inflation,job insecurity,and corruption bated frustration with the lack of political rights. When on 15 April former GeneralSecretaryof the CCP Hu Yaobangsuddenlydied, studentsseized the to opportunity celebratethe liberal policies for which he had allegedly been purgedin 1987. The criticismof survivingleaderscould not be missed. Their the response,disparaging studentsas hoodlums,fed the protest. and Demonstrations even the May hungerstrikemighthave passedquietly, but for the visit of MikhailGorbachev.News media from aroundthe world convergedon Beijing to markthis historicreconciliation.What the television were picturesof a tent city in the main squareand camerasactuallybroadcast populardemandsfor politicalchange to accompanyeconomic reorganization. workers,partycadres,andeven soldiers Theyrecorded intellectuals, journalists, joiningthe recurrent marches.To manyobserversfromabroad,butmoresignificantly to many Chinese, the throngs in the streets impedingarmy efforts to enforcemartial were reminiscent andconsciouslypatterned law of upondemonto oust Ferdinand Marcos in 1986 in the stratorswho used "people's power" Philippines. in The messagehadresonance EasternEurope.Duringthe 1980s, economic and political liberalization advanced,however haltingly, in Hungaryand had the Poland. This had been encouragedby Gorbachev,hoping to reinvigorate European home." socialistworldby integrating Sovietbloc into a "common the that as But Gorbachev provednaivein thinking reformscouldbe gradual severe In economicdeclineprovokedwidespread dissatisfaction. the midstof growing in EasternEurope, protests in Beijing proved inspirational.Young agitation "to strike" the PRCEmbassyin Hungary show that at people stageda "solidarity from Beijing, via Warsawto Budapest,the same processesare takingplace." The East Germanoppositionassertedlater that "it was the recent democracy and movementin China that provokedour determination action against Stalinism."59 and International attention the helpedto sustain Chinesemovement magnified national scopeand pressures upongovernment leaders.So too didits increasingly and the involvement workers.Butby the end of May, exhausted disappointed of one demonstrators beganto scatter.A smallgroupmounted finalgesture,erecting
59 FBIS-EEU-89-101, 26 May 1989, 24; FBIS-CHI-89-237, International Affairs, 12 December 1989, 6-7; FBIS-EEU-89-107, 6 June 1989, 10-11; FBIS-EEU-89-108, 7 June 1989, 57.

516

| POLITICAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

a Goddessof DemocracyoppositeTiananmen.It was too much. On the night of 3-4 June, leadersorderedthe PLA to clear the square.In the ensuingmelee, soldiersandburning tanks. peoplediedamidfrightened severalhundred unarmed The BeijingSpringended in blood and chaos. Outsideof China, the repressionof Tiananmenengendereddismay. The monthsof 1989 Europethatdefinedthe remaining topplingof regimesin Eastern startedironicallywith elections on 4 Junethat broughtSolidarityto power in political systems, Poland.60 Among those seeking to overturnSoviet-imposed images of the Chinese people seeking freedomand facing ruthlessrepression evokedempathyfor the victimsand fear and loathingfor the brutalcommunist
leadership.6'

and In Moscow, too, observerswere aghast.Reformers Chinaspecialistsat that was and theAcademyof Scienceslookedon in horror declared thecrackdown throughout Demonstrators evidenceof a lesser degree of social development.62 leaders.At the firstCongressof People'sDeputies, Moscowcondemned Beijing's Gorbachev took a urgedthatthe USSR recall its ambassador. AndreiSakharov more cautiousline, voicing concernaboutthe bloodshedbut not censuringthe perestroika Still perpetrators. he worriedthatevents in Chinamightundermine the bloc.63 andglasnostandcounseledgreaterflexibilitythroughout communist Violencehadendedthe PragueSpringin 1968, martiallaw engulfedPoland in 1981, and some advocatedusing force to quell dissent in 1989. The Czech Rude Pravo declaredofficial supportfor aggrievedBeijing leaders newspaper " who had shown exemplarypatience. In East Germany,Egon Krenz, deputy State Council chairman,stressed that studentsin China had been puppetsof a counterrevolutionary faction. The authoritiesin Beijing had had no choice; insistedthata "Tiananmen had suppression beenjustified.Andeven as protestors of wouldnot workin Germany,ErichHonecker,generalsecretary the solution" CentralCommitteeof the Socialist Worker'sPartyand chairmanof the GDR StateCouncil, applauded Deng's tactics.65
in and EasternEuropein Transition" Young C. Kim and GastonSigur, 60 SharonWolchik, "Central (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 1992), 53-56. eds., Asia and the Decline of Communism 61 Ivo Banac, ed., Eastern Europe in Revolution(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), 2. 62 The author was in Moscow during the Tiananmenmassacre. See also Pleshakov and Furman, "Chinaand the Soviet Union," 48. 63 Affairs, 25 July 1989, 9; Lukin, "The InitialSoviet Reaction," FBIS-SOV-89-141, International 121-25; Garver, "The 'New Type,'" 1147-48. 4 J. F. Brown, Surge to Freedom(Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1991), 282; "Demonstrations in Krakow," TrybunaLudu, 8 June 1989, FBIS-EEU-89-111, POLAND, 12 June 1989, 12; FBIS-EEU-89-109, 8 June 1989, 22. 65 FBIS-EEU-89-1 10, GDR, 9 June 1989, 32; FBIS-EEU-89-112, GDR, 13 June 1989, 28; FBISEEU-89-120, GDR, 23 June 1989, 37; FBIS-EEU-89-122, GDR, 27 June 1989, 32-33; FBIS-CHI-89Affairs, 12 December Affairs, 8 December 1989, 9; FBIS-CHI-89-237,International 235, International 1989, 7; Brown, Surge, 282; Norman M. Naimark, "'Ichwill hier raus':Emigrationand the Collapse of the GermanDemocratic Republic,"in Banac, Eastern Europe, 82.

CHINA AND COLLAPSE OF SOVIET EMPIRE |

517

to Infact,Honecker intended applytheChinesemodelin Leipzigon 9 October 1989. Duringthe tensedays of early October,a CCPdelegationheadedby Yao in committeemember,appeared East Yilin, vice premierand Poliburostanding to Not Germany markthe state'sfortiethanniversary. only was he quickto draw for Yao assuredHoneckerof "support" using similar parallelswith Tiananmen, policies to protectthe GDR. In the end, Honeckerreconsidered,fearingthat soldiersand police in Leipzig would refuse to shoot, but his threatsto follow to China'sexamplecontributed the subsequent of the regime.fall In Romania,Nicolae Ceausescudid use Chinese methods. But unlike the troops joined Deng hadralliedto his side, Ceausescu's PLA, whosecommanders theprotest.According theYugoslavnewsagencyTanjug,wordof Ceausescu's to to China'sleadership put their securityforces on alert lest executionprompted the swiftly flowing currentsof changecarrythem away too.67 Gorbachev's flexibility in contrastto Chinese rigidity reflectedhis sober total of recognizedthatby attempting calculations power relations.Gorbachev controlover its allies, MoscowhaddrivenChinaintobitteropposition.So too, in withan explosive Europe,he saw the USSRconfronted the mid-1980sin Eastern couldoverwhelm with Moscowandcreatea ties situation, whichif left untended socialist chainof hostilegovernments. Gorbachev chose, instead,to acknowledge pluralism,renouncethe BrezhnevDoctrine,promoteglasnostand perestroika, of and finally acquiescein destruction the BerlinWall and the WarsawPact. for as Paradoxically, Beijingsaw Gorbachev responsible thecollapseof comof reformsas a betrayal his munismthroughout EasternEuropeandcondemned relationsthat promisedecosocialism. AlthoughChinasustainedstate-to-state a nomic benefits, ChineseleadersconsideredGorbachev counterrevolutionary. turnedto the Moreover, Soviets who were determinedto fight liberalization Chinese for support"tryingto use 'the China card' to persuadetheir boss to discontinue Only and perestroika to putthe Soviethousein order."68 whena more radicalBoris Yeltsin emergedas a contenderfor power did Beijing reevaluate with reservations that Gorbachev deem hima fit leaderonce again,although and would become apparentduringthe August 1991 coup in Moscow. Although officially not interfering,Beijing quietlycheeredon the plotters,condemning rather thanfor tryingto overthrow themonly laterfor havingbeen faint-hearted
Gorbachev.69

GermanReunification,andthe Five Principlesof PeacefulCoexistence," 6 JohnW. Garver,"China, Journal of East Asian Affairs 6 (Winter/Spring 1994): 161-63; Elizabeth Pond, Beyond the Wall (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1993), 111-13; Naimark, "'Ichwill hier raus,'"90-91. 67 Claudia Rosett, "The Powderkeg that is China," Wall Street Journal, 28 December 1989. China 6 JohnW. Garver,"TheChineseCommunistPartyand the Collapse of Soviet Communism," Quarterly133 (March 1993): 3-5; Gerald Segal, "Chinaand the Disintegrationof the Soviet Union," Asian Survey 32 (September 1992): 848-68. 6 Gao Di, Talk on 30 August 1991, China Quarterly 130 (June 1992): 487.

518

| POLITICAL

SCIENCE

QUARTERLY

THE END OF THE COLD WAR AND SOVIET COLLAPSE

Given the uncertain benefitsfor Chinaof the new worldorder, it is ironicthat China's in endingthe cold warandbringingaboutthe collapseof Sovietand role Eastern European communism an important, indirect,one. The perceived was if strategicthreatChinaposed to Soviet security, especially when coupled with U.S. power,encouraged military expenditures helpedto cripple economy. that the The Soviets were compelledto realize eventuallythat they did not have the resourcesto fight all the forces arrayedagainstthem. Instead,they moved to diminishcold war confrontation regionalinstability. and China's economicreforms also expedited movement towarda neworder.The boldchangesof theearlyDengera, if partial, for nevertheless provided inspiration Soviets and East Europeans.Deng made it possible for reformersto criticize problemsandrecommend policieswhile pretending discussBeijing's to choices. Finally,the Chinesedemocracy movementhelpedto createan environment in which the citizens of other communistcountriesdared to aspire to a new politicalorder.Thatthe Chinesethemselvessuccumbed a brutallyrepressive to regimedidnotstemthetideelsewhere.Indeed,thecost in bloodof theTiananmen massacremadeclear to observersin EasternEuropeand the Soviet Unionthat violent solutionsmustnot be widely applied. in China,havingservedas one of thecatalysts shaping different a international system, abruptlyretreated future. As its responseto the fearingan uncharted collapse of communismin Europeand the Soviet Union made clear, China's leadersand muchof its citizenrypreferred combineeconomicadvanceswith to politicalstability.But the ambivalence with whichthe Chinesethemselvesview theirrolein expediting world change- economicandpolitical in thecommunist shouldnot preventless passionatelycommittedobserversfrom examiningthe * Chinafactorin the collapse of the Soviet empire.

* I would like to thank A. Doak Barnett, Carol Hamrin, Gilbert Rozman, Banning N. Garrett, Bonnie S. Glaser, He Di, and WarrenI. Cohen for giving of their time and expertise in an effort to save me from error. I also appreciatethe indefatigableresearchassistance of Eileen Scully.