Zhou Enlai's Diplomacy with the United States

To understand people’s minds, you have to stay in them. Whether it develops into goodwill or hostility, if I don’t lose my mind, beneficial results appear.

Diplomatic relations between countries are the same. If avoided, bad situations would develop in the long run. Because the relationship is an expansion.

Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai were different. Mao Zedong tried to get rid of Confucius thought because it was a remnant of feudalism. But he always kept in mind the classical ideas needed for the Communist struggle front. For example, he accepted ideas such as the Sun Tzu’s Art of War, which would give him the energy of victory in conflict and struggle. Mao Zedong said, “When the enemy advance, we withdraw; when the enemy withdraws, we pursue.”There is an Oriental philosophy that aims not to be frustrated with reality but to beat the enemy by preserving active energy. I think Mao was a Taoist pretending to be a materialist.

On the one hand, when President Xi Jinping once mentioned Oriental democracy, I thought the Chinese Communist Party had no entirely different path from Oriental thought. It was especially so by using Mao ideas as a medium.

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Zhou Enlai began studying understanding the United States as he began diplomatic relations with the United States.

Zhou made a study of Nixon and Kissinger, their lives, and the political philosophy of each man. He read Nixon’s book, [Six Crises]. He watched [Patton], Nixon’s favorite movie, about the flamboyant World War 2 American general. He also put together a team, and started planning every detail of the Nixon visit, and, to prepare the nation for the great change in international policy that was about to take place, he circulated an edited version of Mao,s talks with Edgar Snow.

- [ ZHOU ENLAI THE LAST PERFECT REVOLUTIONARY ] by Gao Wenqian

Knowing the enemy is a conflict-ridden technique even Sun Tzu’s Art of War, However, it is essential to understand the other party for friendly negotiations, too.

The reason why North Korea and the U.S. confirmed that they had different calculation methods during the Hanoi conference was because they didn’t know each other so much. So even if no conclusion was reached, a gradual and diverse approach was needed. Until now, in particular, the North Korean people have considered the U.S. the main culprit of imperialism. North Korea people will need time to recognize the U.S. as a peaceful neighbor.