Clearly, in such an international political “church” there could not be two Romes or two Popes. So long as the Soviet Union was the only major Communist power, and even so long as Stalin was alive, the Communist Rome was Moscow, and the source of all correct doctrine was Joseph Stalin.
However, the emergence of a second major Communist-controlled country always presented the possibility of the leader of that country putting forth his claim to be the only correct interpreter of what were the intentions of History. No one was more aware of that than Joseph Stalin.
One can certainly make the case that Stalin’s policies in Europe during the last phase of World War II and thereafter were at least in part determined by the fear of the emergence of a second major Communist power. His acceptance of the de facto division of Germany into at first four and then two segments was probably due to his fear of the emergence of another strong Germany that might repeat the “drive to the East” of the Second and Third Reichs. But there is reason to believe that even if that new Germany had been under Communist control, Stalin would not have wanted it, because, given a reconstructed Germany’s economic and potential military power, a united Communist Germany would certainly have been in the position to challenge Stalin and Moscow as the source of “Truth.”
Similarly, Stalin’s failure to support any attempt by the Communist parties of France and Italy to seize power in the immediate aftermath of the war—which at least for a short time they might have been able to do—would seem to be at least in part motivated by the same consideration. Certainly in France, and perhaps even in Italy, a Communist regime might have been able to challenge the USSR and its dictator as the “correct” interpreter of Marxist-Leninist doctrine.
Most clearly, Stalin did not welcome the coming to power of a Communist regime in China. Mao Tse-tung said in 1962, “In 1945 Stalin refused to permit China’s carrying out a revolution and said to us: ‘Do not have a civil war. Collaborate with Chiang Kai-shek. Otherwise, the Republic of China will collapse.’ However, we did not obey him and the revolution succeeded.”[2]
Of course, Stalin accepted the Chinese Communist revolution once it was successful. The Soviet government recognized the People’s Republic of China the day after it was proclaimed, on October 1, 1949.[3] Subsequently, as we shall see, he launched a substantial program of economic aid to the new regime.
So long as Stalin lived, the Chinese Communist leadership did not offer any ideological or other challenge to him. Indeed, in their own economic policy, they followed the Stalinist model closely in their first Five Year Plan (1953—1957).
However, once Stalin died, the Chinese were not willing to concede to his successors the role of “Pope” in the International Communist Movement. They had well substantiated reason to believe that after Stalin’s death Mao Tse-tung, not only as one who had led the Communists to victory in the world’s most populous country, but also as a major Marxist-Leninist theorist, had every right to be considered Stalin’s successor as interpreter of and elaborator upon Marxism-Leninism, and source of the “Truth.” However, three years passed before the Chinese began to criticize the new Soviet leadership, and seven years before disagreements between the Chinese and Soviet Communist leaders came into the open.
Early Soviet Cooperation with the Chinese People’s Republic
In December 1949 and January 1950, Mao Tse-tung and Chou En-lai made an extended visit to Moscow. Keesing’s Research Report summed up the results of their visit: “Negotiations between the two Governments terminated on Feb. 14 with the signature of (1) a treaty of friendship, alliance, and mutual assistance; (2) an agreement providing that after the signing of a peace treaty with Japan, and in any case not later than the end of 1952, the Soviet Union would transfer free of charge to the Chinese Government all its rights in the joint administration of the Manchurian (Changchun) Railway, together with the property belonging to the railway, and would withdraw its troops from the Port Arthur naval base, whose installations would be handed over to China;(3) an agreement on the granting of long term credits to the amount of 300,000,000 U.S. dollars by the USSR to China, to enable China to obtain industrial, mining and railway equipment from the USSR.”[4]
In the years that followed, Soviet aid to Chinese economic development was considerable. It took several different forms. One was the shipping to China of machinery and equipment for a substantial number of factories built in China by the Soviets. Another was the “lending” to China of numerous Soviet industrial experts and technicians. Finally, many Chinese were sent to the Soviet Union for training.
Annual protocols were signed by the USSR and China that governed trade between the two countries and Soviet aid to China. In 1953, an agreement was signed “that included the construction of ninety-one new enterprises for China. It also provided for the renovation of fifty more, to make a total of 141 to be built or modernized.”[5] In 1954, agreements were reached for the USSR to build fifteen more industrial plants, and to grant China $130,000,000 in long-term credits. “Another agreement provided for the exchange, over five years, of technical ‘documents’ and scientific information, and of specialists.”[6]
In 1955, the USSR agreed to help China install atomic energy plants for peaceful purposes.[7] In April 1956, Anastas Mikoyan signed an agreement in Peking for the USSR to construct an additional fifty-five factories “supplying designer services, equipment, and technological skills.”[8]
All of this involved China incurring a considerable debt to the USSR. By 1957, this debt amounted to $2.4 billion.[9]
There is no information available concerning the total number of Soviet experts who were sent to China during the decade following 1950. However, at the time they were finally withdrawn, in 1960, there were said to be 1,390 such Soviet specialists in China.[10]
China and the Events of 1956
Three things occurred in 1956 that can be seen as the beginning of Sino-Soviet dissidence. These were Nikita Khrushchev’s speeches to the 20th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party; the upheaval in the Polish Communist Party and regime; and the anticommunist insurrection in Hungary.
Khrushchev, as Secretary General, made two major speeches to the CPSU 20th Congress. One of these was his “report” to the meeting; the other was the famous “secret speech.” The Chinese Communist leaders found disturbing elements in both of these discourses. Subsequently, they were to say that their differences with the CPSU began with the CPSU 20th Congress.[11]
There were two parts of the Khrushchev report with which the Chinese particularly took exception. One of these was the CPSU Secretary-General’s argument that a third world war was not inevitable. Khrushchev said “There is, of course, a Marxist-Leninist precept that wars are inevitable as long as imperialism exists. This precept was evolved at a time when imperialism was an allembracing world system, and the social and political forces which did not want war were weak, poorly organized and thus unable to compel the imperialists to renounce war. … At the present time, however, the situation has radically changed. Now there is a world camp of Socialism which has become a mighty force. In this camp the peace forces find not only the moral but also the material means to prevent aggression. Moreover, there is a large group of other countries, with a population running into hundreds of millions, which is actively working to avert war. The labour movement in the capitalist countries has today become a tremendous force. The movement of peace supporters has sprung up and developed into a powerful factor.”
2
John Gittings,
5
O. Edmund Clubb, China and Russia: