A Response to Chaos: The United States, the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution, 1961-1968

Abstract

During the 1960s, the People's Republic of China (PRC) faced two periods of severe turbulence. The first came out of the Great Leap Forward, which began in 1958. Although the Great Leap Forward of ficially ended in 1960, its effects reverberated well into the decade. The second was the Cultural Revolution, which the Chinese leader ship initiated in 1966 and terminated in early 1969. During both peri ods, the United States knew China was in turmoil, but the administrations of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson adopted very different responses. The former initially considered altering ex isting policy to help the Chinese people. Ultimately, however, a com bination of domestic and foreign policy developments compelled the Kennedy administration to stick with the hard-line stance of its pre decessors. The Johnson administration, by way of contrast, adopted a more flexible position toward China as changes on the domestic and foreign policy scenes, including the situation in China, the Vietnam War, as well as modifications in the American public's view of the PRC, provided greater latitude in considering the bilateral relation ship. As a result, the Johnson White House noticeably facilitated Rich ard Nixon's much-heralded efforts to achieve a Sino-American rapprochement with his dramatic trip in 1972. Problems in Sino-American relations came about in the late 1940s when it became increasingly clear that China would come under Com munist control. The Truman administration hardened its stance to ward the mainland, an attitude that was solidified in 1950 after the PRC entered the Korean War. Washington beefed up its emerging policy to contain the threat posed by China with a three-pronged strategy. The first aspect was to increase military aid to those nations around China's periphery (or, in Korea, to engage in actual warfare). The sec ond consisted of providing economic aid to nations in East Asia to help combat communism by imposing controls on trade with Beijing, thus limiting China's economic and military potential. Third was a design to isolate the PRC on the world political stage. The United States refused to recognize the Communist government and urged other