But Nixon saw the China opening as essential to his re-election bid the following year and he decided Kissinger should go ahead with the trip as "we've got to make the big plays now". Resolving the Vietnam War was a particularly important factor. Wu: The visit resulted in the issuance of the Shanghai Communiqu, which provided the pathway for the Carter administration to normalize relations with the Peoples Republic. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. Nixon visited the PRC to gain more leverage over relations with the Soviet Union. And at the end of it, he had this to say. What has the Nixon visit meant to you? Yes, China was still experiencing the turmoil of the latter years of the Cultural Revolution, but lets not forget that the PRC had its own agenda which it used the visit to help advance. RUWITCH: Wu Xinbo of Fudan University says that hasn't happened. This meeting was arranged and facilitated by Pakistan through its strong diplomatic channels with China. The visit and subsequent normalization of relations with the West provided the ideological cover necessary for the economic reforms of the 1980s that launched China from a pariah state to the economic juggernaut that it is today. 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Throughout the 1950s and much of the 1960s, the U.S. and PRC maintained a frosty relationship. The visit inspired John Adams' 1987 opera Nixon in China. Landmarks can include historical, cultural, natural, and human-made constructions. Charles Kraus is the Deputy Director of the History and Public Policy Program at the Wilson Center. "The secondary contradiction between the US and China was set aside so that both could focus on the primary contradiction," Rigger said. While Nixon's China trip and the Shanghai Communique marked the start of Washington's decades-long engagement with Beijing, critics have long argued they were the beginning of the US' dilemma over Taiwan, especially surrounding its strategic ambiguity over the self-ruled island. But as the tumultuous 1960s came to a close, the Nixon administration was facing several major challenges: a disastrous war in Vietnam, social strife at home, and stalled nuclear arms negotiations with the Soviets. This undue focus on ourselves shows up again in the 1980s and 1990s, when far too many Americans including policymakers and academics assumed that the PRC wanted nothing more than to emulate us and converge toward an idealized version of our economy, law and society. Code-named "[Operation Marco] Polo II" and publicly announced weeks before Kissinger left for China, it was effectively a full-scale dress rehearsal for the historic presidential visit. Today . HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. A blog of the History and Public Policy Program. "This is useless: this is a typical diplomatic document that papers over differences. "[18] Nixon, charmed, said "you voted for the lesser of two evils," and Mao replied, "I like rightists, I am comparatively happy when these people on the right come into power. Yun Sun, a senior fellow at the Stimson Centre in Washington, said the lessons for Beijing and Washington from Nixon's visit and creating the joint statement were quite different. Ambassador to China) Winston Lord noted that, by flexibly dealing with both the Soviet Union and China, the United States sought to pressure both countries to reduce their support for North Vietnam in their new prioritization of relations with the United States. But the second visit in October 1971 was very different to the first because it coincided with the United Nations General Assembly's annual debate and vote over membership for the People's Republic of China. Bush argued that Kissinger's visit would undermine Washington's effort to preserve Taiwan's seat at the UN. While the visit was a public relations boon for both nations, Nixon and Kissinger failed to secure Chinas help in ending the war in Vietnam, and no real progress was made on the status of Taiwan. Every country has its landmark tourist attractions, and China is no exception.