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the aid of the friendly Hungarian people in its difficult hour? Why then have you found it necessary again to rehash the past and return to the events in Hungary and Poland?"20

But in fact in this particular game Deng Xiaoping held a good hand of cards and Suslov knew it. After the October 1956 events the influence of the CCP on the political moods and the power struggle in the Kremlin was at its peak. This influence had no precedent under Stalin and it declined later, when Khrushchev ousted his rivals and moved to the position of unchallenged leader of the party and state. This phenomenon, as well as the importance of the Chinese pressure on the Soviets during the Polish-Hungarian “October,” has not been understood by Western observers and scholars; nor was it admitted then and later by the Soviets themselves. Yet, like the events in Hungary and Poland, the changing equation between Moscow and Beijing was a direct result of Khrushchev's cavalier de-Stalinization and the turmoil it caused in the communist movement and the ranks of the Soviet leadership itself. Internationally, Khrushchev's revelations had shattered the traditional hierarchy of the communist world, with Moscow at the top. Internally, the Soviets weakened themselves with internal strife and were eager to cater to the Chinese in order to preserve "the unity of the socialist camp." Khrushchev, who a year earlier had attacked Stalin's and Molotov's role in antagonizing Tito's Yugoslavia (See Plenums section of this Bulletin), was determined to avoid the same mistakes with Communist China, whatever Mao said about Stalin. And Molotov and other opponents of de-Stalinization in the Soviet leadership looked at the Chinese as their potential allies against Khrushchev.

A majority of the Presidium secretly agreed with Chinese assessments of the situation and Khrushchev felt the danger of a united front between Beijing and what would become in June 1957 "the anti-party group" of Molotov, Malenkov and Kaganovich, as well as Pervukhin, Voroshilov, and Dmitrii Shepilov. During Zhou Enlai's visit to Moscow in January 1957 the CC CPSU Presidium de facto reversed the policy of deStalinization and Khrushchev had to name Stalin publicly "a great Marxist-Leninist." This was Khrushchev's forced tactical concessions to the growing opposition, and as Molotov sardonically observed in June 1957: “Of course, when com. Zhou Enlai came, we began to lean over backward [raspisivatsia] that Stalin is such a communist that one wishes everyone would be like him. But when Zhou Enlai left, we stopped doing it."21

In fact, the Chinese leadership preferred to abstain from the power struggle in the Kremlin, perhaps because Mao underestimated Khrushchev's chances for political survival and triumph. At the same time they began to see the CCP and themselves as the central and more senior and experienced "unit" in the world communist movement. After his visit to Moscow, Zhou Enlai reported to the CC Politburo and Mao Zedong that the Soviet leaders (and he

meant Khrushchev, Mikoian, and Bulganin in the first place) “explicitly demonstrate weakness in considering and discussing strategic and long-term issues." The report went to describe examples of Soviet "swashbuckling," internal disagreements and equivocation. Of particular interest was a comment apparently saved for Khrushchev: "extremely conceited, blinded by lust for gain, lacking farsightedness, and knowing little the ways of the world, some of their [Soviet-VZ] leaders have hardly improved themselves even with the several rebuffs they have met in the past year...They appear to lack confidence and suffer from inner fears and thus tend to employ the tactics of bluffing or threats in handling foreign affairs or relations with other brotherly parties." On the positive side, however, Zhou's report noted with obvious satisfaction that "now the Soviet Union and China can sit down to discuss issues equally. Even if they have different ideas on certain issues, they must consult with us.”22

Soon after Khrushchev emerged victorious from the power struggle, Mao's exasperation with him began to show. Mao's agreement to participate in the Moscow international conference of communist parties in November 1957 was just a lull in the growing tension. Soon Mao's wrath was triggered by two Soviet proposals: to establish along the Chinese coast a set of long-wave radio stations to guide Soviet submarines in the Pacific Ocean, and to build a joint Sino-Soviet nuclear-powered submarine fleet. Mao Zedong interpreted the first proposal as a Soviet attempt to gain new military bases in China and the second as a rejection of an earlier Chinese request for Soviet technology, in order to enable the PRC to build its own nuclear submarines.

On 22 July 1958, Mao Zedong vented this rage at Soviet ambassador Pavel Iudin regarding the ostensible resumption of unequal treatment of China by the Soviet leadership. The transcript of this meeting, translated by Zhang Shu Guang and Chen Jian, highlights what happened beneath the surface of the Sino-Soviet friendship around November 1957 and sheds new light on the role of Deng Xiaoping as Mao's right-hand man. As Mao told Iudin, in Moscow in November he had "often pointed out [to the Soviet leaders], there had existed no such thing as brotherly relations among all the parties because, [your leaders] merely paid lip service and never meant it; as a result, the relations between [the brotherly] parties can be described as between father and son or between cats and mice. I have raised this issue in my private meetings with Khrushchev and other [Soviet] comrades....Present were Bulganin, Mikoian, and Suslov... From the Chinese side, I and Deng Xiaoping were present." [my italics-VZ]. "While in Moscow," Mao Zedong continued, he assigned "Deng Xiaoping to raise five [controversial] issues. We won't openly talk about them even in the future, because our doing so would hurt Comrade Khrushchev's [political position]. In order to help consolidate his [Khrushchev's] leadership, we decided not to talk about these [controversies], although it does not

mean that the justice is not on our side."23

When Khrushchev secretly flew to Beijing on 31 July 1958 and tried to resolve tension during long talks with Mao Zedong around a swimming pool at his house (and) even in the pool), Deng Xiaoping was at Mao's side. According to Salisbury's sources, "Mao heard Khrushchev out, then turned Deng Xiaoping loose. Deng flew at the Soviet leader like a terrier. He accused the Russians of 'Great Nation' and 'Great Party' chauvinism." Deng told Khrushchev that China had no objection to long-distance wireless communications for the Soviet fleet, but they must be Chinese-built, Chinese-operated, and Chinesecontrolled. He criticized the conduct of Soviet advisers in

China. 24 Chinese recollections (and apparently Deng's monologue) repeated almost word by word Mao's harangue to Iudin. But Deng could be even more blunt than Mao Zedong and he did it with relish.

Later, during the July 1963 consultations with the Soviets, he told them that in April-July 1958 the CPSU had sought "to put China under its military control. But we guessed through your intentions, and you failed to achieve this aim." He then teased the Soviets further, claiming that Khrushchev's decision to send Soviet missiles to Cuba was dictated by the same imperialist logic. "...In shipping missiles to Cuba, did you want to help her or to ruin her? We have become suspicious that you, in shipping missiles to Cuba, were trying to place her under your control."25

The barbs hit their target, hurting Soviet pride. Suslov apparently had to dip into Soviet archives to quote from the transcript of the Khrushchev-Mao conversation, in order to respond to Deng's allegations. "Com. Deng Xiaoping," he said on 10 July, "after all you were present at the discussion between Com. Khrushchev and Com. Mao Zedong on 31 July 1958 and took part in it. Have you really forgotten the following statement made by Com. Khrushchev in the course of the conversation: "Never have we at the CC of the CPSU ever had the thought of jointly building a fleet... We considered it necessary to talk about the issue of building a fleet, but we neither thought about or considered it necessary to construct a joint factory or a joint fleet." According to Suslov, Mao responded to these words: "If it is so, then all the dark clouds have dispersed."26

Documentary evidence is still lacking on Deng's role in the Sino-Soviet disputes and meetings of 1959, particularly during the famous confrontation between Khrushchev and the Chinese leadership in Beijing in October 1959. The traces of Deng Xiaoping become once again visible in the first months of 1960, when he met with Soviet Ambassador Stepan Chervonenko. Clearly, Sino-Soviet tension was on both their minds. Chervonenko, the relatively new Soviet man in China, did his best to tell Khrushchev and the rest of the Politburo what they were eager to hear. When Khrushchev denounced Eisenhower and the CIA in Moscow and derailed the May 1960 summit in Paris after the infamous U-2 incident, his image in the Chinese leadership dramatically improved. The Soviet ambassador

reported that, according to Deng Xiaoping, "comrade Khrushchev's report [at the Supreme Soviet, when he revealed that the Soviets had Francis Gary Powers in captivity] made a huge impression," and "important new measures in the area of internal policy had once again displayed the Soviet Union's strength to the whole world." Historians would be interested to know that Chervonenko, on Khrushchev's instructions, informed Deng Xiaoping "about the position of the Soviet Union in connection with the summit conference." Deng noted that Khrushchev "acted completely correctly by going to Paris; he should have gone." He also said that the Soviet leader "fully uncovered the true face of Eisenhower and the imperialists."

What came next from Deng Xiaoping, however, could not have pleased the Soviets. In a disingenuous twist of topic, he compared Khrushchev's denunciation of Eisenhower with Zhou Enlai's denunciation of the Indian Prime Minster Nehru during Zhou's trip to India. "Nehru's true face was uncovered," said Deng Xiaoping, knowing perfectly well that he was talking about one of Khrushchev's great friends and allies in the third world. The Sino-Indian border conflict would drag on, Deng continued, because Nehru uses it to receive American economic assistance. "Many political figures in the countries of Asia-Nasser [Egypt], Kasem [Iraq], Sukarno [Indonesia], U Nu [Burma]-are taking the same positions as Nehru. Nehru stands out among them; he is the cleverest. He did not waste the time he spent studying in England; the English are more experienced than the Americans in political tricks." "The struggle with bourgeois figures of this sort is one of the most important problems facing the international communist movement." Chervonenko, however, preferred to conclude his memo to Moscow on a brighter note. He cited Deng as saying that "the issue of developing a movement in support of Khrushchev's statement [at the Supreme Soviet] was being examined in the CC CCP" "Deng Xiaoping asked me to convey a warm greeting to comrade N.S. Khrushchev and to all of the members of the Presidium of the CC CPSU on behalf of comrades Mao Zedong, Liu Shaoqi, and all of the leaders of the CC CPSU. The Americans are closing ranks against us, he said, but their closing of ranks is insecure. Our solidarity, and the solidarity of the countries of the socialist camp is inviolable, since it is founded on a unity of ideas and goals."27 People in the Kremlin and the Soviet embassy in Beijing apparently treated this as an encouraging signal. The Embassy's Political Letter in July 1960 specifically referred to this conversation and mentioned there were "grounds to expect" Sino-Soviet rapprochement on the basis of a common anti-American line. 28

It did not take long for the Soviets to see their hopes dashed to pieces. In early June 1960, at a meeting of the World Federation of Trade Unions in Beijing, Deng Xiaoping turned his "bad side" to them. The most recent evidence on this and subsequent events in Sino-Soviet

relations comes from transcripts of CPSU plenums. Reporting to the plenum on 13 July 1960, Khrushchev's party deputy Frol Kozlov reported that on 5 June the Politburo of the CC CCP " had invited around 40 communists-leaders of foreign trade unions, to dinner, followed by a conference" of trade unionists. Liu Shaoqi opened this conference, and then "com. Deng Xiaoping took the floor, and his speech contained a number of absolutely false positions, which contained an obvious distortion of the line of the CPSU." Deng, according to Kozlov's story, declared that the CPSU and other fraternal parties had "tossed overboard the main points of the Declaration” of the communist conference of November 1957.29 Perhaps this pushed Khrushchev over the edge leading to the abrupt removal of Soviet advisors and technical personnel from China.

The trade union conference in Beijing was, as it turned out, China's preparation for the clash with the USSR at the congress of "fraternal parties" in Bucharest in late June 1960, where Khrushchev and the leaders of the East European countries all participated. With Deng Xiaoping absent from the Bucharest congress, the role of ideological hit-men fell to Peng Zhen, Kang Sheng, Wu Xiuquan, and Liu Xiao. It is not clear what the little "terrier" was busy with at that time. Three years later he explained it away with a joke. "I said [then] I was fortunate that [instead of me] went com. Peng Zhen. His weight is around 80 kilograms, so he endured. If I had gone, and I weigh only a bit over 50 kilograms, I would not have endured." Deng Xiaoping referred to the atmosphere of heckling in Bucharest that he blamed on the Soviets,30

This first open split at a major communist forum led to the first bilateral consultations in Moscow on 17-22 September 1960. Deng Xiaoping headed the delegation which included Peng Zhen, Chen Boda, Kang Sheng, Yang Shangkun, Hu Qiaomu, Liu Zhengqi, Wu Xiuquan and Liu Xiao. The Soviet team included Suslov (head of the delegation), Khrushchev's first deputy Frol Kozlov, Kuusinen, Pospelov, Ponomarev, Andropov, Il'ichev, philosopher Constantinov, Grishin and Ambassador Chervonenko.31 The transcripts of the discussions, found in the East German archives, reveal tactics and positions of both sides.32 Apparently the Soviet delegation's main goal was to rescue the November conference and, while conducting ideological polemics with the Chinese, achieve some kind of a fraternal understanding. Deng must have understood that Khrushchev and the Soviets had a vital stake in preventing an open split. Yet he deliberately tested the Soviet mettle.

In one instance he drew a distinction between Khrushchev, who "stands at the head of Soviet comrades who attack China," and Kozlov and Suslov, from whom the Chinese "have not heard [anti-Chinese] speeches." That provocative pitch evoked indignant rebuffs from both. In another instance, Deng told the Soviet delegation that allegedly Khrushchev had remarked to the Vietnamese

delegation in Moscow that the Chinese were planning to give substantial means for restoration of the tomb of Ghengis Khan and that this smacks of "yellow peril."33

For his attack on Khrushchev, Deng singled out the Soviet Chairman's failed attempt to reach accommodation with President Eisenhower and Khrushchev's refusal to support China in its conflict with India in the second half of 1959-early 1960. "Why did comrade Khrushchev speak with such high expectations about Eisenhower?" "We would like to ask you with whom would you line up in the moment of trouble? With Eisenhower, with Nehru, or with the fraternal socialist country, with China?"34 Then, to maximize the power of his attack Deng rolled out a complete list of complaints: Stalin's violation of Chinese sovereignty in the treaty of 1950, the discussion of radio stations and joint fleet in 1958, etc. He explained to the Soviets that this was necessary to overcome "father-son" syndrome in the Sino-Soviet relationship. However, the Soviets, who had heard it many times before since 1954, genuinely wondered why it was necessary to "unearth" all those issues that had been long resolved. The discussion revolved around the same issues without making any progress.

Still, the Chinese did not burn their bridges to Khrushchev at that time: the Soviet chairman definitely "improved" after the U-2 incident. For that reason Deng Xiaoping, while criticizing Khrushchev and his foreign policy of the recent past, said words that were honey for the hearts of the Soviets: that "differences in opinions" between Beijing and Moscow would be gradually overcome through the mechanism of periodic consultations. and in the interests of joint struggle against "the common enemy." Reciprocating, Suslov asked the Chinese "to pass most sincere greetings on behalf of our delegation and the Presidium of our CC to the Central Committee of the CC of China and to comrade Mao Zedong." He then invited the Chinese delegation to lunch with the Soviet delegation.35 Once again, Deng was a tactical winner: he put the Soviets on the defensive by his criticism and still kept them at bay by dangling the promise of renewed friendship.

Deng Xiaoping soon came to Moscow again in October to take part in the work of a Commission and an Editorial Group, to prepare documents for the congress of communist parties in November 1960-the largest ever in the history of the communist movement. After the first two quiet days, according to Suslov's report, Deng criticized a draft declaration of the congress proposed by the Soviet side as "inadequate” and directed against the CCP. After that the confrontational atmosphere came back. At that time the Chinese delegation acquired a first satellite-the Albanian delegation.36

Mao's terrier leaped forward again amid the work of the great Moscow congress. After Khrushchev's major address to the meeting, in the presence of communist delegates from 67 countries Deng Xiaoping, according to Suslov's account, suddenly began to speak instead of Liu

Shaoqi who was announced on the list. Suslov remarked later that Deng "passed up in total silence the speech of com. Khrushchev."37 This figure of silence was probably meant to imply how unworthy of attention were the pronouncements of the Soviet leader who pretended to be the head of the world communist movement! Khrushchev swallowed the bait and had to give a rebuff to Deng Xiaoping in his second, unplanned speech on 23 November. Deng counterattacked on the next day and this produced a virtual pandemonium at the conference. Each and every leader of an East European country, West European communist party, and pro-Moscow organization elsewhere rushed to the podium to voice their full and unswerving support of the Soviet leader and to appeal to the Chinese not to break the "united" ranks.

The Soviet leadership, too, was horrified by a prospect of schism and preferred to offer a compromise to the Chinese, particularly on the interpretation of Stalin's role. At this point "bad cop" Deng Xiaoping receded in the shadow, and "good cop" Liu Shaoqi, much respected in Moscow, met with Khrushchev on October 30 to reach a deal. 38 All this division of labor on the Chinese side was probably orchestrated in advance, with the active participation of Mao Zedong. But the Soviets pretended they did not understand it, hoping to paper over the growing chasm and eager to end the conference on the note of unity.

The consultations of July 1963 were also the byproduct of these Soviet illusions. Moscow proposed them in a CC CPSU letter of 21 February 1963. Beijing, on the contrary, geared itself for ideological battle, publicizing its so called “25 points" (Proposal for the General Line of the International Communist Movement) on the very eve of the Sino-Soviet consultations.39 The Chinese "points" of 14 June 1963 fell with a thud on the proceedings of the CC CPSU plenum on ideology and naturally became the focus of discussions there.

40

The discussion in Moscow was a bizarre event, more reminiscent of a scholarly exercise, where each side presented "a report" replete with citations from Lenin, Trotsky, Khrushchev, Mao Zedong, etc. Essentially it was just another act in the public show, where teams of speechwriters, cued by instructions of their chiefs, produced tomes of vituperative, albeit impossibly turgid polemics. Georgii Arbatov, then a scholar at IMEMO in Moscow and "consultant" for the CC International Department, became an assistant to the Soviet delegation at the Sino-Soviet talks. He recalls in his memoirs that "they consisted of endless unilateral declarations intended, first, to rip the other side to shreds and, second, to defend one's own case and Marxist orthodoxy." Each day of discussion was followed by "a day off." "As we understood it," writes Arbatov, "the Chinese would then go to their embassy and send the text of our statement by coded telegram (probably with their comments and proposals attached) to Beijing. They then would wait for the reply. We got the impression that this was in the form of a final text of their statement in 41 reply to ours.

The target of the Chinese delegation at the meeting was Khrushchev and his de-Stalinization. Kang Sheng delivered a most unrestrained speech. "Comrades from the CPSU call Stalin ‘a murderer,' 'a criminal,' 'a bandit,' 'a gambler,' 'a despot like Ivan the Terrible,' 'the greatest dictator in the history of Russia,' ‘a fool,' 'shit,' 'an idiot.' All of these curses and swear words came from the mouth of Com. N.S. Khrushchev." Kang Sheng continued sarcastically: "Frankly speaking, we cannot understand at all why the leadership of the CPSU feels such a fierce hatred for Stalin, why it uses every kind of the most malicious abuse, why it attacks him with more hatred than it reserves for its enemies?"

"Can it really be that the achievements of the national economy and the development of the newest technology in the Soviet Union in several decades have been attained under the leadership of some sort of 'fool?' Can it really be that the bases for the development of nuclear weapons and missile technology in the Soviet Union have been laid down under the leadership of some sort of 'fool'? ...Can it really be that the great victory of the Soviet Army during World War Two was won under the command of some sort of 'idiot?'...Can it really be that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union which for a long time had the love and respect of the revolutionary people of the whole world had a 'bandit' as its great leader for several decades?...Can it really be that communists of all countries considered some sort of 'shit' to be their flagbearer for several decades?” "Let us take, for example, com. Khrushchev. He heaped all of the errors of the period of Stalin's leadership...on Stalin alone while he presented himself as being completely clean. Can this really convince people? If the memory of men is not too short, they will be able to recall that during Stalin's leadership com. Khrushchev more than once extolled Stalin and his policy of struggling with counter-revolutionary elements.”42

As we have seen, Deng Xiaoping, by comparison with Kang Sheng, used specific examples from recent international history and history of the crises and tensions inside the communist camp in which he was often a direct participant. He, as a leader of the Chinese delegation, found the weakest spot in Khrushchev's defenses-his inability to end the Cold War with the West and the zigzags of his foreign policy. First, Deng Xiaoping implied that Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalin at the 20th Congress of the CPSU was the result of his political egotism which produced a severe crisis in the communist movement and alliance.

"After the 20th congress of the CPSU, as a consequence of the so-called struggle against the cult of personality and the full, wholesale denial of Stalin, an antiSoviet and anti-Communist campaign was provoked around the whole world. Taking up a good chance, the imperialists, Titoist clique and reactionaries of various countries unleashed an offensive against the Soviet Union, socialist camp and communist parties of different countries and created grave difficulties for many parties." “On 23

October 1956...com. Mao Zedong said that you had completely renounced such a sword as Stalin and had thrown this sword away. As a result, enemies had seized it in order to kill us with it. That is the same as if, having picked up a stone, one were to throw it on one's own feet. "43

Second, Deng Xiaoping condemned Khrushchev's diplomacy of detente toward the West as futile and selfdestructive and here he rose to the height of his rhetoric: "Frankly speaking, into what chaos you have plunged the beautiful socialist camp! In your relations with fraternal countries of the socialist camp you do not act at all in the interests of the entire socialist camp but you act from the position of great power chauvinism and nationalist egotism." "When you consider that your affairs go well, when you believe you grasped some kind of a straw handed to you by Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nehru or somebody else, then you are beyond yourself from joy and in all fury against those fraternal parties and fraternal countries which do not obey your wand and do not want to be under your sway, and then you condemn the socialist camp to total oblivion."

"When you are in trouble, when you suffer setbacks because of your erroneous policy, then you get enraged and vent it on fraternal parties and countries who stick to principles and the truth, then you make them 'scapegoats,' then you even sacrifice the interests of the entire socialist camp in order to cater to imperialists and reactionaries and to find a way out.' ,,44

Some of the Soviet representatives seated on the other side of the table, particularly Suslov, a crypto-Stalinist, had their own grave doubts about Khrushchev's foreign policy that coincided with Deng's observation. Yet, as loyal apparatchiks they expressed outrage at "personal attacks on com. N.S. Khrushchev." Mikhail Suslov described Khrushchev's great leadership qualities: "By his work and struggle, unshakable faith in the cause of the working class, by flexible revolutionary tactics, com. Khrushchev deals precise blows to the imperialists, cleverly uses contradictions in their camp, reveals to broad masses methods of struggle against imperialism and colonialism, for peace, democracy and socialism."45 It was of course

the same Suslov who directed criticism of the ousted Khrushchev slightly more than a year later, at the October 1964 Plenum of the CPSU. 46

There was "the dog that did not bark" in the course of the discussion. The Soviet delegation emphasized the nuclear revolution and the danger of nuclear war as the core of their rethinking of international relations. More concretely, the Sino-Soviet meeting took place in the shadows of the momentous American-British-Soviet negotiations in Moscow that began on July 15 and ended on August 5 with a signing in the Kremlin of a Limited Test-Ban Treaty. In the background exchanges and consultations with Khrushchev, the Americans implicitly and sometimes explicitly proposed to join efforts to thwart the efforts of Beijing to become a nuclear power. On July

15, Kennedy instructed his negotiator Averell Harriman “to elicit K's view of means of limiting or preventing Chinese nuclear development and his willingness either to take Soviet action or to accept U.S. action aimed in this direction."47 Harriman and other U.S. representatives who met with Khrushchev several times in the period between July 15 and 27, noted that “China...is today Soviet overriding preoccupation" and sought to exploit it by raising the issue of joint preemptive actions against China's nuclear program. However, to the Americans' disappointment, "Khrushchev and Gromyko have shown no interest and in fact brushed subject off on several occasions."48 Knowing the precarious state of SinoSoviet relations, it is easy to imagine how dismayed and fearful the Soviet leader could have been. For instance, in the morning on Monday July 15 Peng Zhen talked about "serious disagreements" between the CCP and CPSU and appealed to "value unity" between the two countries.49 And only in the evening of the same day Harriman probed Khrushchev on the Chinese nuclear threat! If the Chinese had only learned about the American entreaties, they would have had deadly ammunition for their attacks against Khrushchev. He would have been compromised in the eyes of most of his own colleagues.

Deng Xiaoping must have been under strict instructions not to touch on the Soviet-American test-ban negotiations. Only in a few instances did he let the Soviets feel how displeased the Chinese were with the rapprochement of the two superpowers on the grounds of mutual regulation of nuclear arms race. “On 25 August 1962,” he said, "the Soviet government informed China that it was ready to conclude an agreement with the USA on the prevention of the proliferation of nuclear weapons. In our view, you were pursuing an unseemly goal in coming to such an agreement, namely: to bind China [in its attempts to join the nuclear club-VZ] by the hands and feet through an agreement with the USA." In commenting on the Cuban Missile Crisis, Deng Xiaoping said that Khrushchev "committed two errors: in shipping the missiles to Cuba, you indulged in adventurism, and then, in showing confusion in the face of nuclear blackmail from the USA, you capitulated."50

Without seeing cables and instructions from Beijing, it is not possible to say what prompted Deng Xiaoping on July 20 to suggest suspension of the consultations. Researchers have long suggested it was a reaction to the CC CPSU open letter to the Chinese published on July 14. But it is equally plausible that the start and progress of the U.S.-Soviet test-ban talks in Moscow made Mao Zedong increasingly impatient with the consultations. Immediately after the breakup of the consultations the Chinese side began attacks on the talks and on three occasions, 31 July, 15 August, and 1 September 1963, published official 51 statements condemning the Moscow treaty.

What was the significance of all these episodes for Deng's political career and the development of his views? The July 1963 performance of Deng Xiaoping was highly

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