Hunt traces how PRC foreign policy developed from the end of the Qing dynasty through the foundation of the PRC. He argues that the CCP inherited many assumptions from the struggles of China against imperialist exploitation. China's humiliation at foreign hands was not unique in the world, but China's history of state strength (or at least the perception of that historical strength) was unusual and combined with resentment of foreign incursions to create a national consensus that the country had to recover its strength to recover its dignity.

Hunt details a lot of more specific inherited ideas. One is the two tendencies in policies of resistance to imperialism: cooperation in attempts to limit imperialist damage and resistance based on popular resistance even when the state is weak. When one failed, the other was attempted until it failed and the first took over again. Coupled with that is distrust of foreign alliances, which came from trying to play one imperial power off another. The Soviet Union managed to escape this because of its ideology and occasional support for the CCP, but it eventually provoked a strong backlash by again siding with foreign powers and the Nationalist government against the CCP.

Another assumption was the importance of the periphery to central state security. This was both a Qing policy before imperialism and a memory of the Japanese using Korea and the French using Indochina as jumping off points to move into China proper.

Hunt also spends a great deal of time discussing the importance of Mao. By the mid-1930's, Mao was the dominant voice in foreign affairs, although he was not yet able to simply dictate policy as he would in later years. One interesting point Hunt makes is that Mao was looking to cooperate with the US at the end of WWII, but was counting on another year of war to position the party most advantageously. He was completely surprised by the abrupt end of the war and the Soviet move into Manchuria. Even then he had not given up on his plan of cooperation. It was not until the Marshall mission that he dedicated the party to a policy of complete victory through civil war.

This book starts slow, largely rehashing the late Qing and early Warlord periods, but it picks up with the formation of the CCP and the rise to power of Mao. He does not discuss domestic politics except where necessary, allowing him to focus almost exclusively on foreign policy. Hunt is very effective in outlining the development of CCP assumptions and how those were manifested in foreign policy. Well-worth a read for anyone interested in Chinese history or foreign policy. ( )