The Bandung Era } 93
throughout the country. A grand memorial meeting was held in Tiananmen
Square.^2 Mao also wrote a eulogy for Stalin: “Let all the imperialist aggres-
sors and warmongers tremble in the face of our great friendship.”^3 Mao had
good reason to stress PRC-USSR solidarity at this juncture. China and the
United States were still at war in Korea, and a new American president,
Dwight Eisenhower, former Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in Europe
in World War II, had taken office in January 1953 and was threatening to ex-
pand the Korean conflict, possibly including the use of nuclear weapons, if
the communist side did not quickly come to terms. Facing US nuclear coer-
cion, Beijing needed at least the appearance of strong Soviet support.
Zhou Enlai, premier and foreign minister, led a Chinese delegation to
Moscow for Stalin’s funeral on March 9. The delegation stayed for over two
weeks.^4 As mentioned in the previous chapter, Zhou and the new Soviet
leaders discussed ending the Korean War, and decided to do so on the basis
of “reasonable compromises with the enemy.” Other major shifts occurred
in Soviet foreign policy. Moscow relinquished its territorial claims against
Turkey and began pursuing friendship diplomacy toward Turkey, Iran, and
India.^5
The impulse to seek a relaxation of international tensions came from
Moscow, but found a ready welcome in Beijing. China was getting ready to
throw its new Soviet economic model into gear, and a relaxed international
environment would allow China to concentrate on making its new socialist
institutions run well. Over the preceding several years, capitalist economy in
the urban sector had been basically eliminated and the Soviet model of com-
prehensive central planning had been transplanted to China. With the new
set of institutions in place, the CCP Politburo was ready to throw the switch
on the new economic model, which was expected to transform China into an
industrialized and technologically advanced country within a decade or so.
Ending the war in Korea and averting a new war with the United States in
Indochina would allow China to do this.
Relaxation of international tension via moderate policies would also fa-
cilitate escape from the diplomatic and economic isolation into which the
PRC had slid during its first four years of existence. A number of factors con-
tributed to that isolation: China’s close military-political alliance with the
USSR, leading Beijing to second whatever harsh rhetoric issued from Stalin’s
Moscow; the turn of the world communist movement in 1947 toward armed
uprisings against “bourgeois democratic” (i.e., independent but noncom-
munist) regimes in the emerging ex-colonial nations; the ruthless uprooting
of Western interests in China; and most of all, China’s intervention against
UN forces in Korea and the resulting embargos and sanctions. By 1953, PRC
policies had nearly destroyed China’s ties with countries beyond the social-
ist bloc. China’s isolation would hinder efforts at economic growth, limit
its diplomatic influence, and make it more dependent on the Soviet Union.