Joining the Socialist Camp } 35
high-handed treatment of Mao. Perhaps the most important judgment was
that by Mao himself; he believed Stalin treated him badly, keeping him waiting
for over three weeks after their initial meeting and a purely formal meeting at
Stalin’s “birthday party,” with nothing for Mao to do but, as Mao complained
in his earthy fashion, “eat, sleep, and shit.”^16 Stalin also declined to discuss
with Mao grand problems of theory and strategy of the world revolution, dis-
cussions Mao craved. Instead, Stalin appointed a philosopher to handle such
discussions, an arrangement that did not satisfy Mao. Mao craved recogni-
tion by Stalin as an equal, while Stalin kept him in the position of supplicant.
In their initial meeting, Stalin asked Mao what he hoped to accomplish from
his visit. Mao replied that he hoped to accomplish something that “not only
looked nice but also tasted delicious.” Mao frequently used such homely cir-
cumlocutions which sometimes left even Chinese guessing as to his meaning.
On this occasion Stalin and his interpreters were apparently at a loss to un-
derstand Mao’s meaning. During Liu’s July 1949 visit, Stalin had agreed that a
new treaty would be signed replacing the August 1945 ROC-USSR Friendship
Treaty, but there are many types of treaty. Mao subsequently gave an inter-
view to the Soviet news agency TASS in which he clarified that the main ob-
ject of his visit was to conclude a treaty of alliance with Stalin and the Soviet
Union.^17 Uncertainty about exactly what sort of treaty Mao desired may have
been one reason why Stalin suspended talks for several weeks after his initial
meeting with Mao. Finally, on January 20, Mao summoned the experienced
negotiator Zhou Enlai to Moscow to handle negotiation of the treaty and to
sign it and other documents with foreign minister Andrei Vyshinsky. Mao
was not personally involved in the negotiations, although he supervised them
closely from behind the scene.
Finally, on February 14, 1950 a thirty-year treaty of friendship, alliance,
and mutual assistance was signed. Article I provided that if either signatory
power was attacked by “Japan or states allied with it and thus being involved
in a state of war,” the other signatory power “will immediately render mili-
tary and other assistance with all means at its disposal.”^18 “States allied with”
Japan was a euphemism for the United States, which then still held sover-
eignty over Japan as the occupying power. (The US occupation ended and
Japan recovered its sovereignty in 1952.) In the language of diplomacy, the
phraseology of Article I was a strong treaty commitment. Treaties of alli-
ance often merely provide for consultation in the event of threat. The phrase
“with all means at its disposal” was introduced and insisted on by Zhou Enlai
to add force and clarity to mutual obligation. The Soviet side resisted this
strong formulation “for quite some time,” according to Wu Xiuquan.^19 The
Chinese side wanted a tight alliance. The requirement that involvement in a
“state of war” was required to activate obligation under the treaty worked, on
the other hand, to dilute Moscow’s obligation. On the other hand, many wars
were undeclared (e.g., the 1937–1941 Sino-Japan war and the then upcoming