Question about Sino-Soviet Split

[82riceballs]

I was reading a biography about Mao and stumbled across this paragraph:

Khrushchev, claimed Mao, had betrayed China. How could the head of the communist world talk about “peaceful coexistence” with the nation that supported the Nationalists and refused to recognize the PRC as the rightful government of China? Relations between the Soviet Union and China worsened when China attacked India in a border war and the Soviet Union, concerned that a Chinese victory might drag the superpowers into another world war, gave fighter planes to India.

How exactly would a border skirmish spark another world war???

Did India have secret alliances with other countries like the belligerents involved in WW II?

[renzhe]

This was during the cold war, lots of nuclear missiles, and itchy trigger fingers.

[atitarev]

The Soviet government wanted to have both India and China as its main allies. The USSR flooded China with economic and financial help in 50's but Mao did not appreciate it in the end. There was a few decade long "cold war" between Russia and China, which ended with Gorbachov (I prefer this spelling).

I didn't do any research on this and didn't read much about the situation, don't consider this a quality answer.

[82riceballs]

Ah...thanks!

[atitarev]

This link confirms your reasons:

中苏交恶 - Советско-китайский раскол

Sino-Soviet split

But there is more to it.

[outcast]

Down with Soviet Revisionism!

Nevermind that the Soviets understood the dangers of being too confrontational with "the west", and also that they were vastly more powerful than China. That didn't stop China from almost going to war in '69.

[gato]

Khruschev's denounciation of Stalin in 1956 directly led to the split with Mao and the PRC. Mao became nervous about his critics within the party and went on to lead a purge starting in 1957, which became known as the Anti-Rightist Movement (反右).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kruschev

Khrushchev pursued a course of reform and shocked delegates to the 20th Party Congress on 25 February 1956 by making his famous Secret Speech denouncing the "cult of personality" that surrounded Stalin, though he himself played no small part in cultivating it, and accusing Stalin of crimes committed during the Great Purges. This effectively alienated Khrushchev from the more conservative elements of the Party, but he managed to defeat what he termed the Anti-Party Group after they failed in a bid to oust him from the party leadership in 1957.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Rightist_Movement

The first wave of attacks began immediately following the end of the Hundred Flowers movement in July 1957. By the end of the year, 300,000 people had been labeled as rightists.

http://www.fsmitha.com/h2/ch25prc.html

Dispute with the Soviet Union

Mao spoke of China achieving communism sooner than the Soviet Union. He had been displeased in 1956 when the leader of the Soviet Union, Nikita Khrushchev, denounced Stalin - the Chinese Communists having praised Stalin to their nation. Mao characterized Khrushchev as a "revisionist" - in other words, deviating from Marxism. He saw the Soviet Union as having become a bureaucratic state. Mao's supporters claimed that China was pursuing Marxism and the Soviet Union was not.

[82riceballs]

Thanks!

[gato]

You might heard of the "nine critiques" (九评) published by F.L.G. It's modeled after the nine critiques of Nikita Khrushchev sponsored by Mao just before the start of the Cultural Revolution. See below.

http://ido.thethirdmedia.com/article/frame.aspx?turl=http%3a//ido.3mt.com.cn/article/200605/show365357c32p1.xxxx&rurl=&title=%u5434%u51B7%u897F%uFF1A%u6BDB%u4E3B%u5E2D%u8BF4%u8981%u8BA4%u771F%u603B%u7ED3%u8D6B%u9C81%u6653%u592B%u4FEE%u6B63%u4E3B%u4E49%u7684%u7ECF%u9A8C%u6559%u8BAD%20---%20ido.3mt.com.cn

吴冷西：毛主席说要认真总结赫鲁晓夫修正主义的经验教训

http://book.sina.com.cn/excerpt/eduhissz/2006-03-16/1735198070.shtml

面对苏联的改变 毛泽东表露选接班人的5条件

　　1964年

7月14日，《人民日报》编辑部、《红旗》杂志编辑部联名发表文章：《关于赫鲁晓夫的假共产主义及其在世界历史上的教训――九评苏共中央的公开信》。

　　这篇文章，运用马克思列宁主义的观点和理论，着重讲述了如何防止资本主义复辟和“反修防修”的问题。文章包括了中苏两党展开论战以来的对赫鲁晓夫假共产主义的最猛烈的抨击。

　　文章认为，赫鲁晓夫在苏联实行了一系列的修正主义政策，为资产阶级的利益服务，使苏联的资本主义势力急剧地膨胀起来。文章还指出：“赫鲁晓夫在 ‘反对个人迷信’的幌子下，丑化无产阶级专政和社会主义制度，这实际上是为在苏联复辟资本主义开辟了道路”。扶植那些占据领导地位的蜕化变质分子，加剧苏联社会的阶级分化。“赫鲁晓夫破坏社会主义的计划经济，实行资本主义的利润原则，发展资本主义的自由竞争，瓦解社会主义全民所有制。”

[bhchao]

Did India have secret alliances with other countries like the belligerents involved in WW II?

Both the US and Soviet Union supported India against the PRC invasion in 1962. During the later conflicts between India and Pakistan, the US and Soviet Union sided with India while China strongly backed Pakistan.

In the aftermath of its experience in Vietnam, the US was looking for a fresh start in the early 70s. This desire coincided with worsening relations between Soviet Union and PRC. So Nixon used this opportunity to exploit the Sino-Soviet split to gain a strategic advantage over the Soviet Union.

By 1972 Kissinger was showing sensitive reconnaissance photos of Soviet troop movements along the Sino-Soviet border to his Chinese counterparts, much to their delight and Zhou Enlai's.

Not surprisingly the secret trip that Kissinger made to China to meet Zhou Enlai originated in Pakistan, where he faked a stomach ache during a meeting to excuse himself before departing secretly to China.

[woodcutter]

I don't really understand why the OP would ask such a question. In the greater scheme of things it didn't matter that South Vietnam went communist, for example. Yet, as we all know, the US was locked into a paranoid struggle against Red Demons who might emerge form any direction, and was prepared to fight. A serious expansion of Red Chinese power into India would certainly set alarm bells ringing in Washington - it wasn't written in the stars that it was a "border skirmish" only.

There's no need to get too hung up on treaties. Countries are always capapble of ignoring them and acting in their own perceived best interests.