Max Zins, to the Attention of Georges Marchais, 'China'

POLEX - November 30, 1983

Max ZINS

[handwritten]

1/Memo on meeting.

2/Draft letter to Hua.

→It would be good to officially give it to the Head of the delegation.

[Name of the author of the handwritten comment underlined twice: Max Zins]

[end handwritten]

To the attention of Georges Marchais

● CHINA

 A brief assessment of the political interviews between the delegations of the French Communist Party and the Chinese Communist Party.

 The delegations, prior to the interview with Georges Marchais, have had four series of interviews: 

The first one was dedicated to the presentation of China’s domestic situation, delivered by the delegation’s highest-ranking member, Xi Zhong Xun, member of the Political Bureau and Secretary of the Central Committee, Secretary-General Hu Yaobang’s right-hand man. That presentation confirmed the orientations taken by the CCP since its 1982 Congress and such as they had been presented to the PCF delegation in Beijing. Three main ideas may be singled out:

 1. The CCP’s consolidation;

2. Some initial successes were achieved on the political and economic fronts;

3. The CCP is determined to continue along the path marked out.

The second series of interviews were dedicated to the presentation of France’s domestic situation by Maxime Gremetz.

The third one were dedicated to the presentation of the CCP’s foreign policy by the delegation’s second-highest ranking member, Qiao Shi.

Two evolutions can be seen regarding the Cambodia question and Afghanistan. [handwritten] The Chinese have highlighted their interest for peace and disarmament. [end handwritten]

CAMBODIA 

The Chinese emphasised more than before the fact they were willing to talk with the Vietnamese, as a party interested in the question of the resolution of the Cambodian dispute. They are willing to discuss the normalisation of Chinese-Vietnamese relations, after Vietnam declares its intention to withdraw from Cambodia and actually starts withdrawing troops. Compared to what had been said to the PCF delegation in October 82 and to the five-point plan that China made public in March 83, it appears that there is a slight difference here.

 Hu Yaobang certainly told Georges Marchais that China was willing to return to talks with Vietnam under the aforementioned conditions, the five point program from March 83 certainly did make the idea public. However, China was at the time placing the emphasis on the USSR’s role and its normalisation with Moscow, with the clear intention of getting the USSR to put pressure on Vietnam. These pressures were implicitly considered as the main condition for the normalisation of Chinese-Soviet relations. 

Nowadays, China appears to have started to disconnect somewhat the normalisation of Chinese-Soviet relations from the normalisation of Chinese-Vietnamese relations. Everything happens as if it were tending more clearly towards acknowledging the specific regional implications of its dispute with Vietnam regarding Cambodia (let us, for instance, remember how the Chinese delegation in Beijing had insisted on the role of the Soviets in the “invasion” of Cambodia by Vietnam; this was not the case at all in Paris in November 83). 

That evolution can only be appreciated by us in a favourable light. At the scale of a resolution process that will most likely still be very long, it marks a small step forward towards a possible future solution. It should contribute to lessen a bit Vietnam’s fear of seeing Moscow and Beijing settle the Cambodian questions at Hanoi’s expense. It ultimately confirms the appropriateness of our reaction in the face of the evolution of Chinese policy in Asia as early as October 82.

 In addition, the analysis of the way Chinese diplomacy has developed regarding the Cambodian affair for more than a year tends to confirm this judgement of the PCF delegation from November 83. 

First, the Chinese secretly reached out to the Soviets in order to resolve the issue. Then they told us what the content of the proposals made [Emphasis original to the document] to the Soviets (and not the Vietnamese) was. Then they made these proposals public, which was inevitably going to connect these more directly to Vietnam’s. Today, in Paris, all the while reaffirming all of their proposals in five points, they have placed the emphasis a little more on Vietnam’s role.

AFGHANISTAN

 In Beijing, in front of the PCF delegation, the Chinese had condemned the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. They had not made any conflict resolution proposal. In Paris, they have made proposals:

 Somewhat along the lines of what they have offered the Vietnamese, the Chinese have offered the Soviets to declare that they were committing to withdrawing their troops according to a timetable. After the Soviet withdrawal, China would then be ready to discuss an international agreement (that it would guarantee) regarding the resolution of the matter on the basis of Afghanistan’s neutrality and non-alignment. Without expressing an opinion on the content of these proposals, the fact that they exist and that China’s perspective incorporates a schedule is positive. 

The fourth series of interviews were dedicated to the presentation of the PCF’s foreign policy by Maxime Gremetz and the cooperation between the two parties. They have agreed on a cooperation programme for 1984.

 All the interviews took place in a warm and brotherly atmosphere, with the willingness to frankly present everybody’s position.

Addition: 

A correspondence which we have just received from our representative in Hanoi, the Humanité’s correspondent, confirms a relative détente by the Vietnamese vis-a-vis the Chinese and a tendency to adopt a broader vision of foreign relations that is not only limited to the horizons of the Sino-Vietnamese dispute.