Mao, Stalin, and Kim il sung: An interpretive essay

MAO, STALIN, AND KIM IL SUNG: AN INTERPRETIVE ESSAY

Vladimir Petrov

To secure Soviet interests in Manchuria after the Yalta agreement on the Far East had been invalidated by the Kuomintang " s defeat, Stalin was forced to welcome the PRC into the "socialist camp." In attempting to eliminate Mao's foreign policy alternatives, he was assisted by an unwitting United States, where Truman was under fire for "losing" China. Data which has recently become available shows that Stalin cemented his accord with Mao by urging him to lead revolution in Asia. Mao's heroic self-image and need to prove to Stalin that he was not "another Tito," caused him to overrule his Politburo and plunge China into the Korean War, thereby assuring its isolation and lasting dependence on the Soviets.

The author has long been a student of relations among socialist states; a few interviews in Beijing with Mao Zedong's personal interpreters and a multitude of newly declassified documents have inspired him to reconstruct the Stalin-Mao-Kim relationship during the formative years of the PRC.

Until recently, the story of the establishment of relations between Stalin and Mao Zedong was known only in a general outline form. Far from a natural union of the two foremost communist leaders, the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance laid no true foundation for Sino-Soviet amity. The treaty was signed despite great misgivings, driven primarily by external developments. The perceptions these men held toward an alliance differed to a high degree. For both, however, such a step held more symbolic meaning than real significance. Although we have previously been unaware of how severely this bond was tested as China became drawn into the Korean War, we now know that Mao had little to do with its incep- tion, and that Stalin did not fully realize the implications of such a union. In authorizing Kim I1 Sung to launch his attack, Stalin believed that the ensuing war would last only 3--4 days. Fearing the provocation of a third World War, neither Mao nor Stalin attempted to relate their alliance to the Korean War. In keeping the Soviet Union detached from the situation on the Korean Penin- sula, Stalin affirmed his superior international standing and assured China's continued isolation.

Vladimir Petrov is emeritus professor of international affairs at The George Washington University. His numerous publications include Escape from the Future (Indiana University Press, 1973) and A Study in Diplomacy (Henry Regnery Co., 1971).

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These are some of the conclusions that can now be drawn following the declassification of secret correspondence between Mao and Stalin, the publi- cation of insiders' memoirs, and the willingness of some of the surviving witnesses of those fateful events to submit themselves to searching interviews by Chinese and Russian scholars. Findings thus accumulated now allow us to understand the motivations and actions of these two communist leaders as they groped for a unified strategy during the formative years of the PRC.

While the published diary of Pyotr Vlasov (Vladimirov), Stalin's personal representative in Yan'an in 1942-1945, l is tarnished by the injection of anti- Mao polemics, the insights it offers into Stalin's hostility toward Mao retain their value. More important to our subject are the reminiscences of Ivan Kovalyov, Stalin's trusted aide, who attended all top-level meetings in 1948- 1950 and who, like Vlasov, had near-unlimited access to Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai during his service in China. 2 At considerable risk to himself Kovalyov preserved copies of Stalin's secret cables to Mao. Mao's cables to Stalin have been published in Beijing.

Chinese sources include the slender memoirs of Wu Xiuquan, Zhou's favorite aide, 3 and the rich recollections of Shi Zhe (Karsky), since 1940 Mao's personal interpreter who also operated the portable radio-transmitter to maintain Mao's communications with Stalin. 4 Shi Zhe served as interpreter in every meeting Mao, Zhou, and Liu Shaoqi had with Soviet leaders in those critical years, often alongside Kovalyov. Mutual dislike between the two aides adds an extra dimension to their reminiscences. Like Wu, Shi was trained in Moscow and was for a while attached to the Chinese delegation to the Comintern. Arrested on Mao's orders in 1962, he was kept in confine- ment for 17 years but, as I discovered in my conversations with him in 1989, this experience did not shake his belief in Mao's greatness. Such was not the case with several other interpreters of Mao and Zhou, an exceedingly knowledgeable group of people whom I met in Beijing. While declassification of documents has been slow, Chinese researchers with access to state and party archives have produced many valuable studies and sometimes granted interviews to other scholars. Most welcome also, are recent memoirs of former North Korean officials who have broken the silence they had maintained for forty years. 5

Finally, there has appeared, in recent years, a number of insightful Ameri- can (including Chinese-American) studies based on interviews and newly released documents. 6 Some of them have been sponsored by the Cold War International History Project of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC, and have been most helpful in recreating a broader picture of Sino-Soviet relations in the late Stalin era. 7 Absolutely unique is Uncertain Partners, a study collectively written by Sergei Gon- charov, a Russian Sinologist (and currently a diplomat), and John W. Lewis and Xue Litai, both of Stanford University. They have drawn upon a huge

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variety of Chinese, Korean, and Soviet sources, including those mentioned. Their work is as conclusive as any is likely to be. It is supplemented by 30 pages of references cited, by translations in the appendix of 82 documents (or excerpts), mainly Chinese, and more than 50 pages of helpful notes. With commendable care, the authors have included all important testimonies they have come across, even if these contradicted each other, letting the chips fall and leaving it up to the reader to draw his own picture.

This flow of information will no doubt continue, but it would be unrealis- tic to expect discoveries of documents revealing the innermost thoughts and strategic calculations of the principal protagonists. While Mao sometimes shared his reasoning with his close associates, Stalin consistently hid his, often forbidding them to keep minutes of the more sensitive conversations he had with foreign leaders. After the outbreak of World War II, Stalin himself controlled all communications with Mao. Obsessed with security, he used various assumed names and informed others on a need to know basis only. Since Stalin's modus operandi severely limited potential sources of our knowledge, and since neither he nor Mao has left us candid memoirs, a student attempting to penetrate their thinking is sooner or later forced to resort to personal interpretation.

To present the story as I see it, 1 had to detach myself from my sources. Partly for this reason, I decided to avoid referencing specific facts and quotes. All of them are verifiable and are as accurate as are the sources themselves. While many are familiar to historians, others are taken from the yet unpublished or little known, recently declassified documents. A few insights were obtained in my interviews with the contemporaries of the events narrated here, with due allowance to their sometimes fading memories. In the end, in order to recreate the Stalin-Mao-Kim I1 Sung interaction and come up with a plausible interpretation of their individual behavior, I had to select from a huge pile of pieces only those that helped me to assemble my jigsaw puzzle. Needless to say, the responsibility for the resulting picture is exclusively mine.

Interpreting Stalin would be a particularly complex task, as many of his biographers have discovered. An essentially uncomplicated and single- minded man, Stalin was loathe to delegate authority. Toward the end of his life, he concentrated the power of decision in his own hands. In addition to the horrendous domestic mess in which the Soviets found themselves at the end of World War II, Stalin handled a maze of foreign relations, including those involving the countries assigned by the Big Three to the Soviet sphere of influence, as well as those with the communist-hating population of the newly annexed territories. At the top of his agenda was the increasingly bitter contest with the United States which, in its crusade against Soviet expansion- ism, enlisted the forces of German and Japanese nationalism, and therefore posed a grave threat to Soviet security. In Stalin's scheme of things, however,


China occupied a peculiarly sensitive place, not only because its geostrategic position required that it be kept out of the "imperialist" camp, but also because of his own rocky relationship with China's large and well-entrenched Communist party (CCP).

Given Stalin's earlier history of support for the Kuomintang (KMT) and his tacit acceptance of Chiang Kai-shek's unrelenting efforts to destroy the CCP, his sensitivity was understandable. This was amplified during the war years by a well-founded perception of Mao's "disloyalty" to the USSR and his yearning for friendship with the United States. In addition, Stalin had never developed effective control over the CCP; the Comintern had maintained only a tenuous connection with the CCP via short-wave radio and occasional couriers. The more pliable Chinese "internationalists" resided primarily in Moscow while Mao, since 1943 the undisputed CCP leader, led peasant armies in the struggle against the KMT. From Stalin's perspective, this struggle weakened China's capacity to resist Japan, Russia's historical enemy, which had threatened its vast, though thinly populated, Far Eastern region since the turn of the century. In his effort to check Japanese expansion in Asia, Stalin found in the KMT the only conceivable partner. That this same KMT since 1927 had been bent on exterminating Chinese communists was unfortunate but could not be helped; to Stalin, Soviet security took prece- dence over ideology.

For Mao, although cooperation with the governing KMT was desirable, submission to it was out of the question. With due regard to China's dire need to resist the Japanese onslaught and the CCP obligation to preserve a credible appearance of international communist unity, Mao's paramount task was to assure CCP survival. This called for internal cohesiveness--which he per- ceived as being undermined by the "internationalist" wing of the party, shel- tered by Chiang's ally, Stalin. So serious appeared this threat that Mao devoted much of his attention during the Yan'an years to weeding out Moscow's influence in the party.

The end of the war changed Stalin's attitude toward the CCP. Anticipating that the Nationalists, having seized Japanese weapons and equipment in China, would defeat CCP forces and establish at least a nominal control over the country, Stalin instructed his representative in Yan'an to inform Mao that in matters affecting the Far East, the Soviet Union would deal exclusively with Chiang Kai-shek. The implication, of course, was that Stalin owed Mao no gratitude and had no commitment to his cause, ideological or otherwise. The Soviet group was instructed to return to Moscow, leaving behind its radio-transmitting equipment as a farewell present. With the departure of the Russians, Mao's direct connection with Stalin was terminated.

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EVOLUTION OF SINO-SOVIET RELATIONS: FROM THE YALTA AGREE- MENT TO THE TREATY OF FRIENDSHIP, ALLIANCE, AND MUTUAL ASSISTANCE

It is impossible to tell whether Stalin's drive to expand Soviet territory and sphere of influence was motivated by his desire to make up for Russia's supreme sacrifice in the war, to recreate the historical empire in all its glory, or to strengthen the strategic position of the Soviet Union in the unfolding conflict with the United States. Molotov relates a story about a school map Stalin tacked to the wall in his dacha, on which he marked Russia's territorial acquisitions and the countries in eastern Europe that Roosevelt and Churchill had ceded to Soviet control. Time and time again, Stalin would pull Molotov to the map and ask him the same question: would the imperialists be able to isolate Russia now; to surround it with a cordon sanitaire, as they did for two decades after the revolution? Although the Allies turned down a number of Soviet demands presented after the defeat of the Axis, there was no doubt that Stalin was quite proud of his achievements in expanding the empire and augmenting its strength vis-a-vis the "imperialists."

The Yalta Agreement on the Far East reflected Stalin's determination to rectify Russia's extreme vulnerability in this region. The document specified restoration of Russia's rights, "violated by the treacherous attack of Japan in 1904," affirmation of the independent status of Outer Mongolia (traditionally claimed by China on historical grounds), the transfer to the Soviet Union of the Kurile Islands and Southern Sakhalin, and recognition of Soviet "preemi- nent interests" in Manchuria. These included the leasing from China of the Port Arthur naval base and the "internationalization" of Dairen, as well as a de facto repossession of the Manchurian railroads built by the Czars half a century earlier.

Of all the terms of the agreement, those related to Manchuria were most crucial to Stalin's design for the war settlement. Containing three quarters of China's total industrial capacity and an ethnically diverse population of some 50 million, the region had been the springboard of Japanese expansion in Asia since 1931. Even earlier, Soviet interests and the rights inherited from the Czars had constantly been trampled upon by Manchurian warlords backed by Japan, while Soviet officials on the extraterritorial Chinese Eastern rail- way were routinely abused by a large and fiercely anti-communist White Russian community in Harbin, eagerly following Japan's guidance. Although the Soviets were forced to sell their properties in 1935 (for the pitiable price of 140 million yen, paid mostly in soybeans), the Japanese threat to the Soviet Union increased after Japan joined Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy in the Anti-Comintern Pact, and launched armed attacks on Soviet and Mongolian territories in the following years. For these reasons, the elimina- tion of the Japanese presence on the Asian continent became Stalin's key


objective, not at all incompatible, initially, with the aims of his Western allies. No less than Sakhalin and the Kuriles, friendly Mongolia, and bitterly anti-Japanese Korea, Manchuria was the key to the Soviet Union's dominant position in northeast Asia.

The Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek acquiesced to the Yalta agreement. Except nominally, and for a short period of time, it had never effectively ruled Manchuria. Its sovereignty over the northeastern provinces was recognized, and Chiang hoped that Stalin would not interfere in the KMT campaign against CCP forces. Thus, as Soviet armies poured into Manchuria, North China, and Korea in the last days of the war, Chiang accepted the inevitable by concluding the Treaty of Friendship and Alliance with the So- viet Union. Shortly thereafter, he recognized the independence of Outer Mongolia, a de facto Russian protectorate since 1911, where in a Soviet-style plebiscite 98.4 percent of the population voted to sever Mongolia's ancient ties with China. Overwhelmed with his many varied achievements, and confident that more would follow, Stalin did not realize that forces beyond his reach would eventually unravel this settlement.

Whatever possibility for accommodation had been present in 1945 was subsequently scuttled by the Truman administration, already alarmed by Stalin's seemingly insatiable appetite. Not only did Truman reject Stalin's demand that Northern Hokkaido should be placed under the control of the Red Army, he ignored Stalin's request to expedite the evacuation of the large U.S. military contingent from China, and encouraged Chiang to take de facto possession of Manchuria. Stalin, who took the Soviet preeminence clause of the Yalta agreement seriously, initially obstructed the entry of the crack KMT troops, speedily delivered to the northeast by U.S. sea and air transport. If the Nationalists were becoming the willing tool of the United States, he may have reasoned, he could counter it by lending a sympathetic ear to the pleas of the communists, who were then reeling under the Nationalists' attack throughout North China. Soviet commanders allowed some 200,000 communist troops to enter Manchuria, as requested by Mao, but not yet willing to foreclose the possibility of dealing with Chiang, Stalin instructed the CCP leadership to keep their troops out of major cities. Thus, by the time Soviet occupation forces withdrew from Manchuria in April 1946, the communists were entrenched in the countryside while the bulk of their troops were under- going retraining and re-arming in the safety of the northeast. At this same time, heavy Soviet presence in the not-yet formally leased Liaodong peninsula, and their effective control of the railroads, inhibited the Nationalists who did not venture beyond Changchun.

All of this added up to a highly unsettling situation, and Stalin extended several invitations to Chiang to come to Moscow to discuss ways to remedy it. Emboldened by the initial success of his campaign to destroy CCP forces, fearing U.S. retaliation, and reckoning that Stalin would not be a reliable

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partner anyway, Chiang declined. Stalin later complained to a Western diplomat that "Chiang wanted me to take part in the extermination of the Chinese communists; this I could not do." It appears that Chiang decided to bank on the United States, with its growing anti-communist sentiment, to aid the KMT on a large scale.

Soon after the Soviet armies withdrew from Manchuria, the civil war in China resumed in full fury. Reorganized and re-equipped communist forces dealt a series of crushing defeats to the poorly led KMT troops, exhausted by the long years of war against Japan. By the beginning of 1948, most competent observers began to feel that Chiang's government would be unable to establish its authority in North China. Reaching the same conclusion, Stalin was forced to rethink his strategy.

Throughout the late 1940s, the Soviets, engrossed in bitter political battles with the West over Germany and Eastern Europe, did little to consolidate their positions in the Far East. They could not make any headway in Japan, then firmly run by the unflinchingly anti-communist and virulently anti-So- viet General MacArthur. The American presence south of the 38th parallel in Korea, governed by MacArthur's great admirer, Syngman Rhee, also pre- cluded any unilateral Soviet action. In China, however, the situation was fluid, with the American-backed Nationalists retreating before the CCP armies. In a cold war context, this supposedly benefited the Soviet Union, but in fact there was nothing for Stalin to celebrate. That Truman and Acheson were increasingly under fire at home for "losing" China was hardly a conso- lation, for the attackers were, if anything, more rabidly anti-communist than the president. In Stalin's view, although the strategic base he had created in 1945 consisting of Mongolia, Manchuria, and North Korea seemed intact, it mattered more that the treaty he had concluded with Chiang, incorporating the Yalta agreement, was rapidly becoming meaningless. Simply put, there was no government of China to secure the "preeminence" of Soviet interests in Manchuria, and the Soviets had no means of doing it themselves. To complicate the situation further, while nominally still allied with the disintegrating KMT government, the Soviets were compelled to reckon with the immediate reality of creeping CCP assertiveness in Manchuria.

In September 1945, Mao sent a score of prominent Central Committee members to Harbin to set up a Northeastern Bureau of the CCP and a North- eastern Administrative Committee. Due to an overpowering Soviet presence, these were mainly symbolic and devoid of actual power. Stalin felt, however, that he had to counter Mao's move by dispatching a group of "internationalists" from Moscow. In addition, several hundred former Chinese participants in the anti-Japanese struggle in Manchuria who bided their time in Khabarovsk helped to dilute the ranks of the "Maoists." The new institutions thus formed never challenged Soviet authorities, limiting their activities to local administration and to the promulgation of land reform. With few excep-

10 JOURNAL OF NORTHEAST ASIAN STUDIES / SUMMER 1994

tions, however, Chinese politicians and officials kept their distance from the Russians, and with the resumption of the civil war, like the rest of the CCP members throughout China, they unreservedly subordinated themselves to Chairman Mao.

There has been some speculation that Stalin could have established Soviet control over Manchuria during the reign of Gao Gang, who replaced Lin Biao as the head of the Northeastern Bureau late in 1947. A wily and ambitious, though myopic politician, Gao doubtless toyed with the idea of carving out a fiefdom for himself by taking advantage of Stalin's dislike of Mao. Ivan Kovalyov tells of one episode, which took place in July 1949 during a meeting of Stalin with the CCP delegation led by Liu Shaoqi. Gao Gang, who was present, suddenly proposed that Manchuria be turned into a Soviet republic and included in the USSR. Stalin cut him short, calling him, angrily, "Zhang Zuolin," after the hated warlord who ruled Manchuria prior to the Japanese occupation. Mao, who detested Gao, calling him a "midget Czar," took no immediate action against Gao at Stalin's request, even assigning Gao important duties during the Korean War. Shortly after Stalin's death, however, Mao had him charged with treason. Incarcerated after a secret trial, Gao supposedly committed suicide shortly thereafter. This shows that Stalin, a pragmatic politician with no taste for gambling, realized that converting Manchuria into a kind of Soviet satellite akin to Mongolia or Bulgaria was totally out of the question. In the process, he would have to spite Mao Zedong, unchallenged leader of the Chinese communists. Knowing Mao's vigilance in protecting the CCP leadership ranks from penetration by Soviet agents, Stalin had no compunction in exposing Gao's treachery toward Mao once he had decided to lay the foundations for Sino-Soviet brotherhood.

Returning to the earlier period, we must take into account an additional reason for Stalin's reluctance to be openly identified with the communist side during China's civil war: the need to not push Soviet relations with the Truman administration to a breaking point. Stalin could not risk an outright confrontation with the United States, because together with Britain it had iegitimized Soviet political and territorial gains at the end of World War II. Much as Truman tried to mount resistance to Soviet expansion, he did not dare to repudiate Roosevelt's and his own concessions to Stalin made at Tehran, Yalta, and Potsdam. On the other hand, it puzzled Stalin that despite Truman's difficulties with the American right-wing, he largely failed to come to the rescue of his "class ally" and equally staunch anti-communist, Chiang Kai-shek. Puzzled or not, Stalin did not want to give Truman any excuse for such measures as landing an army in China, which, as both he and Mao feared, would have reversed the course of the war. In fact, as we now know, as late as April 1949, even after Lin Biao's army had captured Beijing in late January, and Chiang had resigned as president of China, and also after the flight of KMT forces to Taiwan had begun, Stalin sent a long dispatch to

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Mao, advising him that it would perhaps be prudent for the People's Libera- tion Army (PLA) not to advance beyond the Yangtze River for the time being. Ignoring this advice, Mao resumed his offensive. As Shi Zhe relates, Stalin later apologized to Liu Shaoqi for underestimating the strength of the revolutionary forces in China.

It was out of this same remarkable caution that Stalin flatly refused to permit Mao to come to Moscow in April 1948, although Mao's group was already traveling to the Soviet border. Mao cabled Stalin, explaining that he wanted to discuss urgent matters, particularly the knotty problem of governing China, and Soviet help in reconstructing its war-ravaged economy. Stalin curtly replied that Mao should concentrate on commanding his armies, and that everything else could wait. After Mao repeated his request in September, Stalin promised to send a senior Politburo member within a few weeks. Mao waited, but nobody came. It was only in January 1949 that Stalin dispatched Mikoyan on a secret mission to Xibaipo, Hebei Province, for a week of wide- ranging discussion with the CCP leadership. Mikoyan was accompanied by Ivan Kovalyov, a highly regarded administrator who had previously directed restoration of the Manchurian railroads and who was to become Stalin's liaison with Mao and coordinator of Soviet economic aid. Shortly after Mikoyan's visit, Mao, somewhat impatiently, and for the third time, requested a meeting with Stalin. Probably because of the PLA's spectacular offensive south of the Yangtze River, Stalin finally invited a CCP delegation to come to Moscow secretly at the end of July in order to review the entire range of critical bilateral issues and formulate a common international strategy. Mao appointed Liu Shaoqi to lead the group, who took with him Gao Gang, Wang Jiaxiang, who would become PRC ambassador to the Soviet Union, and Shi Zhe. In five formal meetings, Stalin headed a mostly silent Politburo group while Liu spoke for the CCP. Though the atmosphere was comradely, nothing could obscure the reality that Liu was a mere supplicant, and Stalin the source of worldly wisdom and the dispenser of desperately needed material assistance. In order to appreciate the multidimensional char- acter of this meeting, we ought to take into account the complex international scene and the Soviet position, with its strengths and weaknesses within it.

However undeserved, Stalin received a great deal of kudos in the West for the triumph of communism in China. A widespread perception of enhanced Soviet power substantially strengthened his hand in the cold war confrontation with the United States. But while the near-hysterical reaction of the American public to the "loss" of China left the Truman administration's Asia policy in shambles, Truman more than made up for it in Europe, a region of overwhelming importance for Soviet security. The major achievement of the United States was to deny Stalin a peace treaty with Germany on any kind of acceptable terms. Other trends were distinctly unfavorable to the Soviet Union.


The Berlin Blockade instituted by Stalin in June 1948, with the intent to squeeze the former Allies out of the German capital, had to be called off the following spring due to the spectacular success of the American airlift, which was applauded enthusiastically by the devoutly anti-Soviet Germans, and the previously disheartened West Europeans. The United States followed up the lifting of the blockade with the creation of West Germany, and the formation of NATO, potentially threatening the Soviet Union and thus necessitating the preservation of a huge occupation army in the Soviet zone of Germany.

Another cause of Stalin's concern was the painful process of digesting East European countries consigned to the Soviet sphere of influence but resisting the imposition of alien rule. The most vexing of all, however, was the situation in Yugoslavia, where an authentically communist regime entered a state of open revolt against Soviet encroachment. Stalin had carefully cultivated the image of a communist Monolith, linked to his presumably total control over Eastern Europe and the large communist parties of France and Italy. He therefore reacted violently to Tito's assertion of Yugoslavian independence, dubbed "a crack in the Kremlin wall" by the West. Furthermore, it did not escape Stalin's attention that certain admirers of Chinese communism in the United States, observing his inability to crush Tito, openly mused about how nice it would be if Mao Zedong would turn out to be "another Tito." Under these circumstances, it is hardly surprising that Stalin was reluc- tant to welcome China to the socialist camp.

Aside from the denouement of the Chinese civil war, it was the presence of virulent anti-communist sentiment spreading across the United States and Western Europe that finally pushed Stalin to act. This was disheartening news for Mao, for it foreclosed the path of nonalignment he had hoped to secure for China with the help of the United States. Reluctantly, Mao concluded that the Soviet Union was the only great power China could turn to for economic aid and international legitimization. Finding himself in a strong bargaining position, Stalin indicated to Mao the price of Soviet benevolence: China was to abandon hope of an independent foreign policy, and furnish Moscow with proof of hostility toward the United States and its imperialist allies.

"Proof" of such concessions was open-ended. Mao grudgingly authorized a PLA blockade of the American consulate in Shenyang, as well as the denial of diplomatic status to consul Angus Ward, as recommended by Ivan Kovalyov, an action which Stalin personally approved. Another such incident was the cancellation of talks with U.S. Ambassador Leighton Stuart, a man possessing great knowledge of China, well liked by Zhou Enlai, and eager to explore the possibilities of dealing with the new regime. These talks were, in fact, ruled out by the State Department, but the Chinese were still able to present the cancellation to Stalin as a result of Chinese initiative. Somewhat later, during Mao's visit to Moscow, the PRC government requisitioned the

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former military barracks in Beijing then housing the U.S. Consulate General, whereupon all American personnel were withdrawn from China. Stalin also pressured Mao to proceed cautiously with the establishment of diplomatic relations, limiting his approval to those countries that had renounced support of the KMT. These included the Soviet bloc and some Asian countries, but definitely excluded the United States, thereby guaranteeing China international isolation and denial of United Nations membership.

Probably the most important signal Mao sent out to indicate that there was no more room for ambivalence in China's orientation was his June 1949 declaration that "the Chinese people must lean either to the side of imperialism or to the side of socialism," and that "there can be no sitting on the fence; there is no third path," and that "internationally, we belong to the anti-imperialist front." Meant for Stalin and for the Occidental powers, this declaration also contained a message to the Chinese people that the Soviet Union was a friend and patron, and that the party members known for "internationalist" leanings were no longer outcasts.

Did these steps reassure Stalin? Content that the "imperialists" had been humbled in China, Stalin nevertheless remained congenitally suspicious. He could not trust Mao, prone as he was to ideological and tactical meanderings, to tow the line. Obsessed with Tito's heresy, he was obviously concerned that the CCP would one day become a Trojan horse within the monolithic system he was trying to create. In his conversations with Ivan Kovalyov, his personal envoy to Mao, Stalin repeatedly underlined the paramount need for communist unity. In May 1948, he said, "If socialism is victorious in China and our countries follow a single path, then victory of socialism in the world will be virtually guaranteed." Here, "single path" clearly refers to that which he himself had charted, and from which Tito was straying. In his instructions to Kovalyov, Stalin admonished him to observe closely the attitudes of the Chinese leaders toward the Yugoslav "traitor," and watch for signs of "Titoism" or nationalist inclinations in the CCP. His mistrust of the Chinese was manifested in his discussions with Liu Shaoqi, as he discouraged Liu from considering the possible entry of the CCP into the Cominform, a post- war organization of East European communist parties from which the Yugoslavs had recently been evicted. Stalin instead suggested that since the center of the revolutionary movement had shifted from West to East, China, as a "younger brother" ought to relieve the burden theretofore carried by the Soviet Union, as "older brother," and assume a position of leadership among the peoples of East Asia. Once China had created its own Cominform, the CPSU would be glad to join it.

Liu suspected that Stalin was laying a trap in order to test China's readi- ness to submit to Soviet leadership, and therefore reacted with great caution, refusing even to drink a toast to China's new role as proposed by Stalin. Upon his return to Beijing, however, his comrades took Stalin's idea at face


value. Still euphoric with a victory that they were certain was already inspir- ing revolutionary movements in the Philippines, South Korea, and in the former colonies of European powers, such a proposition filled them with excitement. At an international conference in November, Liu himself pro- claimed that the Chinese experience of revolutionary armed conflict had uni- versal value for Asian peoples. All of this confirmed Stalin's opinion that Mao was insatiable in his ambitions. On the other hand, and more impor- tantly, by embarking on a militant path China was bound to collide with the West, ensuring its enmity, and thereby forcing China to remain on the Soviet side in the cold war. As we know, Stalin's strategy of utilizing the revolutionary zeal of Chinese communists, a tactic continued by his successors, was largely responsible for keeping China in international isolation for nearly a quarter of a century.

Mao departed Beijing for his long journey to Moscow without pomp. This was in part due to security; no public announcement of his trip was made. Soldiers were posted at 100-meter intervals along the railroad all the way to the Soviet border. Leaders of the Democratic League and the left-wing of the KMT who had supported Mao were now enraged by his acceptance of Mon- golian sovereignty, and opposed his appearance at Stalin's court with vehe- mence. The true purpose of the pilgrimage remained unclear even to the CCP leadership, as Mao wisely kept his plans and expectations vague. If Stalin proved to be less than accommodating, his own image would not be marred. In the event that Mao should wish to speak to Stalin without Chinese witnesses, he requested that Ivan Kovalyov provide him with a Russian interpreter.

The CCP Politburo approved a tentative agenda for the Mao-Stalin talks, but did not relay it to Moscow. It was also resolved that should negotiations with the Soviets prove necessary, Zhou Enlai would serve as emissary, and not Mao. The Politburo therefore submitted a request to Stalin that Mao's visit be treated as a state affair and extended to the unheard-of length of three months. One month would be devoted to each of the following: discussions with Stalin, becoming acquainted with Eastern Europe, and resting in Stalin's Black Sea resort. The official pretext for the trip would be the festivities surrounding Stalin's seventieth birthday, an event at which every communist and socialist party in the world was to be represented. In keeping with this ruse, Mao limited his entourage to his secretary, Chen Boda; his old body- guard Wang Dongxing, the new deputy minister of PRC security; his butler Ye Zilong, who had recently become a deputy mayor of Beijing; and Shi Zhe, his adviser and interpreter. Three Russians--Kovalyov, Ambassador Roshchin, and interpreter Fedorenko--occupied a separate car. Two more cars were filled to capacity with Stalin's birthday presents, selected by a special committee chaired by Yang Shankun and Jiang Qing.

Shi Zhe and Fedorenko both recall that Mao was on edge during the

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journey, if not outright anxious. He had never met a foreign potentate, had never traveled beyond China's Great Wall, and feared adverse influence on Stalin of Wang Ming and other Moscow-based "internationalists." On the other hand, Mao could hope that Stalin would use the gathering of communist party leaders to announce what he had told Liu Shaoqi in August, namely that because the center of the revolutionary movement had shifted to the East, he, Mao, would lead the struggle for the liberation of the peoples of Asia. Was this too much to expect? Perhaps. After three earlier rejections, his present invitation had been conditional upon his proclamation of the People's Repub- lic of China. Following this October 1 declaration, however, Stalin failed to send congratulations, and his recent request for a three-month state visit had gone conspicuously unanswered. All of this was unsettling for Mao.

Although Mao's innermost feelings are generally difficult to fathom, his view of himself in relation to Stalin can be reconstructed with a fair degree of accuracy. As a victorious communist leader, Mao traced his ideological lin- eage to Karl Marx through Marx's acknowledged disciples, Lenin and Stalin. Like all communists since the great October Revolution, Mao believed that in the absence of a powerful Soviet Union, unrestrained "imperialists" would stamp out the revolutionary movement mercilessly. This dependence linked the fortunes of all communist parties inextricably with that of the Soviet Union. On a conceptual level, it was nearly irrelevant to Mao whether Stalin helped Chinese communism specifically, or hindered its victory, as he later confessed to Liu Shaoqi. Speaking before the CCP Politburo three years after the death of Stalin, Mao declared that "his mistakes amounted to only 30 percent of the whole, and his achievements to 70 percent" and that "all things being considered, Stalin was, nonetheless, a great Marxist." As his train sped across the vastness of Siberia, however, Mao probably wondered about more immediate aspects of the potential relationship. Would Stalin render practical help in the liberation of Taiwan, or relinquish privileged Soviet positions in Manchuria and Xinjiang? Would he, in comradely spirit, accept the de facto takeover of the railroads initiated under Mao's orders? There was also the question of whether the present journey would facilitate the establishment of Chinese relations with Occidental countries, or make such relations difficult. Mao, whose political experience had been limited to China, and whose communications with Stalin had been conducted only through hostile intermediar- ies such as Vlasov and Kovalyov, and by telegrams, had no idea whatsoever what was in store for him. In the absence of truly competent advisers, he knew he would have to improvise. He also knew that China needed Soviet goodwill, but was uncertain whether the reverse was true, and this worried him.

Mao had good reasons to worry, for Stalin judged him too cocky and not sufficiently aware of his inferior position. The reception for Mao at the train station was intentionally chilly. Upon greeting him, Molotov and Bulganin


curtly refused to join Mao for a friendly lunch in his car. After a brief ceremony, they had him whisked away to one of Stalin's more remote dachas. Although feeling tired and ill after his eleven-day journey, he was rushed to the Kremlin six hours later to meet Stalin. After exchanging brief pleasantries, Stalin asked Mao bluntly about the kinds of ideas and expectations he had brought with him. With great caution, Mao replied that for substantive discussions of state affairs he would want to summon Zhou Enlai. Stalin had already arranged for a treaty to be drafted, and remarked that if the two of them could not agree on an agenda there was no point in wasting time. Mao stood his ground and insisted that treaties and accords should be final- ized and signed by the two foreign ministers, and not by party leaders. Not accustomed to hearing objections from other communist leaders, Stalin was not amused. Mao's arguments smacked of pernicious "Titoism."

For the next few days, the leader of the People's Republic of China lan- guished in his quarters in virtual isolation, becoming increasingly distressed by his apparent helplessness. For Stalin's birthday celebration he was taken to the Bolshoi theater, seated next to the host, and given a standing ovation by the international elite present. Immediately after the concert, however, he was returned to his secluded residence. Stalin, it appeared, had resolved to teach him still more humility. Thereafter, with the exception of several brief visits by Molotov and Mikoyan, Mao spent endless hours watching Soviet movies, sometimes in the company of the watchful Ivan Kovalyov. In 1956, Peng Zhen described this time in the following manner: "While in Moscow, Mao had nothing to do except eat, sleep, and use the bathroom." The latter proved particularly bothersome: having been accustomed to "Asian- style"(Turkish) toilets, Mao was very uncomfortable using those in Moscow. He also hated Russian food. Twice Stalin called him on the phone to inquire whether he had changed his mind regarding the treaty, but to no avail. Mao was stubborn in his refusal to discuss state business in Zhou's absence. He began to wonder whether instead of negotiating a treaty with the PRC, Stalin would simply honor the 1945 treaty with the KMT government. Such a move would have put Mao in an extremely difficult position in Beijing and bring international humiliation to the two-month-old PRC.

Stalin had no such intention. A strong believer in formality, he desired a treaty with the new government, preferably one which would secure greater advantages for the Soviet Union than had the old treaty. Perhaps judging that the contest of wills had gone on long enough, he finally sent Molotov and Mikoyan to visit Mao and assure him that a new treaty would be negotiated, and that Zhou was welcome to come to Moscow and attend to the diplomatic formalities. Mao immediately informed the CCP Politburo about the favor- able turn of events. While Zhou would travel with his team of experts, Mao wrote in the cable, he himself would finally do the sightseeing for which he had hoped: visiting Lenin's mausoleum, and an ordnance factory, the Mos-

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cow subway, and a collective farm of Molotov's choice. He would also travel to Leningrad, the birthplace of the Revolution, and to the Gorki house in which Lenin spent his last days.

The pace of Mao's life began to quicken. He was allowed to give an interview to the Soviet press. The scholarly Yudin, a future ambassador to the PRC, came for lengthy discussions of Marxist philosophy and the perils of "Titoism." One day, Foreign Minister Vyshinsky arrived and suggested that the PRC ought to protest the presence of Chiang's representative to the U.N. Security Council. The Soviet Union would support China's case by boycott- ing the council's sessions. Mao liked the idea, and instructed Beijing to communicate with the U.N. accordingly. He did not realize that the purpose of this gambit was to foment anti-Western sentiments in Asia, rather than to advance China's interests.

Upon his arrival on January 20, 1950, Zhou plunged into negotiations. Zhou came well-prepared, but so was Vyshinsky's team, which, in addition, held most of the trumps. Forever mindful of his image, Mao attended no working sessions, leaving everything to Zhou. Zhou argued tenaciously and scored occasional points, but generally followed Mao's admonition: "if the Soviet side proposes a clause to which we cannot agree, then we shall argue; if it should categorically insist on the clause, then we should acquiesce." In a long conversation with Stalin, Mao and Zhou tried to explain that the treaty must appear "equal" in the eyes of a Chinese people long dominated by foreign imperialism, and that it must reflect the fraternal spirit bonding the two socialist countries. Stalin pointed out that this would be accomplished through the relinquishing by the Soviet Union of its old rights in Manchuria in no more than three years, instead of the thirty-year period cited in the 1945 KMT treaty, and especially by Soviet commitment to China's security. He also reminded his Chinese guests that although the $300 million credit amount might not look generous; Russia was only beginning to recover from wartime losses and could not spare more.

In the end, agreements accompanying the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance came to resemble closely those which the Soviet Union had imposed on the nations of Eastern Europe following World War II. Fearing an outburst of criticism in China and abroad, Zhou requested that the most humiliating agreements be kept secret. To this there was no objec- tion. Stalin then demonstrated that he did indeed place China in a different category than other would-be socialist states by recognizing CCP autonomy in the realm of internal affairs. To that effect, he presented Mao with a stack of Gao Gang's confidential reports proving his treachery, as well as a long report written by Ivan Kovalyov in which he maligned Mao and the rest of the CCP leadership in an attempt to sow seeds of distrust in Stalin's mind. According to a statement made later by a KGB defector, Stalin also gave Mao a list of Chinese communists who had been secretly working for Mos-


cow. To Mao, forever concerned lest Stalin succeed in penetrating the CCP structure, this fraternal gesture may have proved reassuring, unless, that is, he suspected that the list included some of Stalin's actual opponents and omitted a few of his moles. When it came to securing power, Mao was quite sophisticated.

After the signing ceremony of February 14, 1950, Stalin, as a special favor, broke his iron-clad rule and attended Mao's farewell banquet on the neutral territory of a Moscow restaurant. He devoted his parting remarks almost entirely to the evils of "Titoism."

On the way home, Mao had sufficient time to ponder his sobering experi- ences in Moscow, and his own failure to establish an intimate rapport with Stalin. Many thoughts doubtless crossed his mind, but much later, in a secret speech to the 10th plenum of the 8th Central Committee made on September 28, 1962, he reflected upon this time:

Even after the victory of the Chinese Communists, Stalin feared that China would become a Yugoslavia and I would become a Tito. Later on, I went to Moscow in December 1949 to conclude the Chinese-Soviet Treaty of Alliance and Mutual Assistance, which also involved a struggle. Stalin did not want to sign it, but finally agreed after two months of negotiations. When did Stalin begin to have confidence in us? It began in the winter of 1950, when our country became involved in the Resist-America/Aid-Korea campaign--the Korean War. Only then did Stalin believe that we were not Yugoslavia and not Titoist.

KOREAN CRUCIBLE: TEST OF THE ALLIANCE

The paucity of documentation enabling us to reconstruct the events lead- ing up to war in Korea is predictable. The attack came soon after World War II, during a time when "aggression" was a very dirty word. Although the war plan hatched in Pyongyang under Soviet supervision had "counterattack" in its title, outside of the PRC and the Soviet Union no one doubted it was North Korea which initiated aggression on the Korean peninsula during the early morning of June 25, 1950. Communist sources shy away from the topic, for although the Korean War ended in a draw, the entire peninsula was devastated and hundreds of thousands of people lost their lives. Responsibility for this catastrophe was shared by Stalin and Kim I1 Sung, and China was forced to uphold the North Korean "counterattack" twist invented by its allies. To this day, the Chinese deny vehemently that they had anything to do with the launching of the war or even knew Kim's plans in advance. Considering the scale of China's sacrifice, and the international repercussions of the "Resist- America/Aid-Korea" campaign, these protestations are understandable. Thus, it is not surprising that the record of events that commenced with Kim I1 Sung's visit to Moscow in March 1949 and ended in the collapse of the Korean People's Army (KPA) following the Inchon landing remains secret.

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The declassified Soviet Foreign Ministry report to the Politburo CC/CPSU, compiled on Brezhnev's orders in 1966 and acknowledging that the war was launched by North Korea is of course welcome. Although an informative document, it is also self-serving. It says nothing of Stalin's motivations, strategic goals, or reasons for not informing Mao, his recent ally, of Kim's ambitious plans. In fact, there seem to have been no top-level communications between Stalin and Mao until the KPA's crushing defeat in September 1950.

We do have a large number of reminiscences of apparently knowledgeable witnesses, collected meticulously by the authors of Uncertain Partners, or published independently. Unfortunately, many of these witnesses have refused to reveal their names for attribution, and much of their testimony is hopelessly contradictory. Some, like former North Korean generals now residing in the former Soviet Union fill the void in our current knowledge of these events better than others, but forty years is a long time; memories fade, and it is often difficult to verify whether the source was an actual witness or heard of the events secondhand.

Khrushchev's suggestion that Stalin decided to help fellow-communist Kim to unify Korea because he was impressed by the Korean's eloquence is, of course, preposterous. No one has yet asserted that Stalin turned either sentimental or senile in his later years. We can only guess what motivated him. Perhaps he was tempted to make up for the reverses the Soviet Union had suffered in Europe, where the Marshall Plan was in operation and where preparations had begun to admit West Germany into the newly created NATO alliance. In 1949, Stalin's high card had been the triumph of communism in China, and he might have been inspired by the prospect of adding to it a communist victory in Korea, and in the process terminating American presence on the Asian continent. His self-confidence was undoubtedly enhanced by the near-panic caused in Washington by the successful nuclear testing in August. As he told Liu Shaoqi shortly before the explosion, "the Soviet Union is now sufficiently strong not to fear nuclear blackmail by the United States." He also showed Liu a "documentary film" of the explosion before it took place; the origins of this film remain obscure.

It is also possible that a vision of Korea tied to the Soviet Union but independent from China appealed to Stalin on geostrategic grounds. He knew, of course, that the Koreans hated the Japanese passionately, and that neither Hart Chinese nor ethnic Manchurians had any affection for Koreans. Additionally, of all the peoples who came to be ruled by the Soviets after World War II, the Koreans proved the least troublesome. Kim I1 Sung, former captain of a Soviet intelligence unit (the 88th Special Rifle Brigade, stationed near Khabarovsk in the early 1940s) and a proud bearer of the Order of the Red Banner, was approved by Stalin personally to lead the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). Kim was capable, highly intelligent, and known for his devotion to the Soviet Union and its great leader.


To accept the above as a fair approximation of Stalin's thinking is only a beginning. How did this man, known for his caution in world affairs, start the chain of events that culminated in the Korean--and Soviet--debacle? Much of the answer can be found in Soviet ignorance concerning South Korea. South Korea's 200,000 communists, Kim asserted repeatedly, would rise up at the moment of KPA attack, overthrow Syngman Rhee's hated government, and throw out the remaining American advisers. The reality, however, was that the Soviets had no intelligence operation of their own in South Korea. Stalin's representatives in Pyongyang depended entirely upon Kim I1 Sung for their information. While a number of violent uprisings swept across South Korea between 1947 and 1948, all of these were drowned in blood by Syngman Rhee's forces, utilizing the draconian methods of the Japanese colonial police. Rhee's "suppression campaign" had been so successful that it left no one to organize popular support for Kim's "counterattacking" army. Stalin was unaware of this situation, and while Kim may have suspected it, he hoped for the best and assured Stalin of a quick and easy campaign.

Kim may have truly believed that victory would come swiftly. The war plan prepared by the KPA command envisaged a war of no more than four days. This war would end with the victorious seizure of Seoul, after which the communist underground and guerrilla forces in the south would quickly finish the job. This war plan was translated into Russian and reviewed by three Soviet generals. These were all heroes of the war against Germany, but largely ignorant of Asia, sent from Moscow in early May 1950. It took these generals only a few days to refine the plan of operations, have it translated back into Korean (by Yoo Sung Chul, KPA chief of operations, who knew Russian better than Korean), and approved by the KPA chief of staff and Commander-in-Chief Kim I1 Sung. The Soviet-revised plan retained the original expected duration of the war at four days.

Stalin's optimistic reading of the Korean tea-leaves was based upon the assumption that the United States would not come to the rescue of the Rhee regime. How he could assume this is puzzling. We know that Kim was certain of it, and, in any case, felt that a quick communist victory would not give the Americans time to intervene. A guerrilla fighter himself, he apparently gave no thought to a likely impact of U.S. bombing. In general, having spent all his life in Korea, Manchuria, and the Soviet Far East, Kim knew nothing about the world at large; his judgments concerning the potential behavior of the United States were of little value.

Was Stalin so beguiled by Kim, however efficient in running the DPRK he was, as to rely on his reasoning? This is difficult to believe. More likely, it was the case of a massive intelligence failure. Such failures are not rare. According to The CIA Under Harry Truman (recently published by the CIA), on October 12, a mere week before thousands of PLA troops started pouring into Korea, CIA Director Walter Bedell Smith reported to Truman that "bar-

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ring a Soviet decision for global war," Chinese intervention in Korea for the remainder of 1950 was "improbable." But American intelligence-gathering in North Korea and China at that time did not exist. Stalin, who had a supposedly omniscient and sophisticated network of spies in the United States, among whom were the fabled and excellently positioned British moles, had no excuse for being surprised by Truman's energetic response to the communist attack. Apart from the spies, there were also many well-placed friends and well-wishers who should have warned the Soviets that Truman was a great believer in the power of the atomic bomb (he had about 50 of them in his arsenal), that he was superbly self-confident, and that he might seize upon the aggression in Korea to whip up public opinion and translate the latent American anti-communism into a holy crusade.

As it was, Stalin was so shaken by the sudden outburst of Truman's militancy that he could only try to distance the Soviet Union from the war, launch a worldwide propaganda campaign against American intervention, and pray to Karl Marx that Kim I! Sung would expeditiously defeat the enemy and unify Korea.

What about Mao Zedong's role in the Korean drama? At the beginning, he had none. Of course, there were Korean units in the PLA and a "Yan'an faction" of Korean communists. Mao knew that during the years of anti- Japanese resistance in Manchuria, Kim I1 Sung made many friends among PLA commanders, and that in the course of the mass demobilization under- taken late in 1949, thousands of Koreans were sent home. Mao probably also authorized a transfer of one fully equipped PLA Korean division requested by Kim in January 1950.

At the same time, the Korean peninsula, controlled as it was by the Soviets and the Americans, remained on the periphery of Mao's vision. If Stalin broached the subject of liberating Korea in one of their talks in Moscow-- and there is no record of this--it probably was in the most general of terms. If told of Kim's desire to rid his country of Rhee's reactionaries and Japanese collaborationists, Mao could only commend him for pursuing such a worthy goal. We ought to remember, however, that at the time of Mao's visit, Stalin himself had not yet decided whether to give Kim the green light or not, while Mao's interest focused on liberating Xinjiang, Tibet, and, above all, Taiwan. Korea, to him, was indisputably a Soviet responsibility.

Stalin authorized the Korean "counterattack" in April 1950, during Kim's secret visit to Moscow, but made it contingent upon Mao's approval. This was probably in order to make the Chinese shoulder the blame in case some- thing went wrong, rather than out of international solidarity. Peculiarly, instead of eliciting Mao's consent directly, Stalin told Kim to go to Beijing and obtain Mao's blessing personally.

Shortly after his return from Moscow, Kim I1 Sung did as he was told. He went to Beijing, was received by Mao, and informed him of his intention to


liberate Korea. Although by then preparations for the attack were in full swing, Kim was not specific. As a former intelligence officer, he believed in keeping important things secret, and since the element of surprise was essen- tial for the invasion's success, he probably calculated that the less said, the better. In addition, had Mao known that the war would start in five weeks, he could have reacted more cautiously; as it was, Mao warned Kim that the United States might intervene, a possibility he himself had considered in planning the reclaiming of Taiwan. We do not know whether Kim reported to Stalin his conversation with Mao, or even whether Stalin was curious to know about it. Such Byzantine ambivalence on the eve of the war seems eerie; we need to know more in order to comprehend Stalin's behavior.

The attack began at dawn on Sunday, June 25. The KPA quickly overran the feeble South Korean defenses and seized Seoul three days later. Then it paused, waiting for the expected uprising of 200,000 communists. It did not materialize. Since no one had foreseen such a contingency, Kim, after con- suiting with his team of Soviet advisers headed by General V. N. Razuvayev, ordered his troops to resume the offensive, this time without any war plan. Yoo Song Chol, the KPA chief of operations, relays that thereafter each of the KPA divisions advanced "simply pushing southward on its own," pursuing the retreating and disintegrating South Korean and American forces.

Truman's decision to authorize General MacArthur to use air and naval power, and to transfer to Korea combat units from Japan in order to prop up the Rhee regime introduced a new element in the picture. It was widely praised in the West, where a widespread belief held that the attack in Korea was a mere diversion preceding a major Soviet operation, possibly against Iran. Officially, the United States was engaged in a "police action" to thwart "armed communist aggression in Korea"; similarly, U.N. resolutions only called for an international military effort to assist South Korea against the DPRK onslaught. Such an avoidance of confrontation with the Soviet Union was understandable, for no one was willing to contemplate a general war. Stalin, who was furious at Kim and his own aides for not foreseeing the American intervention, could at least claim that the Soviet Union was not directly involved in the conflict and wanted it to end as quickly as possible, which, of course, was true.

Mao was also angry, not so much at Kim for not telling him enough about his plan to invade South Korea, as at Truman for sending the Seventh Fleet to the Taiwan Strait, thereby nullifying PRC preparations for the liberation of Taiwan. In addition, the United States' reemergence on the Asian scene greatly encouraged anti-communist resistance throughout China, making the functioning of the fledgling PRC government more difficult. To Mao, America remained an enigma, for much of his comprehension of it was derived from his acquaintance with a few friendly visitors, such as Anna Louise Strong (arrested, briefly, in Moscow on charges of "spying").

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Mao was on firmer ground watching war developments in Korea. Discuss- ing the war with his associates, Mao did not hesitate to vent his feelings about Kim. He often referred to him as a "buffoon," totally incompetent to conduct military operations, and he regarded the rapid advance of the KPA down the peninsula as utterly reckless. As he watched the KPA lines of communications crumble under the relentless and unanticipated American bombing, Mao became increasingly concerned about China's own security. On July 13, the CCP Politburo ordered a formation of the Northeast Border Army and a large-scale transfer of the troops from the south of the Yangtze River to Manchuria. After he received his General Staff's analysis of the strategic situation in Korea in mid-August, Mao instructed Zhou Enlai to inform both Kim and Stalin that the Americans ought to be expected to land in force on Korea's eastern shore, most likely at Inchon. The implied advice to take the appropriate defensive measures was not, and probably could not, be heeded. The day of reckoning was rapidly approaching.

Curiously, neither the outbreak of the war, nor the growing tensions in Soviet relations with the United States could spur high-level consultation between Stalin and Mao, the two men who only half a year earlier had concluded the treaty, whose Article I stated: "In the event of one of the High Contracting Parties being attacked by Japan or States allied with it, and thus being involved in a state of war, the other High Contracting Party will immediately render military and other assistance with all means at its disposal." Did the treaty apply to the Korean conflict? The United States was not "allied" with Japan but it effectively ruled it. U.S. armed forces were not formally present in Korea--the U.N. was--but a few "U.N." bombs had already fallen on Soviet and especially on Chinese targets. Stalin surely pondered at what point the PRC, already preparing for a general war, could call upon its ally to "render military and other assistance." A related question was, would a direct cooperation between the PRC and DPRK complicate the Soviet predicament?

Stalin apparently thought so. When Kim requested permission to ask Beijing for 1,500 truck drivers, Stalin reluctantly granted it but wrote that it had to be done "without reference to Moscow." Due to Kim's stalling, the PRC embassy in Pyongyang did not open until mid-August, and Kim flatly turned down Beijing's request to allow a group of Chinese military observers to come to Korea to appraise the situation. Even later in September, as U.S. forces scattered what was left of the KPA, and his government had to evacu- ate Pyongyang, the frantic Kim I1 Sung made only a half-hearted attempt to ask Beijing for help. His total subordination to Moscow had made his relations with China hostage to Stalin's views, and until the DPRK found itself in a state of disaster, Stalin disapproved of closer Korean ties with the Chinese. He himself deliberately and consistently distanced the Soviet Union from the PRC. His perception of Mao's "adventurism" and the shrill anti-American


propaganda campaign of the Chinese media made him worry about a possibility of widening the conflict. As we know, Stalin firmly believed in the inevitability of World War III, dreaded its prospect, and tried to make sure that Mao Zedong would not drag the Soviet Union into an uncontrollable situation.

In any case, the situation subsequently became uncontrollable when, after heavy bombing, U.S. forces landed in Inchon on September 15 and simultaneously broke out of the Pusan perimeter, crushing the badly battered North Korean troops. Within a few days, the KPA ceased to exist. The ruins of Seoul were seized on the 27th, and ten days later U.S. troops crossed the 38th Parallel while the elated U.N. General Assembly voted in favor of unifying Korea. General M. V. Zakharov, deputy chief of the Soviet General Staff and a top-flight strategist, dispatched by a greatly alarmed Stalin to appraise the extent of the calamity, strongly recommended to Kim that in order to forestall total collapse of DPRK he must urgently request Chinese troops.

Kim addressed Stalin first. On September 29 he sent him a long telegram, vividly describing the catastrophe. He concluded the message by stating that "we will not be able to stop the enemy with our own forces" and that it was "very necessary for us to have direct military aid from the Soviet Union." If that proved impossible, Kim wrote, the only salvation was "in the creation of international volunteer units in China and other people's democracies." With Zakharov at his side, Kim ventured to appeal to Beijing directly and even sent two of his lieutenants to plead with the Chinese, but received a cold brush-off.

Stalin responded by addressing his message not to Kim but to his representatives in Pyongyang, Generals Shtykov and Matveyev, and signing it by his "Chinese" pseudonym, Fyn Si. After sternly reprimanding the generals for their incompetence, and proffering some gratuitous strategic advice, Stalin asserted that Kim "had enough forces" and only needed to organize his defense, paying particular attention to the formation of guerrilla units in the south of Korea, and to the mining of all areas where the enemy was likely to attempt to land. At the end of the message Stalin wrote that "with regard to the question raised in the letter of Comrade Kim I1 Sung to Comrade Fyn Si about assistance by armed forces, we consider a more acceptable form of assistance to be assistance by people's volunteers. On this question we must consult first of all with the Chinese comrades." This telegram was dated October 1.

Stalin was in a predicament. He could not let the DPRK be erased from the map and Kim's regime be annihilated without losing his credibility as the leader and protector of the socialist camp. A setback on this scale would cause immense international repercussions, inviting much greater American aggressiveness, a further spread of "Titoism" in Eastern Europe, and ulti- mately resulting in a new "imperialist crusade" against the Soviet Union.

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Stalin could not give Kim's regime the direct military aid he requested, not only because of compelling domestic political reasons, but because it would automatically internationalize the war, pitting the Soviet Union against the United States in a field of battle. Thus "consulting with the Chinese comrades" emerged as the only conceivable alternative. Considering his failure to consult with Mao in advance of Kim's ill-fated attack in June, this was a very distasteful alternative; Stalin no doubt suspected quite a bit of gloating among the Chinese comrades watching the inglorious debacle in Korea.

At this point we must pause in our narrative to take issue with a significant number of China scholars who see in the developments of the first two or three weeks in October the source of the future Sino-Soviet enmity. They maintain that some time in September Stalin (a) pleaded with Mao to come to the rescue of the crumbling North Korean forces and, (b) promised to protect the Chinese troops sent to Korea against the dreaded American bombing. Presumably on the strength of Stalin's commitment the Chinese leaders, so the argument goes, decided to direct the "Chinese People's Volunteers" (CPV) to Korea, only to be confronted with Stalin's sudden change of heart, as he "reneged" on his promise to provide the CPV with air cover. This treachery, many Chinese and some American scholars assert, was the principal cause of the future Sino-Soviet conflict.

Aside from its simplicity, this theory has an additional appeal, for in view of the enormous price China paid for its intervention in Korea, any opportu- nity to spread blame makes political sense to patriotic Chinese historians. It also helps to explain the gist of history to the masses in a nutshell, leaving no room for ambivalence. The trouble with this argument is that the "Stalin reneged" theory does not hold water.

For one thing, no Chinese researcher claims to have read Stalin's message; no one quotes it, or even gives its date. The researchers with access to the archives, with whom the "Stalin reneged" theory originated, have given illu- minating interviews to foreign scholars but for the most part did it anony- mously, not for attribution. In addition, there has been a great deal of dis- agreement among them over the chronology of events, and their versions of the events themselves are frequently in conflict. A few former Soviet officials interviewed by the authors of the magisterial Uncertain Partners, both anonymous and named, tend to claim more actual knowledge than they could possibly have had, at times contradicting their Chinese counterparts and each other.

The key point that needs to be made here is that in all probability Stalin did not beg Mao to come to the Koreans' aid. He did not have to, for already on October 2 Mao Zedong cabled him a CCP Politburo resolution "to send some of our troops to Korea under the name of Volunteers to fight the United States and to aid our Korean comrades." The given reason was that if the Korean comrades were defeated, "the American aggressors will rampage


unchecked once they occupy the whole of Korea. This will be unfavorable to the entire East." The resolution clearly alluded to China's need for more and better military equipment but did not make the sending of the "volunteers" across the Yalu contingent upon getting these supplies from the Soviet Union; and it contained no reference to the air cover supposedly promised by Stalin.

The question of air cover surfaced after Mao had cabled Stalin the Polit- buro decision, which, incidentally, was not that of the Politburo but Mao's own. The Politburo deliberations began two days later and continued, in several extended sessions, through October 8. It is also no secret that a great majority of the participants opposed Mao's intention to enter the war. Among the opponents were Zhou Enlai, Liu Shaoqi, Gao Gang, and other senior comrades. Lin Biao, Mao's choice to lead the "volunteer" force across the Yalu, suddenly declared himself sick. Only the brave Peng Dehuai, Mao's second choice, and Nie Rongzhen, the acting chief of the General Staff, both junior in the CCP hierarchy, stood by the chairman.

Details of the "strategic debates," as they have been called, have not unfortunately been made public, but some of the arguments, presented heat- edly by the opposition, are known: the dire economic state of China, the need to complete the land reform, and the necessity of establishing public order in the countryside where "over one million bandits" roamed around, terrorizing the peasantry. It was repeatedly stressed that the PLA equipment was badly outdated and that the total control of the skies by the American air force would lead to a paralysis, if not to the destruction, of the CPV. Whether it was stated aloud or not, we can also surmise that Mao's opponents resented the idea of pulling the chestnuts out of the fire for Stalin, whom they deemed responsible for the bloody mess in Korea, together with its hapless leader, Kim I1 Sung.

Mao obviously was not amused by such a challenge to his authority, and considered this a massive display of sentiments unbecoming the ranking party, destined to lead to revolution in Asia. Not about to break the link he had so recently forged (or thought he did) with Stalin, Mao nevertheless could not argue the case of aiding Korea on ideological grounds without appearing indifferent to China's own crying needs. Instead, he accused his opponents of dangerously underestimating the threat to China's security. The American aggressors are on the march, he told them. They had declared their intention to conquer the whole of Korea for their lackey, Syngman Rhee, and their troops were already crossing the 38th Parallel. General MacArthur and Washington reactionary politicians are calling for a "rollback" of communism, and China will be their next target. Mao pointed out that once the aggressors would reach the Yalu River, protecting the Northeast would re- quire a huge army on constant alert for an indefinite time. It is better to take the initiative now, while DPRK forces are still offering resistance, he said;

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defeating the aggressor in Korea would be much easier than if the Americans chose to invade China from Taiwan or Vietnam. The PLA in Manchuria is strong and ready to fight, and has the advantage of an industrial base close by to back it up. Finally, as it advances in Korea, the aggressor must reckon with Soviet power, but if China fails to aid the Koreans now, Mao asserted, it would not be able to count on Soviet help if the Americans attacked it.

It was probably in the context of this debate that Mao presented an overly optimistic view of the likely Soviet assistance and exaggerated his influence with Stalin. As almost an afterthought, at the end of the debate, on October 8, he dispatched Zhou Enlai to Stalin, then vacationing at his Black Sea resort but willing to hear Zhou out. Accompanied by Lin Biao, Kang Yimin, and Shi Zhe, Zhou left by train for Port Arthur, and then to Sochi via Moscow by a Soviet military aircraft. Also on October 8, in his capacity as commander- in-chief, Mao formally ordered the CPV to enter the war, simultaneously informing Kim I! Sung about it. Mao did not bother to seek a Politburo endorsement of his decision. Having encountered so much narrow- mindedness and even cowardice among his associates in the last few days, Mao could better appreciate Stalin's feelings about the treasonous "Titoists" ready to capitulate to the class enemy. Once China had entered the war, Mao intended to make sure that his opposition would be effectively muzzled. As the leader of China and the heir-apparent to Stalin, the indisputable leader of the World Revolutionary Movement, Mao Zedong felt that he had chosen the right path.

Zhou Enlai's main assignment was to obtain Stalin's commitment to provide air cover for the CPV forces in Korea; other supplies had already been pouring into Manchuria, clogging the railroads. As a diplomatic gambit, Zhou began by suggesting to Stalin that the CCP Politburo was uncertain about entering the war, for it entailed a risk of a broader conflict and the PLA's strength was no match to that of the United States. Stalin replied that if China expected the Soviet Union to fight in Korea, it would not do it, for such a move would usher in World War III. Zhou countered that without a full backing by the Soviet air force China would not fight in Korea either. That was fine with him, responded Stalin, sensing blackmail; in such a case we ought to be prepared to see the Korean resistance collapse in a week or so, and make preparations to receive hundreds of thousands of Korean refugees pouring into Manchuria; we would also have to think about arrangements for resettling the government of the DPRK, which will be seeking sanctuary.

Zhou was not ready to contemplate such a contingency, and Stalin re- lented. He said that he would supply China with all the military equipment it could conceivably use. As to air cover, it would be provided after the CPV was positioned in Korea but it would not be employed too close to enemy- held areas, to avoid planes being shot down and their pilots captured. This offer was far short of Mao's declared expectations. Upon receiving Zhou's


cabled report, Mao ordered Peng Dehuai to postpone the crossing of the Yalu and entered a three-day period of doubts and hesitations. We do not know what Mao was brooding over; quite possibly plunging the country into the war barely six months after the end of two decades of fighting the KMT was not an easy decision. Mao's old enemy, Wang Ming, wrote in his memoirs (published in Moscow in 1975) about a conversation he had with Liu Shaoqi in Moscow in November 1952, in which Liu attributed Mao's indecision during those days to his fear of ruining forever any chance for establishing friendly Sino-American relations. But Wang is not an impartial source and, in any case, once Mao reinstated his order to the CPV to move into Korea, his hesitations were over. 8

Within one month, thirteen Soviet air divisions were in place, protecting Manchuria and the areas in Korea where the aircraft was in no danger of being positively identified as "Soviet," eventually inflicting heavy casualties to the U.S. Air Force. Direct military aid to China greatly increased while that to the DPRK virtually ceased since the KPA, or whatever was left of it, could be supplied more efficiently by the Chinese. In all, sixty-four infantry and twenty-two Chinese air divisions were equipped by the Soviets during the war. Contrary to widespread belief, Stalin did not extract payments for these deliveries, although they were assumed to be on credit, at discount prices and accruing no interest. The question of repayment was raised much later by Khrushchev, whereupon Mao, not wishing to be obligated to the Soviets (then in the process of betraying the world revolution) ordered settlement of the account through deliveries of goods; in the end China paid about $2 billion.

There is no doubt that the Korean War subjected Sino-Soviet relations to a great deal of strain, as Mao realized that the price for maintaining communist unity was the loss of independence in foreign and security affairs by all members of the "socialist camp," China being no exception. He also discovered that extricating China from Korea was a near-impossible task, and that the increasingly suspicious and possibly senile Stalin seemed to have maneu- vered China into international isolation and into a state of heavy dependence on Moscow. Stalin's revolutionary mantle, as we know, eluded Mao Zedong.

The DPRK part of the story remains largely a mystery. After the Chinese "volunteer" forces took over the fighting in Korea, Kim I1 Sung nominally remained the supreme commander but was in fact ignored by Peng Dehuai and other Chinese officials. Mao had to repeatedly admonish Peng to make sure that the Koreans were treated as brothers and comrades-in-arms. We know nothing about the operational command structure introduced by Peng except that the Koreans manned a small eastern segment of the front without much coordination with the Chinese. Nor do we know anything about the Soviet role in the military operations after the Chinese had assumed the burden of the fighting. Peng obviously maintained liaison with the Soviet air

PETROV 29

force command in Manchuria and with General M. V. Zakharov's headquar- ters in Khabarovsk, but the form and extent of this communication is un- known. In general, available Soviet and Chinese sources avoid discussing relations with Korea. The previously cited Yoo Song Chul, now residing in Tashkent, is informative but, in spite of his evidently good memory, impre- cise. He also mentions in his "testimony" that he is not at liberty to disclose much of his knowledge and prefers to leave further explorations to "historians."

Kim II Sung's very unusual role in the context of Sino-Soviet relations is not easy to explain. Some of it was doubtless due to the DPRK "heroic" struggle against the vastly superior enemy, acclaimed not only by communist propaganda but also throughout anti-colonialist Asia. If Stalin and Mao pledged to Kim to fight the aggressor until Korea was unified but later reneged on it--which is probable--this can partially explain Kim's hold on them. In fact, it was not until after Stalin's death that the armistice could be arranged, at least in part because Stalin wanted to be true to his promise. It is significant that during the subsequent negotiations in Geneva it was Zhou Enlai, not Molotov, who most consistently tried to achieve peace.

Korea, of course, was totally devastated, with uncounted thousands dead and very few buildings in the whole country remaining erect after the years of incessant bombing. The reconstruction aid from China, the Soviet Union, and people's democracies was substantial but unlikely to erase the bitterness of many Koreans, or Kim's own feeling of having been betrayed by his patrons. In his effort to restore the structure of the DPRK government and reinforce his political base, Kim did not hesitate to purge the Moscow- and Beijing- oriented "Soviet Koreans" and "Yan'an Koreans," executing, imprisoning, and evicting them in large numbers with apparent impunity. One can also suspect that after the war Pyongyang exercised a near-veto power upon northeast Asian policies of the USSR and the PRC.

Answers to these many puzzles must wait until the "Korean files" in Beijing and Moscow become available to historians. Barring a major up- heaval, Pyongyang archives seem doomed to remain sealed for years to come.

NOTES

l. P. P. Vladimirov, Osobyi Rayon Kimya, 1942-1945 ("China's Special Area, 1942-1945"), Moscow, 1973.

2. "Stalin's Dialogue with Mao Zedong," Journal of Northeast Asian Studies, vol. X~ no. 4 (Winter 1991-1992).

3. Eight Years in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, January 1950--October 1958 (Beijing: New World Press, 1985).

4. "1 Accompanied Chairman Mao," Far Eastern Affairs, no. 2 (Moscow, 1989). 1 had the ben- efit of reading a private translation of an article by Shi Zhe in Renwu, no. 5 (Beijing, 1985), and extensive references to his book of memoirs and several articles in the recent study by


Sergei N. Goncharov, John W. Lewis, and Xue Litai, Uncertain Partners: Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993).

5. See Yu Song-chol, FBIS-EAS-90-213, November 2, 1990--January 7, 1991. 6. Such as the article by Hao Yufan and Zhai Zhihai, "China's Decision to Enter the Korean

War," The China Quarterly (March 1990). 7. Among these monographs, Chert, Jian, "The Sino-Soviet Alliance and China's Entry into

the Korean War," 1991; Michael H. Hunt, "The Genesis of Chinese Communist Foreign Policy: Mao Zedong Takes Command, 1935-1949"; and Kathryn Weathersby, "Soviet Aims in Korea and the Origins of the Korean War, 1945-1949," 1993 (unpublished papers). Also by Weathersby, "The Soviet Role in the Early Phase of the Korean War: New Docu- mentary Evidence," Journal of American-East Asian Relations, vol. 2, no. 4 (Winter 1993) and "New Findings on the Korean War," in Cold War International History Project Bulletin no. 3 (Washington, DC, Fall 1993).

8. A number of American analysts of the Korean war question the finality of Mao's decision. What puzzles them is an abrupt interruption of the Chinese offensive on November 5. In his exhaustive article "Threats, Assurances and the Last Chance for Peace," International Secu- rity, Summer 1992, Thomas J. Christensen focuses on a three-week lull that followed and speculates that Mao suspended CPV operations in order to see whether the Americans would reciprocate by discontinuing their offensive across the 38th Parallel, thereby giving the peace a chance. He ignores Marshal Nie Rongzhen's explanation (Inside the Red Star, New World Press, Beijing, 1988, pp. 638--640) that Mao ordered a pause, wanting to lure MacArthur into overextending his forces in their drive to the Yalu before delivering them a crushing blow. There might be an additional reason, not acknowledged by Marshal Nie; to give time to the Soviet armored and, especially, air force units to arrive in Manchuria, for in the First Campaign the Chinese suffered heavy losses from American air strikes. Ten tank regiments were in place early in November, and the 64th Independent Fighter Air Corps commenced its operations against the U.S. bombers later in the month, coincidentally with the beginning of the Second Campaign on November 24. Peculiarly, according to Christensen, Soviet contributions to the Chinese war effort apparently did not enter U.S. strategic assumption and calculations; his exceedingly well researched article contains no reference to the Soviet factor in the war.

Editor's note: Texts of several recently declassified documents from the archives of Russia's ministries of foreign affairs and defense, related to the background of the Korean War, will be published in the next issue of the Journal of Northeast Asian Studies.

Mao, Stalin, and Kim il sung: An interpretive essay

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