North Korea and the Sino-American Opening

The Sino-US rappoache ment took the world by surprise, including North Korean leader Kim Il Sung who saw it as an opportunity to move closer to Beijing, so as to achieve his goal of Korean reunification and the withdrawal of US troops from the Korean Peninsula.

According to Bernd Schaefer in his article North Korean "Adventurism" and China's Long Shadow, 1966-1972 (Working Paper #44, October 2004, Cold War International History Project, Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars), Kim hailed Richard Nixon's visit to China as "a great victory by the Chinese people and revolutionary peoples worldwide" and as the "march of the defeated to Beijing."

Portraying the development as an American attempt to back away from a deadend political strategy, Kim also interpreted Nixon's visit as evidence of the accelerating decline of imperialism and the failure of American hostility towards China.

In North Korean lingo, Kim reportedly said: "The US would stumble from defeat to defeat. The Americans attempted to isolate China, they occupied Taiwan and continuously threatened the PRC. But China developed into a mighty anti-imperialist revolutionary power in Asia, and the American blockage came to a shameful end. Nixon's visit to China would now prove the bankruptcy of America's anti-Chinese policy. Just as the United States came to Panmunjom with a white flag after its defeat in the Korean War, Nixon will head to Beijing. His visit will be that of a loser, not a victor. This will constitute a great triumph for the Chinese people and all revolutionary people worldwide. Now the USA will have to withdraw next from South Korea, Taiwan, Indochina and Japan."