IV. CHINA AND LATIN AMERICA
IV.1. THE MAO YEARS
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IV. CHINA AND LATIN AMERICA
In the twenty-first century, the primary interest of China in Latin America is economic. It pursues to secure a flow of raw materials and agricultural products required to meet the needs of its fast-growing economy and to feed its population, and to open markets for Chinese goods.
At the same time, the PRC has had a major strategic goal related to its highest national interest: isolate Taiwan in that part of the world, where Taipei has its last stronghold, the most important bloc of allies. In the political-diplomatic field, it also struggles to set the foundations for alliances in world issues that are of mutual concern as developing world’s partners, counterbalancing U.S. and Western influence. Nowadays, Beijing is an advocate of multilateralism and ties with the region serve that purpose. Nevertheless, China has always been very careful not to openly challenge US hegemony in the Western Hemisphere.
Eisenman, Heginbotham and Mitchell state,
“While China viewed the Third World largely through an ideological prism during the Cold War (…), today China is reengaging these regions for highly practical reasons – primarily to find new markets for its goods and to fuel its growing economy’s thirst for natural resources and energy supplies to power its industries and promote its growth.”24
Let’s first review the historical ties of China with LA and the Caribbean.
IV.1. THE MAO YEARS
Latin America has never been a top priority in Chinese diplomacy for a variety of reasons: geographic distance, lack of mutual knowledge about culture and language, scarce people-to-people contacts, little economic weight, and its position in the world order.
This is what Dr. Jiang Shixue, a leading Chinese scholar on Latin America, said in May 2006 on the mutual lack of knowledge of both sides:
24 Eisenman, Joshua; Heginbotham, Eric; Mitchell, Derek (Editors). 2007. P. XV. “China and the Developing World – Beijing Strategy for the Twenty-First Century.” M.E. Sharpe, New York, London.
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“Due to geographical distance, cultural differences, language barriers, etc., lack of understanding between peoples in China and Latin America constitutes another problem. Needless to say, lack of understanding hinders further development of the bilateral relations. It is a pity that Latin Americans do not know much about China, and Chinese do not know much about Latin America either.” 25
Historically, Asia was the region of greatest concern for China. As its natural geographic environment, it’s here where its “political and cultural influence has been strongest”, and the bulk of its trade has been conducted with neighbors. Even though in the post-Mao period China grew into a major global economic and political actor, “its foreign policy was still concerned predominantly with Asia,” says Robert Sutter.26
In the 1950s and 1960s, under the revolutionary leadership of Chairman Mao Zedong, the People’s Republic of China supported movements of ‘national liberation’ in different parts of the world. Chinese diplomacy was very ideology-driven. As we said before, China has always loved to portray itself as a champion of Third World causes.
It often supported Communist insurgent groups in the Western Hemisphere. Beijing coordinated its foreign policy moves with the Soviet Union in Latin America until the Sino-Soviet split in the early 1960s. In the initial decades of the PRC’s existence, Latin America was seen as a tool in the fight against American “imperialism.” Later, it also served to attempt to weaken the Soviet superpower, too.
Mao’s thinking guided foreign policy moves. Mao saw the world in terms of numerous contradictions. There were fundamentally three contradictions: the first the contradiction between two opposed camps, capitalism and communism; the second one takes place between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in capitalist countries; and the third one is the contradiction between oppressed nations and imperialist states. Thus, in Mao’s logic, Sino-Latin American policy was based on the idea that the United States and the Soviet Union would contend over spheres of influence from Europe to Latin America, Asia and Africa.27
25 Jiang, Shixue. 2006. “Latin America: China’s Perspective.” Interview published in Latin American Business Chronicle on May 8, 2006. Found in Jiang’s blog: http://blog.china.com.cn/jiangshixue/art/862362.html.
26 Sutter, Robert. “China’s Regional Strategy and why it may not be good for America”. P. 289. In the book “Power Shift – China and Asia’s new Dynamics.” 2005. Shambaugh, David (editor). University of California Press.
27 Xiang, Lanxin. “An Alternative Chinese View”. In Roett and Paz, 2008, p. 46.
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30 The revolutionary regime of Havana established diplomatic relations with the PRC in 1960. Cuba was then the only country that had diplomatic ties with Beijing. The PRC had showed its early support for Cuba after Fidel Castro’s 1959 victory, and it continued to do so until the split between Moscow and Beijing forced Castro to distance himself from the Chinese.
When the American Marines disembarked and occupied the Dominican Republic in 1965 following an internal political crisis, Mao condemned the action in strong terms.28
When the failed, US-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion took place in April 1961 in Cuba, the Beijing authorities denounced it with a strongly-worded statement. In 1964, Mao angrily condemned the US actions in the Panama Canal Zone (then guarded by American Marines) during the riots following an incident involving the flag and American citizens, and which ended with 20 deaths, most of them Panamanian. The Chairman also expressed his solidarity with the Panamanian people’s struggle.29
In December 1970, Chile, ruled then by a leftist president, socialist Salvador Allende, established diplomatic ties with the PRC, becoming the first South American country to break with the ROC and recognize the PRC.
Nevertheless, it could be said that Mao’s revolutionary policy toward Latin America was a failure. Most Latin American governments were conservative; they were often military dictatorships, and close US allies. Regional elites are traditionally very conservative, strongly anticommunist, and they were (and continue to be) very pro-American, conscious of the fact this has been the US traditional “backyard.” Most guerrilla movements were either defeated or neutralized. Chile’s Allende was overthrown in 1973 by a military, CIA-inspired coup and even Fidel Castro had to choose Moscow’s side when the Sino-Soviet split became firm.
28 He, Li. 2009. “Latin America and China’s Growing Interest.” Pp.195-196. In the book “Managing the China Challenge – Global perspectives.” Zhao, Quansheng and Liu, Guoli (editors). 2009. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, London and New York.
29 Jiang, Shixue, 2008. “The Chinese Foreign Policy Perspective.” P. 29. In Roett, Riordan and Paz, Guadalupe (editors), 2008. “China’s Expansion into the Western Hemisphere – Implications for Latin America and the United States.” Brookings Institution Press, Washington D.C.
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31 Australian author Joseph Camilleri says that “by the mid-1960s, the Chinese objective of promoting the broadest possible united front against US imperialism and Soviet revisionism had suffered several notable reverses [in different regions]”. He adds,
“Apart from these disappointments, China’s leverage and degree of involvement remained extremely limited in many parts of the Third World, notably in Latin America where most communist parties tended to be weak, ineffective and pro-Soviet. In spite of China’s skillful propaganda campaign aimed at discrediting Soviet actions in Cuba, in particular [Nikita] Khrushchev’s retreat under during the crisis of October 1962, Castro continued to depend on Soviet aid and to resist Chinese attempts to create an anti-Soviet faction within Cuba. For the most part, Peking was content to highlight the revolutionary sparks that surfaced from time to time in response to the oppressive to the political and economic conditions characteristic of most Latin American nations. But, aside from the benefit of her advice, there was little that China could contribute to the struggle of these diverse but scattered elements striving to undermine the status quo.”30