From the 70s to date Pakistan has often been on the centre stage in the global power struggle and its role has always benefited the USA immensely. One such role was played when Pakistan brought about President Richard M Nixon’s visit to China in Feb 1972. Nixon’s visit to China helped USA contain USSR in the cold war era and also effectively neutralised the then growing Chinese nuclear threat.
In 1969, President Nixon decided that direct diplomatic contact with China ought to be established and the adverse relations between USSR and China must be used to the advantage of the USA. By Sep 1970, after numerous efforts made by USA to contact the Chinese leadership had failed miserably, Henry Kissinger decided to exploit Pakistan’s excellent relations with China.
On 25 October, 1970, at the White House, President Nixon formally requested President Yahya Khan to convey to the Chinese leadership that the USA was desirous of establishing full diplomatic relations with China and would like the Chinese to agree to receive a high level delegation from USA. Assurances were also conveyed that the issue of Taiwan will not be raised during the suggested visit. Nixon’s message was conveyed by Yahya Khan to Prime Minister Chou en Lai. Since no reply came through a similar American message was repeated to the Chinese leadership by President Yahya Khan on 5 January, 1971.
Eventually, on 21 Apr 1971, Prime Minister Chou en Lai responded through a written message to President Yahya Khan authorizing him to convey, verbatim, the same to the USA. Pakistan’s ambassador to USA conveyed this particular message to Kissinger on 27 April, 1971. In that message the Chinese Prime Minister had expressed China’s willingness to receive, publicly, a special envoy of the US President such as Henry Kissinger (then National Security Advisor), the US Secretary of State or the President of USA himself in Peking for direct discussions and that the arrangements of any high level meeting could be made through the good offices of President Yahya Khan of Pakistan.
When President Yahya Khan delivered Nixon’s first and personal message to Prime Minister Chou en Lai the latter had told the Pakistani President that China had received many messages from the USA and through many different sources but China had not even responded to them. He said now that President Nixon has sent his message through Pakistan’s President it shall be given due importance and will be considered by himself, Chairman Mao Tse-Tung and Vice Chairman Lin Piao. This illustrates how prominent Pakistan’s role was in creating the USA-China thaw.
Prominent amidst many discreet contacts made between USA and China through Pakistan, in the year 1971, was the secret visit of Henry Kissinger to Peking in July 1971. Henry Kissinger was secretly flown to Peking by Pakistan where he met, secretly, the Chinese top leadership to pave the way for the projected visit of President Nixon to China. Even at the time that Kissinger was secretly flown to Peking the situation in East Pakistan had become perilously precarious. Yet, Pakistan’s leadership failed to exploit its enviable position with China and the USA to stall India’s efforts aimed at the creation of Bangladesh. Conversely, USSR supported India, wholeheartedly.
Eventually, President Nixon undertook a week long visit to China from 21-28 Feb 1972. So important was this visit that Nixon himself had termed his visit “as the week that changed history”. The meeting with Chairman Mao Tse-Tung was dubbed by Henry Kissinger as “an encounter with history”. It was Pakistan that had made this possible when every other effort made by USA had failed. Arguably, Nixon’s visit to China was one of the biggest ever diplomatic successes achieved by the USA to date and Pakistan was a propelling force contributing immensely to that success.
Had the USA-China breakthrough not happened when it did and, instead, had USSR and China become allies in the seventies most of the world today would have been socialist and USA would not have been the sole super power of the world.
Together, China and USSR extended from the Pacific Ocean to the eastern parts of Europe and the Baltic Sea which gave access to the Atlantic Ocean. Who could have then stopped the march of socialism all the way to the American Continent, throughout Asia and most of Europe? President Nixon’s breaking ice with China prevented these eventualities and Nixon’s ice breaking visit to China was made possible, at that crucial point of time, by Pakistan. Then onwards while the USA moved, assuredly, towards winning the cold war and becoming the world’s sole super power China too broke out of its isolation.
In 1971, while Pakistan was playing global power games to the detriment of the USSR the India-USSR combine was undermining Pakistan’s integrity. Was the Indian effort to break up Pakistan in 1971 abetted by the USSR in order to teach Pakistan a lesson for creating a thaw in the US-Chinese relationship? Was our leadership not alive to this situation? Why do Pakistan and the USA not have the best of trustworthy relations in the light of history? Pakistan needs to search for answers as history seems to be repeating itself.
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