This book addresses a central question about the Cold War that has never been adequately resolved. Why did the United States go to such lengths not merely to "contain" the People's Republic of China but to isolate it from all diplomatic, cultural, and economic ties to other nations? Why, in other words, was American policy more hostile to China than to the Soviet Union, at least until President Nixon visited China in 1972? The answer, as set out here, lies in the fear of China's emergence as a power capable of challenging the new Asian order the United States sought to shape in the wake of World War II. To meet this threat, American policymakers fashioned an ideology that was not simply or exclusively anticommunist, but one that aimed at creating an integrated, cooperative world capitalism under U.S. leadership—an ideology, in short, designed to outlive the Cold War.In building his argument, James Peck draws on a wide variety of little-known documents from the archives of the National Security Council and the CIA. He shows how American ofï¬cials initially viewed China as a "puppet" of the Soviet Union, then as "independent junior partner" in a Sino-Soviet bloc, andï¬nally as "revolutionary model" and sponsor of social upheaval in the Third World. Each of these constructs revealed more about U.S. perceptions and strategic priorities than about actual shifts in Chinese thought and conduct. All were based on the assumption that China posed a direct threat not just to speciï¬c U.S. interests and objectives abroad but to the larger vision of a new global order dominated by American economic and military power. Although the nature of "Washington's China" may have changed over the years, Peck contends that the ideology behind it remains unchanged, even today.
ISBN-13: 9781558495371
Media Type: Paperback
Publisher: University of Massachusetts Press
Publication Date: 09-26-2006
Pages: 352
Product Dimensions: (w) x (h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range: 18 Years
Series: Culture and Politics in the Cold War and Beyond
James Peck is director of the U.S.-China Book Publication Project. He lives in New York City.
What People are Saying About This
Chalmers Johnson
China is the subject matter of this book, but it is also the focus used by the author to analyze and dissect internal, highly classified American ideological explanations and justifications for its evolving strategies toward the entire 'communist bloc' throughout the Cold War.... Above all, Peck's study shows us the roots of American 'globalism' — its tendency to see the entire world as a single chessboard, much as the Marxist-Leninists did, rather than to deal discretely with different situations.
