The Korean War in World History

3. In the Name of Revolution: China's Road to the Korean War Revisited

Chapter 3 In the Name of Revolution China's Road to the Korean War Revisited CHEN JIAN When China entered the Korean War in October 1950, the newly established People's Republic of China (PRC) had just celebrated its first anniversary. Mao Zedong's revolutionary regime faced enormous challenges at home and abroad, having to deal with such problems as achieving political consolidation, rebuilding a war-shattered economy, and finishing reunification of the country by "liberating " Taiwan, which was still under the control of the Guomindang (GMD or the Nationalist party). Why then did the Beijing leadership decide to send troops to Korea? How was the decision made? What were the immediate and long-range causes leading to Beijing's decision to enter the Korean War? How should the significance of Beijing's participation in the war be evaluated? Using newly available Chinese and, to a certain extent, Russian language sources, I will try to synthesize my answers to these questions in this essay.! "Beating American Arrogance" In analyzing Beijing's reasons for entering the Korean War, previous scholarship usually followed a "China under threat" thesis, emphasizing that Beijing's decision on intervention was a response to the threat to China's "vital security interests" caused by u.s.! UN forces' aggressive advance toward the Yalu River in the wake 93 94 In the Name of Revolution of the Inchon landing.2 While it is apparent that the defense of China's physical safety represented a crucial element in Beijing's decision to enter the Korean War, the reasons behind China's intervention were much broader and more complicated than the simple defense of China's northeastern border. In a deeper political sense, China's intervention has to be understood in terms of Mao Zedong's determination to create new momentum for pushing forward his "continuous revolution" and to defeat "American arrogance." In retrospect, three fundamental and interrelated rationales shaped the PRC's foreign policy and security strategy: the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s revolutionary nationalism, its sense of responsibility toward an Asia-wide or worldwide revolution, and its determination to maintain the inner dynamics of the Chinese revolution after its nationwide victory. Beijing's management of the Korean crisis cannot be comprehended properly without an understanding of these rationales and the mentality related to them. Mao Zedong and his fellow CCP leaders grew up in an age when China had lost the status as the "Central Kingdom" and even the very survival of the Chinese nation was at stake. Their conception of China's national interests was deeply influenced by the perceived unequal exchanges between China and the foreign powers during modern times; and their commitment to a Communist revolution in China grew out of the belief that the revolution would revitalize the Chinese nation while at the same time leading to the destruction of the "old world," and that China's position as a "Central Kingdom" would be revived in the emergence of a "new world." Mao's conception of revolution reflected his generation's emotional commitment to China's national liberation, as well as of their longing for China to take a central (but not dominant) position in world politics.3 Indeed, underlying this revolutionary nationalism was the unique Chinese "victim mentality"-during modern times, the Chinese people's perception of their nation's position in the world was continuously informed by a profound conviction that it was the political incursion, economic exploitation, and military aggression by foreign imperialist countries that had undermined the historical glory of Chinese civilization and humiliated the Chinese nation. 4 Consequently, a victim mentality dominated the Chinese conceptualization of China's relations with the outside world. 5 As far as China's relations with the United States are concerned, Chinese revolutionary nationalism, reinforced by the Chinese "victim CHEN Jian 95 mentality," led Mao and his comrades to emphasize persistently that the Chinese Communists would not tolerate Washington's disdain of China and the Chinese people. While Washington's hostility toward the Chinese revolution offended Mao and his comrades, the perceived American disdain for China as a weak country and the Chinese as an inferior people made them angry. Mao and his fellow CCP leaders were more than willing to challenge this"American arrogance."6 Closely related to the CCP's revolutionary nationalism was the Chinese Communists' lofty aspiration to promote an "Eastern Revolution " or even a world revolution that would...