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“We will never forget our old friends.” Chinese leader Xi Jinping greeted Henry Kissinger as an “old friend” during a meeting in Beijing with the former US secretary of state, now a centenary. “We will never forget our old friends and we will not forget your historic contribution to developing Sino-US relations and strengthening friendship between the two peoples,” Xi told Kissinger on Thursday, state broadcaster CCTV reported, quoted by CNN. “China and the United States are once again at a crossroads as to where to go, and the two sides must again make a choice,” the Chinese president said, urging the former secretary of state and like-minded Americans to “continue to play a constructive role in returning Sino-US relations to the right path.”
The meeting took place at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, a diplomatic compound in western Beijing where Kissinger had been received on his first visit to China in 1971, the first US official to visit communist China. Since then, he has returned over 100 times. The veteran American statesman and diplomat promised Xi to efforts to improve mutual understanding between the parties. “The US-China relationship is vital to the peace and prosperity of both countries and the world,” Kissinger said, quoted by CCTV.
“You need your diplomatic wisdom”
“The United States needs the diplomatic wisdom of Kissinger and the diplomatic courage of Nixon in its policy towards China.” Wang Yi, the head of foreign policy of the Communist Party of China, on Wednesday recalled the American talks and policies of the 1970s by welcoming “old friend” Henry Kissinger to Beijing yesterday, who, in the Republican administrations of Richard Nixon and John Ford, played a key role in the rapprochement between Washington and Beijing. And that today, 100 years old in May, he continues to be listened to a lot in China. Kissinger’s realpolitick together with his unscrupulousness in intervening in the world – with political power and even with military force – to protect the interests of the United States, still conquer the top Chinese exponents.
The “decisive” contribution
Wang Yi recalled the “decisive contribution made by Kissinger, even after leaving the American administrations, for the development of relations between China and the United States and in improving mutual understanding between the two countries”. But it is in today’s current situation, in the ongoing economic and political clash between the two great global powers, that Beijing would like to confront the experience of the former secretary of state: on the status of Taiwan, on the technological challenge between chips and national security, on hegemony in the South China Sea, as well as on the war unleashed by Russia in Ukraine, with Beijing’s ambiguous support for Vladimir Putin. And there is no doubt that the elderly strategist of German origins, with his doctrine that has always placed dollars and power before principles and rights (often, as in Latin America, even before international law), has no difficulty in finding common ground with Xi Jinping’s autocratic regime.
“The United States and China should eliminate any misunderstanding, coexist peacefully and always avoid confrontation,” said Kissinger, who also met Chinese Defense Minister Liu Shangfu on Monday.