ABSTRACT
The People’s Liberation Army as a foreign policy actor The past two decades saw rapid changes in China’s strategic thinking, for two significant reasons. First, the end of the Cold War in the 1990s reduced the possibility of direct state-to-state conflict with Beijing’s then-rivals, including the Soviet Union, with which it had severed all political ties in the 1960s. As well, Beijing was in a better position immediately following the Cold War to address lingering border disputes, including with the former USSR, Vietnam and to a degree with South Asia. During this period, Beijing suddenly found itself the beneficiary of a “peace dividend” permitting it to focus on mending relations with many of its neighbours in the former Soviet regions as well as in East, Southeast and South Asia. By the late 1970s China had already begun to lose interest in exporting its revolutionary thinking abroad, a policy frequently attempted under Mao Zedong, and by the 1990s Beijing was in a stronger position to redefine itself as a partner in Asia as opposed to a potential hegemon.
