ABSTRACT

The United States desire to exploit the division between the People Republic of China (PRC) and the Soviets, deferred to the American public and Congress' fixation of anything that was 'red' was evil, and its commitment to the Kuomintang (KMT) in Taiwan. The accusations of the PRC's potential emergence as a 'great power' have set in motion a call for preventive measures against the PRC and possibly against the Chinese race in general. Certainly in statements during the 1950s and 1960s, the PRC rather than the Soviet Union was more explicit in its support for armed struggle in the Third World, and indifferent towards the consequences of nuclear war with the US Thinking of international conflicts as clashes of civilisations involves a grand and dangerous simplification of source of war complicated and often obscure interactions. The power and roles of the different parts of the state remain poorly defined and political institutions designed to resolve conflicts remain inadequate or non-existent.