ABSTRACT
The existing pattern of United States (US)-China-USSR triangular relations is not merely the product of developments since the 1969 Sino-Soviet border clashes, or President Richard Nixon’s visit to China, or the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Rather, it is part of a long and distinctive history of great power involvement in China’s affairs predating the establishment of the People’s Republic. Strategists and statesmen in the West recognize intuitively that China is, to some as yet unspecified extent, a factor in the global balance of power. China’s impact on the global balance is both perceptual and substantive, and in each instance finds its widest expression within the framework of the US-USSR-China triangular relationship. During 1982, several major interrelated trends were discernible in China’s foreign relations. As Chinese power grows, the “united front” aspect of its international strategy will likely be retained, but the operational importance attached to it progressively diminished.
