Principles and Heresies

If it were not so serious, there would be a rich element of Gilbert and Sullivan farce in the most recent chapter of American-Chinese relations. A table tennis team, complete with purple bell-bottomed hippie, is invited to China, is decorously defeated by the Chinese, has an audience with Chou En-lai in the Great Hall of the People. Presto! President Nixon relaxes a twenty-year-old trade embargo, to say nothing of lessening a whole series of regulations directed against Communist China. The air and the press are full of rumors of impending recognition. The New York Times devotes massive sections of its precious space to “Chinese-American friendship,” including an ineffable article on American-Chinese relations since 1784.

But the matter is serious—and not only because of the highly doubtful wisdom of steps that can only lead to strengthening the economy of a sworn enemy of the United States. It is perhaps even more serious because of the manner in which it is done, the presuppositions about international affairs that that manner reveals, and the effect upon the mood of the American people at a time when our defenses are in desperate need of strengthening. This diplomacy by table-tennis reduces matters of life and death for our country to the level of Madison Avenue public relations. As a friend of mine said: “If they’d invited the Mets or the Knicks, Heaven knows what concessions we would have made.”

FS

About the Author

Frank S. Meyer

Frank S. Meyer was a senior editor of National Review.

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If it were not so serious, there would be a rich element of Gilbert and Sullivan farce in the most recent chapter of American-Chinese relations. A table tennis team, complete with purple bell-bottomed hippie, is invited to China, is decorously defeated by the Chinese, has an audience with Chou En-lai in the Great Hall of the People. Presto! President Nixon relaxes a twenty-year-old trade embargo, to say nothing of lessening a whole series of regulations directed against Communist China. The air and the press are full of rumors of impending recognition. The New York Times devotes massive sections of its precious space to “Chinese-American friendship,” including an ineffable article on American-Chinese relations since 1784.

But the matter is serious—and not only because of the highly doubtful wisdom of steps that can only lead to strengthening the economy of a sworn enemy of the United States. It is perhaps even more serious because of the manner in which it is done, the presuppositions about international affairs that that manner reveals, and the effect upon the mood of the American people at a time when our defenses are in desperate need of strengthening. This diplomacy by table-tennis reduces matters of life and death for our country to the level of Madison Avenue public relations. As a friend of mine said: “If they’d invited the Mets or the Knicks, Heaven knows what concessions we would have made.”