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This is the veteran author's third book on China, where, as a career diplomat, he enjoyed three postings. His personal observations and experience and his personal interaction with almost all the leaders of the two countries Mao Zedong, Zhou En Lai, Chen Yi and on the other side Mohammad Ayub Khan, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and Mohammad Ziaul Haq is the main value of this book.
A Pakistani update on Sino-Pakistan Relations has long been overdue, since Anwar H. Syed's China and Pakistan: Diplomacy of an Entente Cordiale (Karachi, Oxford University Press, 1974) was published when the main protagonists of this entente, Mao Zedong, Zhou En Lai and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto were alive and in office. The relations between China and Pakistan have not changed, however, the world around has changed, and even close mutual ties need to be re-stated and re-defined constantly as the surrounding world re-arranges and re-configures itself. Pakistan-China relations, helped by an early Pakistani recognition of the People's Republic of China were established firmly during the Bandung Conference in 1955. Pakistan's founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah had fallen out with Chiang Kai-shek over the latter's questioning of the advisability of Partition, and though a gift of two priceless Ming vases were offered to breach the heal the new country did not hesitate in holding out its hands towards Chiang's rival.
These relations began when Russia and China were formally allies. They peaked when the Sino-Soviet split had occurred, and by the time the 1971 War broke out, Russia and China were outright adversaries. Today, the world has passed from being Bipolar during the Cold War, to being Unipolar after the disintegration of the USSR; and now after the resurgence of China, it is back to the classic Balance of Power equation, as Vladimir Putin clearly spelt out in December 2014.
Russia and China having shed most of their ideological baggage have a deeper understanding of each other now, as compared to the Cold War Era. This time round, it is Russia that is the more pressed of the two Eastern powers ever since conflict in Ukraine broke out. Why this should be so is not apparent as it is not clear why the European Union, faced with the withdrawal of Britain over migrants...