After visiting Nikita Khrushchev, just before dawn Mao saw a familiar figure appear before him. Looking closely, he exclaimed, “Isn’t that Brezhnev?”

Brezhnev approached and greeted Mao first: “Hello! Thank you for coming such a long way to see me, and for bringing flowers.”

Mao replied: “I never met you while I was alive, but in China everyone was familiar with you. In 1964, when you removed Khrushchev from office, Liu Shaoqi, Zhu De, Zhou Enlai and I jointly sent you a telegram congratulating you on becoming General Secretary. You and Alexei Kosygin replied together to express thanks. I then stopped the high-profile criticism of the Soviet Union from the previous years. I decided to send Zhou Enlai to Moscow, leading a Party and government delegation to attend the 47th anniversary of the October Revolution, to test your policy toward China.

“But your defense minister, Rodion Malinovsky, in a toast said to Zhou Enlai: ‘We have removed Khrushchev; you should remove Mao Zedong so that our two countries can normalize relations.’ Zhou told me this, and of course I was very unhappy.”

Brezhnev said: “Yes, I did want you to step down. In 1963 you continuously published the ‘Nine Commentaries,’ calling the Soviet Union revisionist and trying to discredit us completely. How could I get along with you? If you stepped down, Sino-Soviet relations would have eased.”

Mao replied: “My line differed from Khrushchev’s. But since you removed him, couldn’t we have made a fresh start?”

Brezhnev said: “I retained at least half of Khrushchev’s reforms and opening policies. I largely preserved his attitude toward China. I only partially restored Joseph Stalin. Yet you said I was Khrushchev without Khrushchev and still revisionist. How could there be a new beginning? In fact, Khrushchev treated you quite well. He visited China three times in ten years and gave you far more assistance than Stalin ever did. I governed for eighteen years; you never invited me, and I never once went to China. Compared with Stalin, I found you even more rigid and increasingly leftist. How could we get along?”

Mao said: “I understand your attitude. Since you did not want to get along with me, I continued criticizing your revisionism and decided to show it through action—by launching the Zhenbao Island incident.

“The Sino-Soviet border stretches 7,000 kilometers. Since relations deteriorated, friction was constant. I chose to fight at Zhenbao Island, an uninhabited island in the Ussuri River, located on China’s side of the main channel’s centerline. On March 2, 1969, our troops ambushed a Soviet patrol, killing thirty-two Soviet soldiers. We also suffered dozens of casualties. On March 14, you brought in heavy artillery and tanks and launched a much larger battle at night. Soviet missiles struck twenty kilometers inside Chinese territory. The Soviet side reported sixty deaths; China reported eight hundred. American intelligence analysts said the Chinese side of the Ussuri River was pockmarked with shell craters like the surface of the moon. You were clearly serious.”

Brezhnev replied: “As you once said, ‘If others do not offend me, I will not offend them; if they offend me, I will certainly respond.’ I was merely reciprocating.”

Mao said: “Your fierce counterattack shocked me. I feared a Soviet invasion and spoke internally about the possibility of you ‘striking in.’ I immediately ordered: ‘Stop fighting.’ Even when Soviet forces later bombarded Zhenbao Island, I did not retaliate. When we saw Soviet troop movements toward the island, I instructed the Foreign Ministry to inform you that China was prepared for diplomatic negotiations. I most feared you would launch a sudden attack while we were convening the Ninth Party Congress in Beijing. Security was extremely tight; delegates were confined, phones removed, curtains drawn, and routes carefully concealed.

“On August 13, in the Tielieketi region of Xinjiang, you sent large numbers of tanks and armored vehicles deep into Chinese territory and wiped out a Chinese border unit. You even considered using nuclear weapons to strike China’s nuclear facilities and consulted the United States about its attitude. I was deeply worried and broke my previous policy of avoiding high-level contact. I agreed to let Kosygin stop in Beijing in September 1969 after attending Ho Chi Minh’s funeral. Zhou Enlai met him at the airport and directly raised the issue of a possible Soviet nuclear strike. He did not obtain a guarantee. A week later, Zhou wrote again asking for confirmation that both sides would not use nuclear force against each other. The Soviet reply deliberately avoided confirming this understanding. It was the United States that helped us. America opposed your nuclear strike and said it would not stand aside. Only then did you stop.”

Brezhnev said: “Of course we had to consider America’s attitude. If the United States had said it was an internal matter of the communist camp, I could have acted freely. But since it signaled intervention, they effectively saved you. If I had ignored them and they retaliated, we could not have borne it.”

Mao said: “Even so, I still did not trust you. On October 18, when the Soviet delegation came to Beijing for border negotiations, I feared the plane might carry atomic bombs instead of negotiators. Before its arrival, I left for Wuhan, and Lin Biao went to Suzhou. Zhou Enlai stayed in Beijing and moved into a nuclear-proof military command center in the Western Hills until February 1970.

“For nearly four months, the entire Chinese army entered emergency combat readiness. We evacuated 900,000 people, 4,000 aircraft, and 600 naval vessels. In Zhongnanhai we dug massive nuclear shelters connected by secret tunnels. I called on the whole nation to ‘dig deep tunnels.’ The cost was enormous. A small test at Zhenbao Island caused tremendous turmoil. I also accelerated Third Front construction to prepare for nuclear war.”

Brezhnev said: “Your thinking was outdated. Modern nuclear war makes no distinction between front lines and rear areas. Your underground shelters would have been prime targets. A deep-penetration nuclear missile would destroy everything. Perhaps only America’s airborne command center could escape tracking. If I wanted safety, I would head to the Arctic Ocean; if you wanted safety, perhaps the Himalayas—if you did not wish to disappear from the Earth.”

Mao asked: “During your years in power, you competed with the United States in nuclear arms. Why did you not surpass them?”

Brezhnev replied: “During my tenure, our national strength greatly increased, living standards improved, and at one point our number of nuclear warheads even exceeded America’s. But the economic burden became too heavy. The inefficiency of our communist system could not match the capitalist system. People began to complain. The ten-year war in Afghanistan drained us. By the end of my life, decline had begun. I still could not outmatch the United States. Before my death, I had already begun to reconsider, including improving relations with China.”

Mao said: “I value your final efforts to improve relations with China. That is why I came to lay flowers for you. Your governing experience is very valuable and worth careful study.”

Brezhnev said: “Thank you for your evaluation, and thank you for the flowers.”

Brezhnev rose to bid farewell. Mao saw him off as he gradually disappeared.

NEXT: 15. Enver Hoxha (1908–1985)