CONFIDENTIAL
encouraged further.
But even if they are maintained,
Britain will need to look at a closening relationship
with China in a wider international context which
embraces other countries of immediate importance to
the UK. There is no question of undervaluing China's
importance; but we need both to be coolly realistic
and to keep the balance in our overall relationships
right.
3.
Irrespective of the way the Chinese order their
society, there is no alternative to treating as a world
power a country which is a permanent member of the UN,
has perhaps one-quarter of the world's population in a
territory the size of the United States and traditions
and resources which make her formidable even against
the background of enormous demographic problems.
Given the great differences in China's culture and
her history of self-containment, it is not surprising
that the West's, and Britain's, relations with her in
the past have often been unhappy.
It is not long
since China effectively renounced an alliance with the
country which is still our main adversary.
Memories
of Korea, the Sino-Indian War and Vietnam die hard;
you yourself need no reminding of the horrors of the
Red Guard years.
This makes the friendlier face
which China is now turning to the West the more welcome
and I believe we should respond to it, while remembering
that profound differences between China's view of the
world and our own are likely to persist.
As I see
/it "friendship"