་་
CONFIDENTIAL
-
10
a result of American failure to show restraint. China therefore hoped the United States would show restraint in INF deployment and would make efforts to reach agreement with the Soviet Union.
32. The Prime Minister pointed out that the superpowers were fundamentally different. The Soviet brand of communism, unlike any other political system, had world domination as its objective, which it sought through the threat posed by the great forces at its command, through active subversion and through the use of proxy forces such as the Cubans. The United States on the other hand used its strength solely for defence. Despite having for years had a total monopoly on nuclear weapons, the United States had at no stage used that power to extend its territory.
33.
She continued that nuclear weapons, by their horrific power, had provided a kind of security that did not exist before, provided no nation obtained a means to knock out another's nuclear weapons. The current escalation was because each side felt that the other might first develop such a capacity and so upset the balance. The Prime Minister said one of her tasks was to explain to the Soviet Union that the United States was not seeking superiority but that balance could be upset if one side got so far ahead that the other felt insecure. Another task was to convince the Soviet Union that the West was sincere in wanting genuine disarmament. This could not be achieved without other measures to relax tension and build confidence. the Prime Minister concluded by emphas- ising that world security would not be helped by an agreement which merely resulted in the relocation of existing Soviet nuclear weapons.
34.
Premier Zhao replied that China'a views on the nature of the Soviet knion were identical to ours. He had made his point about the escalation of the arms race against the back- ground of a new posture on the part of both the Soviet Union. and the United States. In the 70s it had been the Soviet Union that was increasing its armaments, but now the situation was different, particularly after the United States deployment of the first INF in Europe. It was in that context that he had said the United States should show restrainț. He asked the Prime Minister to convey his greetings and regards to President Reagan and to say that China sincerely hoped to see the development of healthy Sino-US relations on an enduring and steady basis and hoped that in the President's second term there would be further development of existing relations on the basis of the three joint communiques.
35.
On Sino-Soviet relations Premier Zhao said that the situation was unchanged. Progress depended on the removal of the three obstacles. No progress had been made in this respect either at the Foreign Ministers' meeting at the UN or at the most recent round of normalisation talks. But exchanges in the economic, technological and cultural fields had increased
CONFIDENTIAL
/ and