Mao proposed sending 10 million Chinese women to US as China has too many women

China’s infatuation with the West started right at the top. Mao Ze Dong’s belief in population control was possibly another import from the West.

Mao Ze Dong With Dwarakanath Kotnis circa 1939; source & courtesy – http://blog.sina.com.cn | Click for image.

Big Trouble in China

Fifty years after the Boxer War, he Communist Party was able to impose its authority on mainland China – ending more than 25 years of civil war in China. China, during this war, went through considerable dislocation.

India medical aid team on arrival in Guangzhou; source & courtesy – cctvpic.com | Click for image.

In 1937, after the Japanese invasion of China, the communist General Zhu De requested Jawaharlal Nehru to send Indian physicians to China. Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, the President of the Indian National Congress, made arrangements to send a team of volunteer doctors and an ambulance by collecting a fund of Rs 22,000 on the All-Indian China Day and China Fund days on July 7–9. He had made an appeal to the people through a press statement on June 30, 1938. In Modern Review S.C. Bose wrote an article on Japan’s role in the Far East and denounced the assault on China. The key element of this mission was it was from a nation itself struggling for freedom, to another nation also struggling for its freedom. The mission was reinforced with Nehru’s visit to China in 1939.

A medical team of five doctors (Drs. M. Atal, M. Cholkar, D. Kotnis, B.K. Basu and D. Mukerji) was dispatched as the Indian Medical Mission Team in September 1938. All, except Dr. Kotnis, returned to India safely.

via Dwarkanath Kotnis – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Dwarakanath Kotnis – before he went to China. Image source & Courtesy – cctvpic.com | Click for image.

Adversity can teach wrong lessons

Over the years after the fall of the Qing dynasty, China’s infatuation with the modern West (in China, earlier the West was India) has only grown. This infatuation has only driven the Chinese to learn the wrong lessons.

One such lesson was on population control – which Chairman Mao himself was an eager convert.

Chinese leader Mao Zedong proposed sending 10 million Chinese women to the United States, in talks with top envoy Henry Kissinger in 1973.

The powerful chairman of the Chinese Communist Party said he believed such emigration could kickstart bilateral trade but could also “harm” the United States with a population explosion similar to China, according to documents released Tuesday by the State Department on US-China ties between 1973 to 1976.

In a long conversation that stretched way past midnight at Mao’s residence on February 17, 1973, the cigar-chomping Chinese leader referred to the dismal trade between the two countries, saying China was a “very poor country” and “what we have in excess is women.”

He first suggested sending “thousands” of women but as an afterthought proposed “10 million,” drawing laughter at the meeting, also attended by Chinese premier Zhou Enlai.

Kissinger, who was President Richard Nixon’s national security advisor at that time, told Mao that the United States had no “quotas” or “tariffs” for Chinese women, drawing more laughter.

But Mao dragged the talks back to the topic of Chinese women.

“Let them go to your place. They will create disasters. That way you can lessen our burdens,” Mao said.

“Do you want our Chinese women? We can give you ten million,” he said.

Another image of India medical aid team with Mao Zedong; image source & courtesy – cctvpic.com | Click for image.

Kissinger noted that Mao was “improving his offer.”

Mao continued, “By doing so we can let them flood your country with disaster and therefore impair your interests. In our country we have too many women, and they have a way of doing things.

“They give birth to children and our children are too many.”

A shrewd diplomat, Kissinger seemed to turn the tables on Mao, replying, “It is such a novel proposition, we will have to study it.”

But Mao again lamented, “We have so many women in our country that don’t know how to fight.

The assistant Chinese foreign minister, Wang Haijung, who was at the meeting, then cautioned Mao that if the minutes of the conversation were made public, “it would incur the public wrath.”

Kissinger agreed with Mao that the minutes be scrapped.

But when Kissinger joked that he would raise the issue at his next press conference, Mao said, “I’m not afraid of anything.

“Anyway, God has sent me an invitation,” said the Chinese leader, who coughed badly during the talks.

Mao died in September 1976. US-China diplomatic relations were restored in 1979.

via AFP: Chairman Mao proposed sending 10 million Chinese women to US: documents.

Letter to Chairman Mao – from 2ndlook

Chairman Mao Sir,

On the eve of your departure to god’s kingdom, you lamented, that China had too many women.

There is good news.

Well! Now, China has fewer women.

Looks like god has been kinder to your country. He has reduced more women than, you Sir, probably wanted.

Fewer than what experts believe China should have. Did you specify exactly how many less you wanted, Chairman Sir.

A wise rishi once told me Be careful with your wishes! Careful with what you wish for and ask from god. He may just decide to go ahead and grant you your wishes.

Anyway, I thought I would let you know. Hope you are having a good time There.

Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai

Best Wishes,

– 2ndlook

---

Related Articles

• US & China: How Will They Engage In The Next 25 Years (2ndlook.wordpress.com)
• China’s ‘naked’ officials (2ndlook.wordpress.com)
• When China Becomes The Biggest Economy? (quicktake.wordpress.com)
• Superpower China: Emerging From 60 years Of American Shadow? (quicktake.wordpress.com)
• Wife of Dwarkanath Kotnis is no more (thehindu.com)
• IHT Rendezvous: The Man Who Stayed Behind in China Comes Forward (rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com)
• #hypocrisy: Clement widely mocked for Twitter communism controversy (news.nationalpost.com)
• In Madam Mao’s Golden Oldies (morningstaronline.co.uk)