The return of panda diplomacy: what it suggests about China-US relations
- Beijing resumes lending bears to US zoos in a soft-power bid to improve ties with Washington
- Earlier withdrawals showed ‘a toughening stance against the United States, intended to ... penalise the increasingly strident hostility of American politicians’, an analyst says
“I have a two-year-old. My son waved as the truck left,” she said, adding that he would be delighted when he found out.
Forget celebrity missions, embassy-hosted parties or other attempts at warming American hearts. Last week, Beijing played its ace card in its bid to rekindle US-China people-to-people relations with the announcement that it was putting its black-and-white diplomats on the job even as some wonder how effective they will be.
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Washington National Zoo’s last giant pandas returned to China amid strained US-China ties
Behind the warm, fuzzy imagery, however, are some careful Chinese calculations on timing and the bears’ expected reception, befitting a country that has used panda diplomacy for centuries to ingratiate itself, reward friends and punish adversaries.
“The Chinese famously tend to take the long view. Pandas are a symbol of their country with a proven record of effectiveness in softening its image and developing foreign constituencies for cordial relations,” said Chas Freeman, a veteran diplomat who interpreted for then-president Richard Nixon during his historic 1972 Beijing trip to meet Mao Zedong.
