I’m finishing the last episode of S5 now, and I’ll be fully caught up on this series. Between Afghanistan and Cambodia, China’s willingness to play ball with the US and its agenda is frustrating to learn.

It leaves me wanting to learn more about the Sino/Soviet split. The way this division manifested really aligned China with some dark forces, it would seem.

I also imagine the process of “normalization” with the US plays a huge role in the way this history unfolds as well.

It makes me wonder what they knew about The Khmer Rouge’s operations. I was left with the impression, based on how the history was laid out, that China was aware of just how aggressive and bloody the Khmer Rouge’s policies were.

Something about that stretch of time between 79 and 89 seems to have resulted in a bunch of weird geopolitical stuff.

Need to finish this episode, I guess.

  • newacctidk [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    21 hours ago

    It is worth noting that China doing this is not an immediate consequence of the split. Afghanistan in late 70s, same with UNITA. Khmer Rouge is earlier, but the other stuff is mostly post-Cultural Revolution shift in policy. Like you said “79-89” which is effectively the fall of the Gang of Four and the ascendance of Guofeng and then Deng all the way to the end of the USSR as a stable actor.

    Not to say Mao didn’t make the shift to the US, he and Zhou 100% did, but China going completely off-kilter foreign policy wise really kicks in in 79