Knüsel's book makes a welcome contribution to the study of Chinese–European relations during the Cold War. It is based on deep research into Swiss and Chinese archival sources and a solid grasp of the secondary literature on China's foreign relations and Cold War history. It is clearly written and well organized.
The Swiss role in China's policy toward Europe during the Cold War remains a little-studied subject. Knüsel's study of Chinese–Swiss encounters from the 1950s to the mid-1970s fills a gap in the Cold War historiography about the unique position Switzerland occupied in China's approach toward Europe. With fascinating details, Knüsel reveals that the People's Republic of China (PRC) strategically used Switzerland as a hub for its political, economic, cultural, and intelligence activities in Europe during the first two decades after its founding in 1949. In the wake of the improvement of China's ties with the United States and Western Europe in the early 1970s, however, Switzerland's function as Beijing's European headquarters diminished. By examining the nature and scope of Chinese political, economic, propaganda and intelligence operations in Switzerland, Knüsel enriches our knowledge about the making and implementation of Beijing's foreign policy, especially toward Western Europe.
In analyzing the cooperation and conflict between China and Switzerland, Knüsel usefully applies Federico Romero's decentralized and heterogeneous concept of the Cold War as “a complex fabric of disparate interactions (local, national, transnational and global) with multiple actors operating in many intersecting fields.” By highlighting the ideas, visions, initiatives, and agency of Beijing and Bern, Knüsel makes clear that post-1945 history was shaped both by the superpowers and by lesser players such as secondary and small countries, supranational groups, transnational movements, and international organizations. While China attempted to establish itself as a major actor in Asia and as a leader of the Communist camp in the 1960s and the Third World in the 1970s, Switzerland sought to assert itself as a key neutral mediator between the East and the West. Chinese and Swiss leaders were eager to fill the international stage and leave their imprint in history. If they could not dislodge the two superpowers, they could at least share the stage with them and divert the spotlights to themselves because their statements and actions caught the attention of the world.
Knüsel points out that China initially mistrusted Swiss neutrality and it was only with the 1954 Geneva Conference and China's adoption of “peaceful coexistence” as its official foreign policy principle that Beijing's descriptions of Swiss neutrality improved. The change in China's attitude toward Swiss neutrality reflected the general shift in its policy toward neutralism as a whole during the early Cold War. In the early years of the PRC, Mao's government followed closely Stalin's “two-camp” theory on world politics and opposed neutrality in the East–West conflict. For instance, in keeping with Moscow's line on neutralism, Beijing denounced Indian leader Jawaharlal Nehru as a “stooge of imperialism” and lambasted his suppression of the Indian Communist Party. The post-Stalin leadership in the Kremlin, however, abandoned Stalin's hostility toward neutralism and sought to befriend leaders of neutral countries. Following Moscow's example, Chinese officials reached out to Afro-Asian leaders during the Geneva Conference and the 1955 Bandung Conference. Knüsel's discussion of Chinese leaders’ changing views of Swiss neutralism broadens our understanding of China's “peaceful coexistence” doctrine by demonstrating that the principle was relevant not only to Beijing's relations with Asian countries but also to its interactions with Western Europe including Switzerland.
Knüsel pays sufficient attention to the effects of the Sino-Soviet rift on China's operations in Switzerland. She sheds light on how Beijing compensated its loss of Soviet economic, scientific, and political assistance by expanding its various networks in Switzerland. The Chinese embassy in Bern increased the size, intensity, and reach of its transnational network of embargo goods dealers with a focus on obtaining the material necessary for the construction of nuclear weapons, like high-speed cameras, uranium, heavy water, weapons, and electronic goods.
Knüsel's recounting of Chinese intelligence operations in Switzerland represents a break-through in the scholarship on Chinese foreign policy during the Cold War. Knüsel obtained special access to the archival collections of the Federal Police (Bundespolizei) for her study, which reveals that Chinese diplomats in Switzerland often had an intelligence background and carried out intelligence activities as handlers and agents and that they operated several transnational intelligence networks.
Knüsel's text is marred by a few factual mistakes. For instance, in discussing China's participation in the 1954 Geneva conference, Knüsel writes: “The importance that the Chinese leaders attributed to the Geneva Conference can also be seen in the fact that the Chinese delegation included about 250 people, including Premier Zhou Enlai and Vice Premier Chen Yi, and was overseen by spy chief Li Kenong.” (pp. 41–42) This statement contains two glaring errors. First, Chen Yi did not attend the 1954 Geneva Conference. Second, at the time of that international gathering, he did not serve as Vice Premier. Instead, he was the mayor of Shanghai. He became Vice Premier in September 1954 when he was elected to that post at the First National People's Congress.
Despite these quibbles, Knüsel's volume remains a valuable addition to the study of Chinese foreign policy and Cold War history.
