France, May 14 -- The 1972 meeting between Nixon and Mao marked a turning point, when China, then in the middle of the Cultural Revolution, courted its arch-enemy Washington out of fear of the Soviet Union.

"China had always regarded the United States as the great enemy. But by 1971-72, they were beginning to get more and more concerned about the Soviet Union... There was a feeling in Beijing that China might actually be attacked," said Michael Dillon of King's College London's Lau China Institute.

After 1948, when the US-supported Kuomintang government led by Chiang Kai-shek fled to Taiwan following defeat in the Chinese Civil War by the Chinese Communist Party led by Mao, mainland China "closed [itself] off to Westerners," according t...