The Cold War was a time of diplomatic games to get an advantage. Here was a stamp that displayed one of the key turnabouts. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
There are both German and Italian stamps from the 30s and 40s that similarly show Hitler an Mussolini, but face it. Italy was a second string power in terms of military if not cultural power. Stalin and Mao signing a treaty that amounted to an alliance is really much scarier to potential rivals like the USA. Just 5 years earlier, Stalin was our ally against Hitler and in the last days at least against Japan. Two years before China was ruled by the USA allied nationalists. Chinese troops at the exact time were pouring into North Korea and pushing back the American gains in Korea. 6 years after World War II the effect of all this must have been terrifying.
Todays stamp is issue 1L177, a 5000 Juan stamp issued by the Northeast China Postal Service (Manchuria) on December 1st, 1950. It was the last days of Manchuria being postally administered separately from the People’s Republic. The stamp honors the treaty of friendship between China and the Soviet Union earlier that year by showing Mao and Stalin shaking hands. The Northeast China issue is in different colors and denominations from the same stamp issued by the PRC. The 4 vertical Chinese characters on the upper right of the stamp also signify it. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth $29 in mint condition. There are reprints of this stamp that have a lower value, but they are printed on a duller paper.
Manchuria had been occupied by the Japanese during World War II and before. In the late days of the war, the Soviets invaded in order to be in place to take the Japanese surrender. The area had been important to Russia since czarist times as railroad and port access was helpful to a Soviet Far East presence. After taking the Japanese surrender, the area except the needed ports and railway was turned over to Mao’s communist forces. This explains why separate postal administration lasted into the first years of the PRC.
A treaty of Friendship was signed in 1950 was closely modeled on the one signed with the Chinese nationalists in 1946. It replaced that one and had some additional goodies for China. It allowed for the turnover of the Russian railway and the ports of Dalian and Lushun to China. These were some of the last enclaves of European colonialism except for Hong Kong and Macau and getting them back was an important accomplishment. The treaty also provided to China a 300 million dollar loan at a time when civil war recovery and supporting the invasion of Korea was a big expense to China. The treaty ran until 1979 but did not prevent the Chinese-Soviet communist doctrinal split after the end of Stalinism. Deng Xiaoping did not want to extend or have a new treaty with the Soviet Union. He was then anxious to attack Vietnam, a Soviet ally that the treaty would have prevented.
With Chinese troops pouring over the border into Korea pushing back America’s hard won victory over the North Koreans, the effect of the alliance was profound. The American General Macarthur was removed after suggesting a nuclear attack on China was the only military solution to the Chinese onslaught. Instead the line was stabilized into trench warfare very near the original North-South border until a cease fire was finally arraigned in 1953. Chinese troops in North Vietnam in the 60s also kept America from bringing that war to a successful conclusion, showing how important the treaty was. War with China now meant World War III.
Well my drink is empty and I wonder how scary the early 1970s pictures of Nixon and Mao were to the Soviet Union. Very scary I am sure, No stamp of that though, the closest I could find was the Chinese ping pong stamp. Come again for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2018.