Richard Nixon's 'crazy' idea: Make befriending the Chinese Communist Party his legacy

This came as a shock to Kissinger. Nixon ran his whole career as an anti-communist, and China was run by a strong Communist Party. The Chinese had a saying for America: running dogs of capitalism. Their leader Mao Zedong was a totalitarian, revolutionary, hardline Communist.

Kissinger’s deputy, Alexander Haig, remembers Kissinger saying of Nixon, “The man wants to open up relations with China? He must be crazy!”

But Kissinger had orders from the president, and he got to work on one of the most surprising and important diplomatic missions of the last century — a mission that is still playing out today.