Ping pong diplomacy: Time for the rematch

By Gillian Flaccus  |   2008-6-10  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

IT was an unlikely diplomatic tool in the Cold War: paddles and ping pong balls and nine giddy United States table tennis players in a country Americans hadn't seen for decades.

Yet the week of table tennis exhibition games in China in April 1971, helped open China to the world, changed public opinion and paved the way for a groundbreaking visit to China by US President Richard Nixon, who is credited today with restoring diplomatic ties between the nations.

More than three decades later, China and the US will pay homage this week to the now-famous "ping pong diplomacy" with a three-day event at the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace Foundation in Yorba Linda, California, that culminates in a rematch between several of the original - and aging - athletes.

The games also are designed as a tribute to the friendly relations between the two nations today and as a prelude to the Beijing Olympics.

"No one was envisioning that this dramatic trip to China would be a precursor to re-establishing diplomatic relations," said Steve Bull, director of government relations for the US Olympic Committee and a former Nixon aide.

The 1971 invitation from China came during the 31st World Championships in Nagoya, Japan, where the Chinese team was competing for the first time in six years. Just two days later, nine US team members, team officials and two spouses flew to Hong Kong and then crossed into China's mainland, the first group of Americans to visit the country since 1949.

A handful of US journalists were allowed to travel with them. Time magazine called the trip "the ping heard around the world;" Americans became obsessed with the story.

Team member George Braithwaite, now 69, recalled that his passport contained a list of countries that were off-limits to Americans. Before boarding the plane in Tokyo, he said, a US embassy official simply took out a pen and crossed the People's Republic of China off the list.