Beijing China
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Coordinates: 39°54′50″N 116°23′30″E
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Country
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China
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Settled
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473 BC
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Elevation
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43.5 m (143 ft.)
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Population
(2009)
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22,000,000
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U.S. President Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to the People's Republic of China was an important step in formally normalizing relations between the United States and the People's Republic of China. It marked the first time a U.S. president had visited the PRC, who at that time considered the U.S. one of its staunchest foes. The visit has become a metaphor for an unexpected or uncharacteristic action by a politician.
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| President Nixon and his advisors on AF1 in route to China |
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| Chairman Mao and President Nixon |
WHCA personnel stayed in an approved "hotel"
style building in Hangchou. (That was the proper spelling in that era, along
with Peking instead of Beijing used today. All of the meals were served family
style at round tables seating 8 people and there was a window for each meal. A
small group of Supervisors would remain in work areas when the meal started,
and once the first group was finished, the next group of people would go to the
dining area witch was a screened in Porch. At the end of the hall the screens
had been replaced with temporary vinyl or glass covering. It was VERY cold in
the eating area. The last group of people would arrive, and they would scan all
the other tables. Some serving platters were still piled high with something
that you could not identify. Quick lesson, if the rest of the team left it
there, don't even bother to taste it. We would point to completely empty
serving dishes with just a hint of some kind of sauce and indicate we wanted
more of that item. Still often a mystery, but we avoided tasting a lot of items
that were non-starters. Of course, there was NO selection of anything
"beef" since cows are sacred. We once had a dish that resembled
"beef stew" in a very strange chartreuse sauce, and it was delicious.
We ordered more and it was a big hit. We then asked, "What are we eating?
Found out that I like "Muskrat"! Yak!
Laundry
on overseas trips was always a problem but we had mixed results on the 1972
trips to China and then Russia.
In
China after a few days, we received instructions through the houseboy about
laundry. No problem, just place you items in a small bag in the closet and
leave it at the foot of your bed. Don Cammel decided to test this service, and
took about 3 pairs of underwear, some socks, and a couple of polo shirts and
tried it out.
The
houseboy picked up the bag and took off down the hall on the dead run! It
looked like he was stealing something! No worries, in about 3 hours, he
reappeared with a mess hall tray being held high in the air, and on the tray
were all my very clean, ironed underwear, socks, and shirts! Really the
definition of pardon the pun, but a "Chinese Laundry". Don spread the
word, and the entire team enjoyed the same results without and problems for the
remaining 3 weeks of our stay and we can't say enough good about the service.
Now
let’s fast forward a couple months to our visit to Russia. Don was assigned to
the team in Kiev. he once again was the "test" case for how the
service in Kiev was going to work. The front desk seemed a little confused, but
it was explained to place items in a pillowcase type bag, and drop it off at
the front desk. No inventory was necessary, probably because they couldn't read
English. he took a few items, mostly underwear, and some perma-pressed shirts,
and maybe a pair of dockers type pants. He dropped them off at the front desk
at about 0900, and the next morning at about 1030, the House Boy delivered the
laundry, and it was once again, an excellent experience.
He again spread the word at the joint Count Down meeting with 45 WHCA, 30 USSS, and 15 WH Staff, along with another 20 State Department people. So several people took bags to the front desk, and we quickly received a memo from the Embassy, saying that future drop offs should be in a Conference Room on the first floor. It also instructed that returned laundry would be delivered to a claim room on the top floor of the hotel, turned out to be a large banquet room.
The next day, we looked out our WHCA Office window, and the bags of collected laundry was being dropped down a chute from about the 3rd floor, into a large dump truck! We soon started expecting the return of our laundry.
After
almost a week, they told us it would arrive the next morning. We went up to the
banquet room, and there were rows of tables set up like a flea market. One
table had 400 pair of every brand of underwear known to man, the next table 700
socks not matched to each other, and then of course another table with various
under shirts, yellow arm pit stains, some with holes, some very new, many very
old. Then our regular shirts, slacks, and everything else. It was obvious that
someone had a new "red" sweatshirt and now there was one table of
"pink" underwear. Each of us tried to walk through an identify our
items. Very difficult without names or markings. Really a lot of J.C. Penney
underwear.
This massive pile of laundry remained huge for several days, many items no one wanted to claim in front of others. WHCA did not have any female members at that time, but the State Department and USSS might have had a couple women. They were not pleased about their various "cup sizes" being observed by all of us "dirty old men in training". Remember, they hauled this off in a dump truck, so it was a huge amount of clothing.
The memos from the front desk to go claim your items continued to get frantic as we were closer to visit day. In the end, there was still enough laundry to fill 3 giant boxes like a truck load of toilet paper from Sam's Club. The WH Advance told them to just donate any unclaimed items to charity after we left.
About 5 months later, the WHCA Vault received 3 large boxes shipped through the COMSEC courier service from the US Embassy Annex in Kiev. You guessed it, all the remaining unclaimed laundry from that visit! They once again asked people to come check it out and claim any missing items. After a few months, they were donated to the Salvation Army. Some team members were able to process claims for "lost items" and received a check for replacement. The paper drill was very long, depreciation schedule for used underwear is actually listed in a government document somewhere!
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| The Nixon’s tour the Great Wall of China |
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| The Nixon’s tour the Great Wall of China
At the conclusion of his trip, the United States and the PRC Governments issued the Shanghai Communiqué, a statement of their foreign policy views and a document that would remain the basis of Sino-American bilateral relations for many years. Kissinger stated that the U.S. also intended to pull all its forces out of the island of Taiwan. In the communique, both nations pledged to work toward the full normalization of diplomatic relations.
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| Letter of Appreciation |
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| Certificate of Membership |
Destinations
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Dates
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Purpose
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Agana
Guam
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February 20-21,
1972
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Rest
stop in route to China
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February 21-28,
1972
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State
visit; met with Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou En-Lai.
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WHCA’s Role in the President’s Trip to China
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| Agana the Capital of Guam |
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| B-52 departing Andersen AFB to Vietnam |
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| R-1051 SSB Receiver |
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| URT-23 1KW SSB Transmitter |
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| The WHCA Mini-switchboard |
Guam became the staging area for all equipment and personnel returning from China. Of course, the C-141 Crew was tired of running shuttles from the three trip locations in China to Guam, so on arrival the aircraft was grounded for repairs and for a new crew was assigned to fly us to HI.
The KBCCT flew directly to Guam from China by the most direct route. Some details are fuzzy, but they remembered the Exchange and Snack Bar were closed on their arrival at Anderson AFB, Maybe they were just tired and ready for a good old American Cheeseburger, however the only food available was a mobile "Hot Dog Cart" in front of the Exchange. and it was bought out in record time! Those were some nasty hot dogs, but they ate every one of them! When they left China, it was late in the day then when they arrived in Guam the C-141 when they arrived had to be unloaded and then reloaded on the plane that we had loaded with the equipment from the Guam stop. The long flight from China to Gaum plus the 2+ hour time shift gives you a long very day.
We had been on Guam for 35 days and were all anxious to get home, but the Military Customs Officers on Guam had other ideas they read the rules, and they were NOT going to allow anyone to enter the U.S. territory from the People's Republic of China. Since we were on Guam we were not required to go through customs however by sharing the plane with returning WHCA personnel we had to wait while the Customs Officers contacted the State Department in Washington DC.
The
answer was to defer our customs clearance until we reached the U.S. instead of Guam.
Finally, The plane was loaded, and we were ready to depart Guam for a couple of
days of rest in Honolulu, Hi. We
received clearance and departed
Guam for Hickam AFB, once again we had a major problem with the C-141. All of
the equipment that we loaded on the C-141was deck mounted and not as simple as
moving a dozen pallets, so they wanted to fix the aircraft instead of unloading
it. The Hickam AFB folks were like the people in Guam, checked the regulations
and deferred the Customs clearance to mainland U.S.
We were all ready for some R&R after spending close to a month preparing and executing this very historical event. We stayed in Hawaii for almost three days at the Ala Moana Hotel on Waikiki beach in Honolulu both the El Toro CCT and the Homestead CCT again boarded the aircraft.
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| Ala Moana Hotel in Honolulu HI |
Both the El Toro CCT and the Homestead CCT personal were on the aircraft along with all of the communication equipment from both stops. We landed at El Toro MCAS, and it was very hot and with typical Marine logic, we had to stay on the hot aircraft for almost an hour. While the Customs Agents were discussing the process they needed to follow, the El Toro Team started un-strapping their portion of the equipment, and setting aside all of the PX purchased Sony and Pioneer stereo equipment of this era that they purchased in both Guam and Hawaii. Finally, the El Toro Customs said they would only clear the El Toro team members to remove their equipment and would be getting off the plane at El Toro, so, March 2, 1972 the San Clemente CCT returned to their home base at El Toro MCAS form Guam and the China trip was over.
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| EL Toro Marine Corp Air Station operations |
The rest of the personal and equipment were deferred to the next stop. There were both DC folks bound for Andrews Air Force Base (AAFB), and the Key Biscayne CCT headed to Homestead Air Force Base still on board and they were not allowed to deplane at El Toro.
Because there was a pending visit by the President to Key Biscayne there were helicopters ready to take some of the team members to Walkers Cay. These people basically hugged their families, got a new suitcase, and headed out for the weekend. Bottom line is the people from Key Biscayne never did clear customs, the Customs Agent from Fort Lauderdale called his guy and said, just let them in.
Little did I know that in three months I would be transferred to Key Biscayne and live on Homestead Air Force Base.
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