In September 1972, the Japanese prime minister Kakuei Tanaka came to Beijing to normalize relations with China. During the final round of talks, Zhou Enlai wrote out six characters from the Analects and gave them to Tanaka: 言必信，行必果, “Words must be kept, and deeds must be carried through.”
Tanaka answered with six characters of his own: 信为万事之本, “Trust is the root of all things.”
On April 27 and 28, 2018, Xi Jinping and the Indian prime minister Narendra Modi held what China’s Foreign Ministry called an “informal meeting” (非正式会晤) in Wuhan. The ministry said that the meeting would deepen mutual trust and set the general direction for relations between the two countries.
According to a report on Sina, the meeting had no set agenda. No agreements were signed and no joint document was issued. The two leaders walked beside East Lake and then took a boat ride. The report described the format in three short phrases: 散散步，喝喝茶，聊聊天, “take a walk, drink some tea, have a chat.”
In 2016, China’s Supreme People’s Court and Supreme People’s Procuratorate issued an interpretation of the law on bribery. It covers an official who accepts property worth 30,000 yuan or more from a subordinate or from someone under the official’s administration. If the gift “may affect the exercise of official power,” it is treated as a promise to seek a benefit for the giver.
The rule applies even when the giver has never asked for anything. A law professor writing in The Paper named what it targets: the so-called 感情投资, “emotional investment.”
On September 25, 1972, the Japanese prime minister Kakuei Tanaka spoke at a welcome banquet in Beijing. He said that Japan had caused the Chinese people trouble. In the Chinese accounts, the phrase is 添了很大的麻烦, “caused a great deal of trouble.” A People’s Daily article says that it “provoked strong resentment among the Chinese people.”
At the talks the next day, Zhou Enlai raised the phrase. According to a Party history account, he found the meaning “too light.” The joint statement that followed says that Japan keenly feels its responsibility for the serious damage the war caused the Chinese people, and “deeply reproaches itself.”
The exact wording of the speech differs between sources. The Japanese record, as quoted in a Chinese report, has 迷惑, the Japanese word meiwaku.
Talks to end the Korean War opened at Kaesong on July 10, 1951. In May 1951, the Chinese Communist Party leadership had set its course: 边谈边打，争取谈判解决问题, “talk while fighting, and work to settle the problem through negotiation.”
The armistice was signed at Panmunjom on July 27, 1953. A Party website notes that two years of the war passed in talking while fighting.
On August 1, 1955, the ambassadors of China and the United States met in Geneva for the first of a series of talks. After a meeting in December 1957, the talks were suspended for nine months. They resumed in Warsaw on September 15, 1958. By February 1970, the two sides had held 136 meetings.
Negotiations on an investment agreement between China and the European Union were formally launched in November 2013. The 35th round took place from December 6 to 11, 2020. On December 30, 2020, the two sides concluded the talks in principle. A Chinese report called the negotiations a seven-year “long run” (长跑).
On May 20, 2021, the European Parliament voted to freeze work on the agreement until China lifted its sanctions.
On October 10, 1984, the Chinese and German partners signed the joint venture contract for Shanghai Volkswagen in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. It came, in the words of a Chinese account, “after nearly six years of difficult negotiations” (经过近6年的艰难谈判).
On September 24, 1982, Deng Xiaoping met Margaret Thatcher in the Great Hall of the People to discuss Hong Kong. According to People’s Daily, he told her that “one or two years at the latest,” China would formally announce its decision to take back Hong Kong.
The talks that followed ran to 22 rounds. A Chinese account of July 1984, when the talks were stuck, refers to the “original two-year period” set for the negotiations.
檀公三十六策，走是上计. “Of Lord Tan’s thirty-six stratagems, running away is the best.” The line is in the Book of Southern Qi, where thirty-six means simply “many.” The book called The Thirty-Six Stratagems came much later. Its earliest printed edition appeared in Chengdu in 1941, from a manuscript found at a book stall in Shaanxi.
Each stratagem has a short name. Number 6 is 声东击西, make a noise in the east and strike in the west. Number 16 is 欲擒故纵, let the enemy go in order to catch him. Number 17 is 抛砖引玉, throw out a brick to draw in jade.