parties, one at a time, which it is entitled to do, and after such meetings these parties come out with statements and articles which defend everything which China says and does. Now the entire concern of the Communist Party of China is that the Marxist-Leninist communist movement should accept that the ideas of Mao Tsetung lead the world, accept the cult of Mao, the Proletarian Cultural Revolution and the entire line of the Communist Party of China with its good points and its mistakes... Just as the opinions of one party cannot be accepted en bloc, neither can those of two parties be accepted en bloc. All must state their opinion. Therefore, the joint meeting and the taking of joint decisions is important." Following the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 an Albanian delegation to Beijing was told by Zhou Enlai that "Albania, as a small country, had no need of heavy armament and that it was not at all in a position to defend itself alone from foreign aggression... Therefore, according to Chou En-lai, the only road for Albania to cope with foreign aggression was that of... concluding a military alliance with Yugoslavia and with Rumania... [and he] repeated this same thesis to the Albanian Government delegation which had gone to Peking in July 1975... [which] was turned down again by our delegation in a clear-cut and categorical manner." An indication of the Albanian position on Romania was shown by Nicolae Ceaușescu's visit to China in June 1971, with Hoxha writing in his diary that: "Hsinhua reported only that [Mao] said to him: 'Rumanian comrades, we should unite to bring down imperialism'. As if Ceausescu and company are to bring down imperialism!! If the world waits for the Ceausescus to do such a thing, imperialism will live for tens of thousands of years. It is the proletariat and the peoples that fight imperialism." 1970s Following Lin Biao's downfall the Chinese leadership began seeking an accommodation with the United States against the Soviet Union, viewing the latter as a more dangerous opponent to its interests. Henry Kissinger's visit to China in July 1971 and the subsequent announcement of Nixon's visit came as a shock to the Albanians, with Hoxha writing in his diary at the time that "when the Americans were killing and bombing in Vietnam and the whole of Indochina, China held secret talks with the Americans... These