Beijing viewed the statement as “a slap in our face” that laid bare the divergent at- titudes of China and the Soviet Union to the world.5 A cable sent from the Chinese embassy in Moscow the next day interpreted the statement as in- tended to deescalate tensions on the eve of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev’s visit to the United States.6 Beijing’s dissatisfaction with Moscow’s declared neutrality. [...] At the San Francisco Peace conference in 1951, Vietnam asserted sovereignty over both the Paracels and Spratlys.24 This position conflicted with that of the Soviet Union’s, which refused to sign the treaty due to its disagreement with Japan on the sovereignty of the Northern Territories. [...] Moscow also backed Beijing’s claims in the South China Sea, condemning the treaty for “grossly violat[ing] the indisputable rights of China to the return of integral parts of Chinese ter- ritory: Taiwan, the Pescadores, the Paracels, and other islands severed from it by the Japanese militarists.”25 In the 1950s and 1960s, Beijing managed to secure certain forms of ac- ceptance of its claims by Han. [...] When China gained the control of the whole of the Paracels in 1974 after a naval skirmish with South Vietnam, neither Hanoi nor Moscow protested as they “could not take the side of South Vietnam.” Moreover, Hanoi still needed Beijing’s support to complete the war against the Saigon regime.27 Following the 1974 skirmish, the South Vietnamese government occupied six land features in the Spratlys, wh. [...] 254 Sino-Russian Relations in China’s Territorial Disputes with India and Vietnam After the Cold War Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia lost its global power status, while China emerged as the more powerful party in the Sino-Russian dyad by the end of the 20th century.