<Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> The Sino - Soviet split (1960--89) was the deterioration of political and ideological relations between the neighboring states of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) during the Cold War . In the 1960s, China and the Soviet Union were the two largest communist states in the world . The doctrinal divergence derived from Chinese and Soviet national interests, and from the governments' different interpretations of Marxism--Leninism . </P> <P> In the 1950s and the 1960s, ideological debate between the communist parties of the USSR and China also concerned the possibility of peaceful coexistence with the capitalist West . Yet, to the Chinese public, Mao Zedong proposed a belligerent attitude towards capitalist countries, an initial rejection of peaceful coexistence, which he perceived as Marxist revisionism from the Soviet Union . </P>

Why did the soviets and chinese split in 1960
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