Sharing a thought from a friend of mine, who is Indonesian-Chinese(by race)
It was very lucky for China that Deng was the leader instead of Mao during the Sino-Vietnamese war.
Deng realised and was man enough to admit that the PLA got whipped, was outwitted by the Vietnamese, and its time to quit.
Chinese casualty was horrific...their armour columns got caught time and time again on open roads by Vietnamese artillery. Their generals were fighting Korea all over again....mass infantry attacks were stopped by Vietnamese provisional troops and militia ...then retreated to let the Chinese pursuit ..leading them deeper into Vietnam while Hanoi is transferring their best troops from Cambodia to meet the Chinese
Make no mistake...PLA is struggling against 2nd rate Vietnamese troops, ..and their best troops are coming.
Deng was shocked but quickly realised the game is up....on the other hand, Old Mao would have sent in another 100 thousand troops into Vietnam...Mao does not fear casualties, he doesn't care if the soldiers are dying by the thousand...to him it's a sign of how patriotic Chinese soldiers are in fact he was proud of high casualties.
No one is more important to Mao than Mao....bloody a$$hole.