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Normalizing relations between China and the US began with the historic 1972 visit of President Richard Nixon to China. During this diplomatic breakthrough, China dispatched pandas to the U.S., including the famous Ling Ling and Sing Sing, marking the first time at that scale that pandas were sent as a gesture of goodwill to a Western nation. These pandas became beloved symbols of burgeoning diplomatic engagement, often called "panda diplomacy."