I haven't seen Doonesbury in a long time. I remember well his wonderful cartoons about China opening, and Mao, and Zhou Enlai, and the charming translator, Honey. I believe Kissinger was blended in somewhere. And, of course, the inimitable Uncle Duke. I believe Zhongnanhai and its own collection of Merrymen would give Trudeau a wealth of material to have pleasant fun with these days.

From a Doonesbury trivia quiz:

While he was Ambassador to China, which high-level member of the Chinese Communist Party did Duke visit in prison? Answer: Deng Xiaoping

Deng, later to oversee China's rise to its much-improved status, was purged and sent to a re-education camp during Duke's tenure; one of the old-time leaders who fell from grace in the Cultural Revolution. In the strip, his name was Romanized according to Wade-Giles as "Teng Hsiao-ping". Duke, hearing that he was in prison, paid a visit to his former diplomatic sparring partner.

Jiang Qing, Mao's wife, was a perpetrator of the afore-mentioned Cultural Revolution, and was also mentioned in the strip - Honey Huan was called to testify at her trial after her own fall from grace. Mao himself died during Duke's time in China, and Zhou Enlai, the second man of China's revolution, was already dead."