Remembering ping-pong diplomacy 45 years after Chinese team's US tour

How a game became an unlikely diplomatic tool and helped normalize relations

CHICAGO - Forty-five years ago, a group of world ping-pong champions from China paid a return visit to the United States, following the US team's historic visit to China in 1971.

Normalization of relations between the two rival nations during the Cold War was gradually realized thanks to ping-pong, an unlikely diplomatic tool.