The democracy movement in Tiananmen was crushed, roughly 1-2 thousand people were murdered under the orders of Deng Xiaoping the then Chinese Communist Party ruler.
At the time China was in a state of financial difficulty, it was on the brink of selecting its next generation of leaders for the politburo. The government accused the protestors of being 'capitalist roaders' or counter revolutionaries.
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| Tiananmen Square, Beijing 1989 |
On May 13th 1989 hundreds of Chinese students from more than 40 universities gathered in Tiananmen and commenced a hunger strike. By June 3rd the the PLA had received orders to reclaim the square at whatever cost. 10pm, the Army had begun opening fire on those who obstructed, vocally objected and on those simply watching the scene unfold. In the early hours of the following morning at around 5am thousands of Chinese intellectuals and students were escorted off Tiananmen at gun point.
Most foreign media attention was fixed on Tiananmen Square. This was inaccurate as the real massacre was on Fuxingmen Avenue and other approaching roads. Where the massacre that took place was not of students but of ordinary 'Beijingese', workers and residents - "precisely the target the Chinese government had intended" argues George Black and Robin Munro authors of 'Black Hands of Beijing'.
"The students were not the problem. Indeed, the Party's line never varied after Deng Xiaoping first defined it for the April 26 People's Daily editorial. "Emotionally excited young students" were never the issue. The official conspiracy theory demanded other threats and other scapegoats - "outside elements" with "ulterior motives." This meant dissident intellectuals and workers. After their ruthless repression under Mao, the intelligentsia had been granted a kind of historic compromise by Deng. But by the spring of 1989, they had come to be seen as the agents of bourgeois liberalisation, of China's "peaceful evolution" toward Western-style pluralism. After Tiananmen, they would be singled out for punishment. The working class, meanwhile, had become the carrier of an even more dangerous virus - the Polish disease.
The Beijing Workers Autonomous Federation, tiny though it may have been, was the "cancer cell" the authorities feared. The Goddess of Democracy represented the arrogant intrusion of decadent Western values into the symbolic heart of Chinese Communism, rupturing the sacred cosmology, the feng shui of the great square. But the crude red and black banner of the BWAF, less than a hundred yards away, signified the more terrifying power of the workers awakened". The book goes on to say that the bold actions of students had initiated the protests at Tiananmen and that their actions were to be dwarfed by the "intervention of much broader social forces".
The layered cake of communism in China was crumbling. Those at the bottom, the laobaixing the ordinary people had experienced a jolt of human sympathy. The second tier was "the ideological defection of the Party apparatus itself". The Chinese media and press had rallied to the cause of democracy and freedom. The backbone of the dictatorship had begun to break free from the Party's grip. So what about the top tier you may ask? Those at the top, the apex of power sought to crush any hope of repeat. "The specter of organized popular unrest had to be exorcised not for a year or two, but for an entire generation".
Those that attended the rallies were facing at least 17 years imprisonment. Their families complaints silenced. The hounding of generations linked to Tiananmen continues to this day whilst the Party's elite masquerade as the transition to democracy and reform. In 2009 a Chinese soldier who had taken part in the military operation which cleared Tiananmen Square wrote a public letter to the then President Hu Jintao. The 40 year old Zhang Shijun urged the government and Party to reconsider its condemnation of the demonstration of 1989. He was swiftly taken from his home at 2am and detained at his local police station. In an interview with AP Zhang said, "back then, we thought it would all be addressed in the near future. But democracy just seems further and further away". Chinese detain Zhang Shijun
The world had hoped for the same. More recently on June 7th 2012, Li Wangyang 62 a prominent voice of dissent in China was found "hanged" in the morning under suspicious circumstances while he was in hospital. Li had spent 21 years in prison for his involvement in the Tiananmen Square protests. According to his family he suffered systematic torture whilst imprisoned resulting in his becoming blind and bedridden.
Zhu Chengzhi activist and school friend of Li visited him on June 4th."We talked a little, although he was not in good health. He had to be hospitalised but was optimistic. I do not think it is suicide because he is the kind of man who does not kill anything, not even with a knife to his neck" said Zhu. The family of Li say they had not received a proper autopsy or time of death, they were also prevented from photographing the body and were subsequently thrown out of the hospital by force.
Li Wangyang found dead.
One interesting point I should make is the Communist Party's spin on words. In 1989 they referred to the protests as "counter revolutionary" today the euphemism used is "counter-insurgency". Revolution is a word associated with a moral uprising against a power or system that is perceived to be corrupt and dysfunctional by the people. Whilst insurgency is a word often used by the U.S to describe areas gripped by 'insurgents', the polite term for you're a terrorist.
The very mention of the 'Tiananmen Square Massacre' in China has been socially doctored as a taboo. Much like the 'Hama Massacre' in Syria which occurred in 1982 under Hafez al-Assad. Up to 40,000 people were killed in Hama by Bashar al-Assad's father, socially it is only spoken of as the 'incident'.
China's sophisticated 'Great Firewall of China' and other mechanisms to control and censor speech on the internet has seen words like "black," "today," and "vigil" being erased from the blogosphere.
Today, June 8th we learn of a new massacre in Hama that has left hundreds dead. This time by the hand of Bashar. The Chinese foreign ministry issued a strong but rare statement concerning the latest blood bath in Syria. Beijing "strongly condemns" the deaths of innocent civilians and called for the "murderers" to be punished.
China will be better off admitting to her people that this was no 'incident' and then a more caring China will emerge.
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| Hu Jintao delivers a speech at the CPC Anniversary gathering |
The layered cake of communism in China was crumbling. Those at the bottom, the laobaixing the ordinary people had experienced a jolt of human sympathy. The second tier was "the ideological defection of the Party apparatus itself". The Chinese media and press had rallied to the cause of democracy and freedom. The backbone of the dictatorship had begun to break free from the Party's grip. So what about the top tier you may ask? Those at the top, the apex of power sought to crush any hope of repeat. "The specter of organized popular unrest had to be exorcised not for a year or two, but for an entire generation".
Those that attended the rallies were facing at least 17 years imprisonment. Their families complaints silenced. The hounding of generations linked to Tiananmen continues to this day whilst the Party's elite masquerade as the transition to democracy and reform. In 2009 a Chinese soldier who had taken part in the military operation which cleared Tiananmen Square wrote a public letter to the then President Hu Jintao. The 40 year old Zhang Shijun urged the government and Party to reconsider its condemnation of the demonstration of 1989. He was swiftly taken from his home at 2am and detained at his local police station. In an interview with AP Zhang said, "back then, we thought it would all be addressed in the near future. But democracy just seems further and further away". Chinese detain Zhang Shijun
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| Chinese tanks in Tiananmen |
The world had hoped for the same. More recently on June 7th 2012, Li Wangyang 62 a prominent voice of dissent in China was found "hanged" in the morning under suspicious circumstances while he was in hospital. Li had spent 21 years in prison for his involvement in the Tiananmen Square protests. According to his family he suffered systematic torture whilst imprisoned resulting in his becoming blind and bedridden.
Zhu Chengzhi activist and school friend of Li visited him on June 4th."We talked a little, although he was not in good health. He had to be hospitalised but was optimistic. I do not think it is suicide because he is the kind of man who does not kill anything, not even with a knife to his neck" said Zhu. The family of Li say they had not received a proper autopsy or time of death, they were also prevented from photographing the body and were subsequently thrown out of the hospital by force.
Li Wangyang found dead.
One interesting point I should make is the Communist Party's spin on words. In 1989 they referred to the protests as "counter revolutionary" today the euphemism used is "counter-insurgency". Revolution is a word associated with a moral uprising against a power or system that is perceived to be corrupt and dysfunctional by the people. Whilst insurgency is a word often used by the U.S to describe areas gripped by 'insurgents', the polite term for you're a terrorist.
The very mention of the 'Tiananmen Square Massacre' in China has been socially doctored as a taboo. Much like the 'Hama Massacre' in Syria which occurred in 1982 under Hafez al-Assad. Up to 40,000 people were killed in Hama by Bashar al-Assad's father, socially it is only spoken of as the 'incident'.
 |
| Hong Kong vigil for the victims of the 'Tiananmen Massacre', 2012 |
Today, June 8th we learn of a new massacre in Hama that has left hundreds dead. This time by the hand of Bashar. The Chinese foreign ministry issued a strong but rare statement concerning the latest blood bath in Syria. Beijing "strongly condemns" the deaths of innocent civilians and called for the "murderers" to be punished.
China will be better off admitting to her people that this was no 'incident' and then a more caring China will emerge.
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