That’s today (Wednesday). It’s referred to by some Chinese as the June 4 Incident, but the assault began about 10:30pm on June 3. Lasted awhile. That famous photo of the man stopping the tank was taken on June 5. (He was never seen again.)
Back then, I was living in northern Thailand. I recall listening to events on VOA and BBC via my shortwave radio, but only late at night and early morning, as reception tuned out during the daylight hours. There was no cable television in Thailand then, and I didn’t have a TV anyway.
Stories here, here and here. China seems to have blocked Twitter, Hotmail and some other networking and e-mail sites for a few days.
Premier Zhao opposed the use of force to solve the Tiananmen protests, but lost the political battle within the top levels of the Communist leadership. He was put under house arrest for the rest of his life. He nonetheless managed to dictate his memoirs about the incident on cassettes and had them smuggled out of China. His memoirs are just now being published.
Pathetic. “Plain clothes” police officers tried to block the reporter’s view with umbrellas. Did it ever occur to them that they look awfully silly? What a sad little country.
I’ve been in Tiananmen Square quite a few times since the crackdown, and you can always spot the cops. They’re the stern-faced, eagle-eyed fellows quietly watching everyone. It’s actually a cool place to hang out, though. Groups of Chinese tourists always want to take their photos with me. The vendors are not too aggressive.
There’s a record breaking turnout at the vigil held at Victoria Park in Hong Kong. According to the organizer, 150,000 showed up. (Reports by NY Times and BBC) I’m very pleased to see that people still care.
There’s a newly published photograph of “Tank Man.” It shows three men moving away as the tanks approach (one running and ducking from gunfire) while off in the distance is Tank Man going towards the tanks preparing for the confrontation.
It’s a pretty amazing shot, knowing what happens next.
Are you sure you aren’t thinking of North Korea? China is the largest country in the world, actually, and is amazing in many ways. Bad government, for sure, but an amazing country with great customs and wonderful people…right? You do know this, right?
The NY Times interview with one of the protestors makes me sad. It’s amazing to think about the sacrifices these people had to make in their effort to gain freedom - and even the survivors may not live to see the day that China is truly free.
On the “sad little country” issue, well, one thing we definitely don’t want to do is underestimate China. Seems to me like they are well-positioned to be a dominant force in world politics for a long time. I’m quite concerned about what that will mean for worldwide human rights (not to mentions issues like environmental concerns) in the coming years.
Ok, that was a poor choice of word on my part. No doubt, it is physically a very large country. Obviously I wasn’t literally referring to the physical size, but more its character. (Think the phrase “sad little man”).
As a nitpick, China is not the largest country in the world. It is actually quite a bit smaller than Russia. According to the CIA World Factbook, for total land area, it’s 16,995,800 sq km vs 9,326,410 sq km.
Sure, the Chinese culture is great. I’m originally from Hong Kong and I’m an ethnic Chinese myself. Nowadays, if you’re rich and if you can keep your mouth shut and just play along with everyone else, you can even live a pretty decent life, with all the comforts similar to other developed countries, in one of the bigger Chinese cities. But it doesn’t change the fact that the country has some pretty serious and fundamental issues that needs to be resolved. Every time I hear people suggest that everything is ok and justified because of all the recent economic development, I tend to get very upset.
