June 4 marks an anniversary remembered around the world – except in China. Known as the Tiananmen massacre, it seemed to those looking from outside to be a mass protest by students in favour of greater democracy. The Chinese government tolerated them for a while before sending in their troops. To this day we still do not know how many were killed. In the minds of the world, three words sum up the events of that day – students, democracy, massacre.
I happened to be in Beijing visiting a client in May and again in July 1989. I saw the students in the Square on the first visit and heard several staff in my client’s office say they could never trust their government again on the second. Now with all the changes in the country including a massive rise in living standards, censorship within China means that a new generation is growing up not knowing what happened and why. Although that statement is not quite true. Many young Chinese are extremely adept at finding ways around the censorship. The events of Tiananmen Square are indeed remembered around China. Just not officially.
Having been so close to what happened, I believe it is important to flesh out those three words. China arrived at that dreadful point in its history as a result of a myriad of issues. We need to take them into consideration.
The Origins of the Student Protests
The Tiananmen protests started out in a minor way and were confined to just to Beijing. One lasting effect of the ten disastrous years of the Cultural Revolution (1965–75) was the almost compete destruction of the country’s education system. With the rush to modernisation which had started only a few years later, students in Beijing's universities felt left out - in particular in regards to two items: the need for reform of the academic curriculum to better prepare them for life in the new freer economic environment, and their very poor accommodations which had not been improved since the Cultural Revolution. The catalyst for protest was the death of Hu Yaobang in April 1989. Earlier in the decade, Hu had introduced many of Deng Xiao-ping’s popular economic and political reforms as General Secretary of the Party. The conservative old guard who had brought China to Independence was bitterly opposed to the changes and managed to have Hu ousted in April 1987. But he remained in the Politburo and very popular throughout the country.
When Hu suddenly and unexpectedly died in April two years later, students further objected to the low-key funeral accorded him by the state. So they gathered in Tiananmen Square during the short memorial service in the Great Hall of the People which borders the west side of the Square. Groups remained behind. Eventually they were joined by others. At this time they had a variety of grievances, but no single over-riding issue and no leaders.
The 1989 protests were far from the first that Tiananmen Square had seen. Throughout the 20th century, it had been the site of several political events and student protests starting with a major one in 1919. It was therefore natural that the Square would become the focus of the 1989 student movement.
Reforms Still Possible
Deng could still rely on another key reformer. Zhao Ziyang had been promoted from Premier to General Secretary to replace Hu in 1987 and was very much in favour of a degree of loosening political reform. He firmly believed talks with the students could avert a crisis. Amongst the students it was thought that Zhao’s view was in the ascendency. As a result many quickly lost interest, left the Square and returned to their studies.
The Hard Liners Trump Card
It was historically unfortunate that Zhao faced an impossible task against the hard-liner brought in to replace him as Prime Minister in 1987, Li Peng. Li was universally loathed. He led the movement within the government to clear the Square at the earliest opportunity. By mid-May more students had arrived by bus and train from other parts of the country. Even so, after some students were allowed to open a dialogue with the leadership and Zhao had come to the Square in the dead of night when, in tears, he made an eloquent plea to beg the students to leave, most eventually left of their own accord, not a few also in tears. For a second time the protest seemed to be petering out.
Even after his biography was published after being smuggled out of China following his death in 2005, we still do not know what motivated Zhao’s actions. We do know that in his later years he wrote in favour of a free press, an independent judiciary and a multi party democracy. We can therefore assume with some accuracy that he was in favour of the students’ aims, although he was extremely concerned that they were pushing too far too quickly.
Unknown to the students, though, Zhao had earlier that day lost the internal struggle with the hard-liners and been stripped of his posts. Confined to house arrest, he was never again seen in public. Within days of his ouster martial law was declared.
End of the 30-year Sino-Soviet Split
Before then, the government had suffered what for it was a massive embarrassment. For 30 years there had been a Sino-Soviet split, which included a border war that almost turned nuclear. China had broken off all relations with the Soviet Union. Mikhail Gorbachev healed the rift and a formal State visit to China arranged. Normally the official greeting ceremony would have been held in the Square but persuaded by Zhao and the reformers, no attempt was made to clear the Square. So the ceremony had to be held at the airport. This represented a loss of face incomprehensible to non-Chinese.
When the students then returned, this time they finally had leadership, several charismatic individuals who determined to keep up the earlier momentum by pushing for a far more radical agenda that included greater government transparency and more attention given to driving out corruption. Only after that did protests erupt in other cities. Despite this renewed momentum, though, by the end of May the students were once again losing heart. Yet again many drifted away from the Square.
Students Meet with Government Leaders
Before then, the key student leaders had been invited to a meeting with Li Peng. The government agreed that this be televised nationally. It was a complete disaster. Fed by their increasing support, the student leaders verbally attacked Li and his colleagues. Li gave the impression of being non-confrontational but will have known that he was being seen as an elder Confucian Chinese whilst the students were coming across as a bunch of rabble-rousers. Inwardly, Li will have been incensed at this huge loss of face. Many commentators agree that the students overplayed their hand at this meeting in a big way. Had they been more ‘Chinese’, more subtle and much less aggressive, there is a possibility – however faint - that martial law might have been averted.
Statue of Democracy Appeas at the Last Minute
Then, at virtually the last minute, students from the Central Academy of Fine Arts decided to build a statue. It took 4 days and was brought into the Square overnight on May 29. By that time less than 10,000 students remained. At one time there had been more than 100,000. This statue was never modeled on the Statue of Liberty as many overseas commentators wrongly stated. Its designers deliberately changed a lot of features as they did not wish it to be interpreted as pro-American. But the art students had called it “the Goddess of Democracy”. This proved the catalyst. Within the next two days, the Square was full again, this time with 300,000 students whose various demands had now coalesced very simply into the single issue of democracy. After that, we all know what happened. What the government had set in motion two weeks earlier came to pass.
None of the above excuses what then took place. I remember being in bed in my Hong Kong apartment listening to the BBC World Service when I heard shortly after midnight that troops had moved in. I remember the march of over half a million people in Hong Kong in protest against the Beijing government’s action. All that needs be said is that a hugely complicated situation escalated and the hard liners won. The leaders of a country bled by nearly two centuries of chaos only understood force.
But then China was not alone. Can we forget the 1947 slaughter of over 20,000 innocent protestors by Chiang Kai Shek’s Kuomintang troops in Taiwan? The 1961 massacre of 200+ peaceful demonstrators for Algerian separatistism in Paris? The My Lai massacre of 400+ unarmed villagers during the Vietnam War? The protesting students killed by the Ohio National Guard at Kent State University?
The fact is there have been hundreds of massacres involving hundreds of thousands of innocents since World War 2. Tiananmen Square is etched in our memory. Sadly we tend to forget the others.