I was teaching in Shanghai in May/June 1989 when the protests began in Beijing, and ended in massacre. My own students had decided to boycott classes and march in Shanghai in support of the Beijing students, and asked me and another teacher to join them, which we did. Streets were blocked, and after the massacre in Beijing, about a million people gathered peacefully at the riverfront in Shanghai. The army was waiting nearby , but fortunately never took action against this crowd. After two great marches, and a final gathering to mourn the students killed in Beijing, students slowly began going back to classes, pro-democracy signs were taken down. During all of this, the Chinese media pretended like nothing happened. They showed old footage of Tian ‘an men Square on TV, and in the papers briefly mentioned a few troublemakers in Beijing. When asked by a professor and a student if the shooting really happened (They couldn’t watch CNN at a Western hotel), I rode my bike to the Sheraton Hotel and bought a stack of Time and Newsweek magazines with photos and articles about what had happened, and passed them out at the university. And about two weeks after things had calmed down, my politically-minded friends began to disappear in the middle of the night – taken from their dorm rooms. I don’t know what ever happened to them, and it dawned on me that China would never give in to demands for democracy.
155
@Kerstin, thank you for sharing that. I hope that was what happened to my students. I have always wondered.
13
@Nancy S.
Some years ago I visited an exhibit featuring body parts (legs, heads, viscera, etc.) taken from "Chinese prisoners". All of them appeared to be healthy, young men. The exhibit traveled around the world and probably made lots of money for the Chinese government. Could these be the missing students?
18
@Nancy S.
Gorbachev and Honecker, at the moment of truth, chose not to emulate Deng's viciousness and murder East German citizens a few months after Tiananmen Square.
The result? China received trillions of $$ in FDI and the former Soviet Republics received almost none. Putin noticed the hypocrisy of the West and did away with democracy in Russia.
13
I had the day off from work when I put on CNN to see what was happening. They were live reporting from Tiananmen Square. I was horrified as I watched the brutality inflicted on the students.
In the years to come I boycotted buying Chinese goods which at one time was an easy thing to do. Then globalization was thrust upon us without a second thought for human rights. The excuse for abandoning human rights issues was globalization would magically change the Chinese government either through opening up to commerce or the people overthrowing the government.
It is the bait and switch method of doing business. Human rights are no longer considered when doing commerce. The pretense has been lifted and the human price paid is beyond measure.
66
The pundits were wrong in May of 1989 when they scoffed at the idea that the demonstrations would grow into something big enough to be considered a threat by the Party. Because soon enough, workers started joining and supporting the students and things got real. The pundits were wrong again in June when they said that the Party would not order troops to kill students, because of course that's exactly what happened. And the pundits have been wrong over and over again ever since when they keep saying that economic growth will inevitably lead to demands for more freedom. China in 2019 is more repressive than it was in 2009. Economic growth has allowed the Party to create an almost perfectly repressive state, with the enthusiastic support of most of the population. As the use of social credit scores leads to even more repression in the near future, combined with a society that lives longer than we so and has greater wealth, we will have to regard the idea of the inevitability of liberal democracy as quaint.
56
I know from family and personal, first-hand experience, you are right.
No one has wanted to sew this hard truth for decades.
I hope we can see now.
I hope when we do, it’s not too late.
12
I was a 41 year old Michigan State Life Long Learning student on a 6 week study abroad program in China in 1984 and brought a big duffel bag of books with me to give away to the native Chinese students who wanted to read books in English. A large number of my giveaway books were copies of the Federalist Papers. When the 1989 Democracy Movement happened I felt guilty about spreading the word about democracy, but Nick's columns give me hope that the flame of freedom may rise again in China. I met so many brilliant young students when I was there, but I still pray they were not all gunned down in 1989.
38
@Lynn Ochberg
The flame of freedom is kept alive in Hong Kong, and Taiwan, and in the countries where the Chinese diaspora has spread. However, now we know the Communist Party endeavors to control the diaspora with intimidation and threats.
Shame on the U.S. government for not doing more to defend human rights and to require human rights as a predicate for doing business with the U.S. consumers and businesses.
I am sure someone has written a history (but i am not aware of it) of the undoing of the hope many felt with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the prospective peace dividend we thought was coming during the Clinton years. But we never sanctioned China for the Tianemen Square massacre.
The loss of hope waa affected across the world by authoritarians hateful of freedom and human rights. The most significant event in this history was the 9/11 events in 2001.
3
I will never forget Tiananmen Square, because it is also the day my child was born. Cradling my newborn in my arms, I watched in horror as the army was moving in on the demonstrators and a peaceful demonstration turned into a bloodbath. Thirty years later, the Chinese government has all but erased the uprising. No one can suppress history for long, in the end it all comes out just as it happened and the perpetrators pay the price. It's difficult to have patience in the face of crimes against humanity and decency, but we must persevere, never forget and ensure that the rest of us don't know or forget as well. Thank you for this thoughtful and deep piece, Mr. Kristof!
26
[I had to leave a lot out here because of the character cap].
In June '89 I was in China on vacation before going to MIT. I arrived in Hong Kong in May as nationwide protests were breaking out.
In Beijing boulevards to the Square filled with columns of trucks with young, frightened soldiers who were told the demonstrators would overthrow the government and were ordered to fire on innocent civilians.
I ran into journalists...westerners stuck out in the crowd...I likely met Nick, but at that time hadn't heard of him, so who knows.
We were staying near the Square and went to talk to the demonstrators. When they heard I was going to MIT, they were incredulous. It was a dream beyond reach. They didn't want to talk about their revolution, but about MIT.
Three months later I gave a slideshow to my class. A year after that I got a call from the Chinese students association. They heard I had pictures and asked me to show them at an anniversary event.
But there were no Chinese students that had not been screened by their government. They asked me to leave my pictures to review them. I knew photos that leaked out in the aftermath were used to identify protestors. I said no, packed up the slides and hid them in my friend's basement.
My children are now grown with the good fortune to be born here in this country, in this century. But watching the destruction that Trump is wreaking across this country and the world, I wonder, will things be so different here in a few years?
168
@Ralph Schiavo Are you serious? This president is the strongest ANTI-Chinese and anti-Russian man we've had in thirty years. He isn't the one building up Antifa.
2
@The Observer
Don't be fooled by Trump's arbitrary alliances. He loves foreign dictators.
His tariffs are intended to fool his base into thinking that he's protecting them. They have nothing to do with objection to China's authoritarian government.
21
I returned from a month- long trip to China in June of the year prior to the Tiananmen massacre. We were a group of seminary students who had spent the year studying, Chinese history and language. We arrived ready to learn, so our national “guides” soon learned that the local “guides” didn’t need to tell us the history of the town, but to deepen our understanding of the culture and spiritual values of that place. In Beijing our guide was a student at the university who shared much information with us that we would not have learned any other way, especially about the Gang of Four and their cruelty and corruption. He had a strong hope the democracy was just around the corner.
When the soldiers entered the square that day, I stayed glued to the TV hoping that the students would be spared. I’m sure that young man was there unless he had made it to the US already. I have grieved that moment and its horrors ever since.
Thank you Mr. Kristof for your story. My heart and love is still present in Tiananmen Square and with the students. And I carry his hope with me.
94
While the people of Central and Eastern Europe were defeating their longtime oppressive communist governments and basking in the warm glow of freedom, the people of China sought these exact freedoms, but their government brutally put them down and punished them severely for challenging the status quo. As the PLA shot hundreds of protesting Chinese dead with military rifles, it became painfully clear to China and the rest of the world that the government would continue to deny and suppress human rights for as long as they could. Today, the Chinese Communist Party scrambles quickly to extinguish any ember of democracy, civil rights, freedom of faith and freedom of speech and thought, as a reminder that they are more than willing to kill to remain in power.
16
This is one example of a government clamp down that cost many lives, but the Chinese have never been cordial or civil to each other. I think you only need to go back to the cultural revolution to witness what the Chinese can do to each other. I see it every day, living here, foreigners are often tolerated, but if you are a Chinese, you are given extremely short shrift--unless, of course, you've got that old time religion, i.e. status. Then you are granted red carpet treatment. Old world thinking, vestigial remnants of our common humanity, still lingers en masse in the modern China.
9
I wasn't in Beijing during the massacre, but I was there on business just afterwards. Nearly every young person who had been in Beijing that day had a story to tell. Our office manager said her uncle, an elderly man, had been shot and killed when he opened his door to see who was setting off what he thought was fireworks.
By the time I arrived the army was pulling back, and you could walk through the tunnel under the square. There you could see the freshly patched machine gun holes and the places where the half-track vehicles had crushed the stairs. The thought gives me a chill to this day.
7
Some of China's achievements cited by Mr Kristof are illusory. Chinese students scoring better on PISA is one of them. The schools which participate in the test are top 10% of the schools in Shanghai. In vast parts of rural China and in the less developed cities, schools are extremely low quality and students don't come anywhere near to scoring well on tests. Vietnam's primary and secondary education system is assessed by OECD to be far better than China and with less inequality between regions. China's level of social and human development is roughly comparable to other middle income Asian countries - in fact it is worse in some areas. When Mr Kristof tries to acknowledge China's achievements before offering criticism on human rights, some of the claims that he makes on behalf of China echo nationalist propaganda and are embarrassingly wrong! The health system in China is very unequal as well. (just like the US). I am living in China for the last five years.
64
Nazi Germany also developed a thriving middle class, pulling the nation out of economic disaster. Mussolini did the same in Italy.
Prosperity is no yardstick for freedom and democracy. China's progress is top down and allows working people no power over their own lives, including the unimpeded access to information.
26
Tiananmen Square, it will be a hundred yeas before the truth gets told.
9
To the Chinese diaspora: seek the truth about the 7% who run your government. Mao’s cultural revolution starved up to 50 million of you. The Taiping Civil War, maybe 100 million died. Anyone who openly practices Tai Chi with principles of Truthfulness and Compassion (aka Falun Gong/Dafa) is imprisoned and tortured, maybe their organs are forcibly removed and sold on the black market. It is not “a cult” as the propagandists told you, its a highly popular movement driven underground. We had the same thing in America during the 60s . They were known as hippies. Preached peace and love. They listened to The Beatles. That would not be tolerated by your government. Anything or anybody popular is smashed by tanks and APCs. Face the truth.
14
You, American consumer, fund a totalitarian militaristic Orwellian regime and its network of spies - a regime with WMD aimed at USA. TianMen is the tip of the iceberg. More died under The China communist party than Hitler and Emperor Hirohito. A trade deal with China is a trade deal with the Devil. I’ve lived in China 20 years. You?
6
This needs to be a lesson to those coming here: never, NEVER let people expand any national government. With gov't intrusion comes gov't players expanding their power and control over people.
A great example is the Green New Deal taking away your personal decision to own a car or buy a plane ticket.
The Founders wrote down a list for the federal gov't for us, leaving EVERYthing else to the states. Adding to that list is asking for the gov't to not only go broke but order you and your family around.
6
@The Observer
The Green New Deal is a bad example of government intrusion because it doesn't exist; there is no such thing, it is only an idea.
The Patriot Act passed 5 days after the 9/11 event would be a better example to cite of government intrusion; it increased and enhanced the government's capacity to monitor American communications and limit the freedom to travel.
13
And here in the US we have near daily mass shootings and Federal laws that facilitate them. Big Pharma charging one thousand dollars per life saving pill. State sanctioned police shooting of unarmed black men. Planet killing environmental policy in the face of irrefutable climate science. And the most powerful survailence state ever assembled, while the Administration bans Huawei products with a pretext that the Chinese are spying. Hypocrisy is alive and well.
9
The famous philosopher Isaiah Berlin said "The first function of any social organization (i.e. government) is the elimination of extreme suffering". Yeah right.
It’s a great piece. In these times, when Twitter bans Chinese dissidents...
2
#WR: Terrible! China massacred its own people, because the Chinese Communist Party doesn’t have respect for the human life. For them, only the Party is important.
4
The video shows even when citizens are suppressed, that some brave souls will take on the establishment, even when it's communist.
Also don't be fooled by communist, democracy, religious theocracy, titles as Russia is a great example of how a nation can water down the principles of a democratic establishment to create a pseudo democracy that is still somewhere between a communist nation and a democracy.
If China does eventually evolve into a democracy it will probably still suppress free speech like Russia does.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpjM0y-vZk8
1
Just a reminder that centuries of Chinese history, artifacts, books and records of past dynasties were destroyed under Mao’s plan to rid China of “the four olds.” So perhaps the “record keeping “ is not as accurate as you would like the world to think.
2
What was Kent State's date? What was the Mexico Olympics date? Why is it that each year we memorialize June 4th with a religious fervor in this country? If you cannot answer the first two questions, you cannot deny the third.
4
America has killed its own in varied ways since its inception. Manifest destiny, the Monroe doctrine, police killings, our own civil war and foreign wars virtually every year. I’m not an apologist for the pathetic men ruling dictatorships in China, Russia or the myriad of other countries. I’m just stating the obvious, humans are a violent primitive species with zero hope for a sustainable, peaceful future. Good luck kiddies, it’s a dark future ahead.
3
Nick Kristof is the best journalist of this generation. What true journalism looks like.
2
This is a poignant essay that needs to be etched into our psyches. What brings to mind is our present trade war with China. We are emphasizing our economy vs its. Yet, not surprisingly the Trump administration turns a blind eye and a deaf ear to the human rights' violations that persist within this schizophrenic nation's communist/capitalistic social and economic paradigm. The two ideologies do not mix, quite the contrary. They are anathema to each other, both godless and god-worshipping in the form of a Golden Calf. Suppression exists today under Xi's rule. Indeed it has never really disappeared. It is just more insidious and not so blatant. There may not be mass shootings. But just like its son North Korea, cruelty remains. As Nicholas mentions, we see in one form or another oppression of its own throughout an ominously changing world, including here in a once proud United States.
3
In a bizarro world, would having right to bear arms right have a different outcome in1989 Beijing, one can only wonder.
Isn’t that how America was built, against the tyranny of its “own rulers” although in a far away land.
1
If you have a child and love that child you cannot help but love all children. If you love humanity with all its goodness and knowing its capacity for stupidity, tribalism, selfishness and violence you can not help but love China. Mr. Kristof is a lover of humanity and he loves China. Love is based on knowledge, respect and responsibility.
Jiang Lin, a former officer in the People's Liberation Army was a witness to the Tiananmen massacre. She is a Chinese patriot, the daughter of a general. She was on the front page of the NYT on May 29. When i read about her to my daughter that day as I took on my babysitting duties and she prepared for work I had to stop because I was ready to cry.
We must not see China as an enemy. In dealing with China we must be aware of what the Chinese government perceives as its core interests and intelligently work with that. We must also see our own core interests and understand how we are perceived by others. We must struggle to see ourselves as we are and not just jump to judge others.
Many believe it is the United States which is the most danger to the world, not China, not Russia, not the other players in the Middle East. We must struggle to understand why. It is very humbling to realize that American foreign policy results in the deaths of thousands of innocents all over the world. If we have true faith in ourselves we can face this and understand why.
China will be China after President Xi Jinping. -Rudy
-
2
When China massacred its own people? That's a dictatorship. They have an awful past history of suppression, starvation, and human rights abuse.
The question is--- why is the United States of America, once an example of democratic govt for the world, allowing the massacres of its own people by guns---regularly like clockwork?
America is an advanced, enlightened democracy with a Constitution and Bill of Rights. It's not fulfilling its purpose.
Our elected govt is failing us in its 1st duty to citizens--basic public safety----- and ensuring Freedom From Fear, to paraphrase Roosevelt---when we go to school, work, shopping, religious services, etc.
The bodies of dead and injured citizens, their bodies torn by bullets, are piling up higher and higher.
Our political system is warped by big money donors, who control policy---all legitimized by our own Supreme Court equalizing money with 1st Amendment Free Speech. This delivers our govt into the hands of profiteers, with no duty to society.
The NRA gun maker lobby has controlled gun policy in this democracy---despite that most voters, most gun owners and many NRA members disagree with its propaganda for profit.
So the basic rights of Americans not to be murdered in public places and in the home as well, are not being protected.
Don't let the gun makers call the shots in our politics.
Give us representation for our taxation.
Then we can give lessons to world dictatorships from a high moral ground.
1
There is a well-known saying, Mr. Kristof: how soon we forget. Thank you for your eloquent remembrance of the horrors of that time in China and the testimonial to so many brave souls.
6
I find your optimism very puzzling. Most other massacres have been quite successful in disappearing from the history that most people remember, and the records in scholarly books don't have any effect. The virtual eradication of the native americans serves as a fine example, although on a much larger scale. Trends around the world seem to be in the direction of authoritarianism, militarism, and propagation of falsehoods.
Where does the belief that things will come around come from?
7
Thank you for doing your part to keep the memory alive in an indifferent world with a totally different agenda.
I doubt there will be much change in China because DESPITE the more educated, growing middle class with access to information and ability to circumvent the "Great Firewall", these people have too much to lose, much like masses in the US who meekly stand by as the country gets debased on a daily basis because they need to pay off their mortgages, credit cards, tuition and plan for the next family vacay.
8
Thanks for sharing your memories Mr. Kristof. Talk about a life changing experience.
One version of China today is millions of its citizens have become very wealthy as a result of wide spread corruption, which the govenment is either involved in or turns a blind eye too.
As a result, the growing educated class is more interested in learning how to benefit from the system instead of protesting suppression of individual rights.
If this is true, it doesn't sound all that foreign.
5
It's nice to think that freedom will someday come to China. It's also nice to think that gun control will someday come to the USA. Sadly, thinking doesn't make it so.
13
Most moving article depicting the savagery outcome of Chinese autocracy in Tiananmen Square, and now its autocratic leader Xi along along with European autocratic countries such as Poland, Austria and Hungary , supporting Trump's objectionable leadership. The only hope as Mr. Kristof alleges is the more educated the public becomes the greater the chance for democracy to prevail.
3
Unfortunately Mr Kristof, attention to human rights among the public has waned in light of our governments embrace of dictators and selective outrage expressed when it suits our economic interests. How much outrage can we really express when we know it is being unevenly acted upon by our government. Witness in case, our lack of outrage towards actions in Yemen and Palestine.
6
We visited Tiananmen Square in the fall of 1996, part of a required itinerary arranged by the China Center for Adoption Affairs which included visits to the Great Wall, the Summer Palace, and the Forbidden City while in Beijing.
Tiananmen Square had become a tourist attraction by then akin to the other three visits. Interesting that the Chinese Government included the Square which they could have easily omitted.
3
@mlb4ever - they push the square precisely because it's a trademark of the nation AND that they have done such a successful job in eradicating that night of June 4, 1989
1
Some different perspectives: What happened on June 4, 1989 was a tragedy, and it was a watershed moment. The west depicts it as a massacre (in western media it is often called Tiananmen massacre, although the actual carnage occurred elsewhere. There were also soldiers who were lynched with their bodies hung from bridges). The reality was more complicated because there were earlier failed non-violent attempts to clear the square, the student leaders refused to compromise and did not offer any meaningful proposals for negotiation, which precipitated the eventual rupture. In the US, things would have unfolded differently because there is a well-established mechanism to defuse tension. Protestors will be partitioned into blocks, fenced in like sheep, and when the authorities decide time is up, the protestors will be cleared by force if necessary, with batons, and lethal force when the police feel their lives are threatened.
The result is that the Govt shut down all discussions of political reform and directed the public’s energy instead to improve their material well-being. The strategy has worked as China experienced remarkable growth in the ensuing decades. The cost is the death of the idealism that inspired the young protestors, which is a tragedy in itself. But if events unfolded differently, what would China be like now if the Govt was ousted by the protestors? My guess is culturally richer, but economically much worse, politically probably more like Russia today.
8
Although the current Chinese political system is oppressive in its censorship and suppression of civil society, for most Chinese, their living standards have improved dramatically and they’re proud of their achievements. If forced to choose between the current reality and an alternate reality where China follows the path of Russia, I think most Chinese would choose the current reality despite its downsides noted by western observers. Democratic ideals sound good, but if they cannot deliver good governance and improve people’s lives, then it is hollow. That’s the problem faced by liberal democracies, even in western countries today. China will not follow exactly the western model, but there is hope among many Chinese (after all, censorship is really annoying) that China will become more liberal. Although the current leadership has regressed, which will lead to a detour of a few decades, China will gradually find its way.
4
Thank you Mr. Kristof for bearing witness to the awful events of 30 years ago. I would like to think that eventually the Chinese will achieve a more democratic government. I would also like to think that we in the U.S. will restore our democratic government to that which perhaps inspired the Chinese.
Our Imperfect Union is under attack by tribalism, created by political parties who care more about power than country. We see it every day, and their are plenty of examples from both parties. I dearly hope that one day the United States will become the inspiration for democratic government around the world.
12
I didn't know Nick witnessed this first hand at risk of his own life. Amazing story!
I'm outraged that the US has played into this authoritarian hand by the government. A lot of people questioned our normalization of Chinese trade under Nixon, and I still question that decision. Trade is our most powerful tool to spread democracy, and we haven't even tried to use it that way. In the past we used trade as a threat, but threats never work. Effective international diplomacy requires action.
Rather than blame Trump for his apparent support for world dictators, I'd rather focus on something that US citizens can do.
It would be great if the CEOs of America could take a stand and force higher labor, environmental and democratic standards through their influence, but I highly doubt they'll do it. We have a bad crop of CEOs in this country. They have sold out the US for profit, and so they certainly won't bat an eye in selling out the Chinese people.
Citizens of our democracy can demand change through our political system and their own actions.
I recently quit my job at a company that I believed was trading democratic potential for profit in China. They were openly pushing surveillance on Chinese citizens for profit, and they were hoping to encourage that in the US also. Ultimately, this is the reason I quit.
Trump is punishing China, and he's also punishing the bad actors at the head of US companies. I'm with him on that. Citizens, please don't work for them!
6
I admire your idealism but you are definitely too naïve. The problem is not that we have a bad crop of CEOs. The problem is the capitalist system that requires that CEOs focus on short term profits. Remove all the current CEOs and their replacements will behave in the same way.
Also, anything Trump does is suspect. Any actions he takes against China is only because it benefits himself. If he had any principles he would get tough on Russia and Saudi Arabia, but we know what goes on there.
By all means, continue to rally your fellow citizens to take a stand against repression. Just please be mindful of a corrupt system, as opposed to just corrupt actors.
3
This column is excellent and most poignantly written.
Despite its impressive strides in business and global influence over the last 30 years, China continues to be controlled by those who clearly have much less respect for human dignity than we do.
Like Taiwan, the U.S. can be a beacon for change in China. The current tumultuous climate in the U.S. is actually a golden opportunity for us to work through its difficult issues and emerge as a wiser, stronger and more empathetic nation for having done so. China and the rest of the world are watching.
10
Killing its own people is China’s tragic, and its corrupt values assault its own citizens, today. The re-education of Muslims, the advance of its suppression on Hong Kong, its support of North Korea and Syria (a great business opportunity!). Yet, we Americans generally give China a pass. We don’t BDS them. We enthusiastically visit China. We re-coil at attempts to put their trade policies in place. Why? We like our electronics? Too big to confront? We can all get along? Sharing what you witnessed is valuable and principled. Not sure what impact it will have.
8
It is wise advice to beware of getting what you wish for.
If the revolt against the communist government had succeeded in 1989 does anyone seriously claim that a stable and democratic China would have swiftly and bloodlessly come into existence?
Even a shallow study of China's history shows that when governments there fall there is slaughter on a scale that dwarfs almost anything else in human history.
I do not like the Chinese communist government any more than Mr. Kristof does and I condemn its response to the uprising of 1989 as strongly as he does, but that evil was far less than any realistic alternative, then or now.
6
@Max Davies
Memories of the Arab Spring of 2010 come to mind.
Be careful what you wish for indeed.
1
Okay, Thank you Mr. Kristof,
1) Fact from 1989 - "pointed [gun] at the bus driver’s head: Move the bus! The driver took the vehicle key and hurled it as far as he could into the bushes beside the road."
and,
2) Per writer Lu Xun after an earlier massacre: “Lies written in ink cannot disguise facts written in blood.”"
Note to GOP -- please understand #1 and #2 above.
Your attention is directed to a bus driver risking his life to save, most likely only delay injury to, unknown persons. This in the defense of getting a honest government.
Even if you fail to attend History will.
You are seen, soon to be weighed and the found wanting part is up to what you do when you Vote 2020!
5
Thank you, once again, Nick.
Wonderful column.
3
" many young Chinese have no idea that the Communist Party massacred its own people." I can only hope that somehow they can read your column....facts written in ink.
5
China is our warning shot across the bow - the country which can manage growth of the middle class with authoritarian repression. Gild the repression with growth and shopping malls, and hey, it doesn't look so bad.
If we look at the trajectory of the growth of far right ideas - Bannon ideas, Miller ideas and President Trumps massive ego that he should be the one in control - we need to keep the image of those tanks in Tiananmen Square in mind.
Is keeping the trains running on time worth crushing our children? Do we want to take the kleptocracy we are building and formalize it, authorize it, ensconce it in legitimacy?
The jingoist anthem "God Bless the USA" gushes that we are "proud to be Americans, where at least I know I am free..." Am I? Will I be tomorrow?
Freedom is earned, and treasured and carefully fostered with a respect for rights and responsibilities. It isn't a song or a bumper sticker that we can ignore once we've slapped on our car's butts.
10
History is nothing but a story. Most everyone gets nothing out of it. And just what and where are we going here? Is it like your military holidays, where you worship killing each other?
3
Whether it is Stalin's purges, Tiananmen Square, Kent State or Jackson State - when government repression turns to murdering it's citizens, it is a stark answer to the questions - Who rules this country? Who's country is this?
These are questions people should ask themselves long before the killing starts.
4
Those individuals who stood up for their rights, or who did their part to help others, are bigger than the tanks they faced down.
And as the years go by since the massacre, we must not lose sight of the atrocity's magnitude, or cease bearing witness to an injustice that the Chinese government would just as soon sweep under the rug.
4
Trump is likely to have someone read this to him and suddenly realize the dictators ruling China are in fact his kind of people.
8
I just arrived back from Spain where, among other things, I took a dozen undergraduate students to see Picasso's Guernica, lectured to them about the history of the bombing and Franco's other pro-Nazi atrocities, visited the town of Gernika-Lumo to see how the German carpet bombing Franco requested had erased whole swaths of the center, only to be replaced by cartoon-like "Spanish" architecture rather than the Basque buildings he destroyed. As we were leaving, one of the students asked if there were "ghost tours" of the town. I explained that that would be a bit like asking if there were ghost tours of Auschwitz. Her response: "Are there!" Many college students today do not know who Franco was, nor Stalin, and certainly not what happened Tiananmen Square, and not because it has been scrubbed from the history books, but because those books go unread. The worst form of censorship is self-censorship through apathy and ignorance. In truth, I'm far more worried about preserving American Democracy than I am about a nascent one in China. We are on a precipice while most seem quite happy to keep walking straight forward, heads down texting, chatting, snapping.
28
@gd History repeats itself. Not because it wasn't documented but because people don't care to learn from it.
3
Maybe it’s time that America looks at its own ‘concept’ of democracy. A corporate run oligarchy is not a democracy. A country where the government bails out the corporations but not the citizens is not a democracy. A country where companies are deemed ‘too big too fail’ is not a democracy. As the author points out, China runs rings around the US in education, the economy, and healthcare. How arrogant are we to wish and even impose our very imperfect system on anyone else? Don’t be sure that the democracy will flourish in China until democracy flourishes in the US. Classic Western hubris.
17
The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution, the epitome of freedom, probably kills more people, repeatedly.
18
"Paradoxically, the Communist Party has helped sow the seeds of its eventual demise by nurturing the rise of an educated middle class that is more difficult to fool, bully and bribe into perpetual submission."
Thank you for the moving recollections. But what evidence do we have that, in today's world, an educated middle class is more, rather than less, difficult to fool or bribe than a poor, uneducated one? Try an experiment: think of a political issue you care deeply about. Then google the issue on the computer of a friend or relative whose political beliefs are contrary to yours. Then marvel at how easily prosperity & education are used to fool people.
12
I was in Minnesota when the Tianmen massacre happened. My uncle had just gotten a TV for the first time. He was a Tibetan Buddhist who hated the Chinese government. We watched the situation so carefully on that little TV. A stray dog showed up, skinny and scraggly. My uncle adopted him on the spot and named him "Comrade.". He was a good dog.
8
Next time Trump flies to Asia, Air Force One should be emblazoned with the symbols of Tiananmen Square; the goddess of liberty and the brave soul in front of the tank.
4
just a thanks for the writing and sharing
1
As an Oregonian, I know about your father's escape from communist east Europe, let alone his opposition to the fascism that preceded it. You are your father's son, a brave and eloquent spokesman for social justice and liberal democracy.
You have honored that very brave Chinese worker who labored to save the wounded for you have told us in very clear terms what happened. Moreover, you correctly commented on the current regimes of Trump, Orban etc., let alone the Chinese regime
10
Why is this country our trading "partner"?
4
Yes, Nicholas, yes, yes, yes. paul in bessemer
1
As China tightens its grip on its people and on the world with its Belt and Road initiative and as the stain of authoritarian rule spreads here in America and around the world, there will be an awakening.
We will find ourselves like Winston Smith with our very own if metaphorical cage of rats strapped to our heads.
Each and every one of us will come to understand we are all Uighurs.
3
"Paradoxically, the Communist Party has helped sow the seeds of its eventual demise by nurturing the rise of an educated middle class that is more difficult to fool, bully and bribe into perpetual submission..". No, I'd say they've done a good job nurturing a submissive and apathetic middle class whose concerns do not go beyond the mall corridors and their phone screens.
7
@Kevin The same as in the US of A. Masses too busy shopping, watching TV and sports to notice what is being done in their name.
2
Tiananmen must be remembered, like the Holocaust, our slavery, perhaps climate denial, and those many nasty facts, which have many who would bury them or deny their existence. Keep speaking up, Mr. Kristof, for your credibility on China is a voice to those many millions who either do not know the truth or dare not speak it (along with the another "T", Tibet.)
6
"China is not like the old Soviet Union, which both impoverished and repressed people. Rather, China has saved lives, built universities at a rate of one a week and lifted more people out of poverty than any other country in human history..."
Amazing what you can do when you are the protégé of the USA.
1
Revolutions are bloody....take ours for example. With more uprisings like Tiananmen Square I suspect things in China will change for the better but it will take time. Not sure if being more educated will help this change evolve sooner as even the uneducated know tyranny when they see and experience it. Rather liberal elitist of you to think that Nik
2
I was at the tv, watching the beautiful and brave students of China. I was in awe. The very sun seemed to shine brighter. Then came the government’s crackdown—and I am sure I was one of thousands who kept watch, now in tears and horror and grief. I thought it would be temporary. Now I’m nearing the end of a lifetime with China still Under dictatorship and other countries, including my own, drifting in that direction. For people who believe freedom is sacred, the courage of those Chinese young people and those, like the rickshaw driver, who risked their lives in support will always be remembered, a beacon of hope for our benighted species. Thank you helping to keep this memory alive.
7
Mr. Kristof, this would perhaps be a good time to quote from the NYT op-ed today of Wang Dan, a student leader at Tianamen Square. Wang Dan paid a heavy price for his activism.
"But instead of instigating liberalization, Western capital fattened the pockets of the Communist Party leaders, giving them the power to prolong their rule by silencing dissent at home and expanding the country’s global clout."
.........In a perverse way, President Trump’s tough stance against Beijing, despite its unpredictability, is proving effective. Through this trade war, I hope Washington will show the Chinese leadership that the West will not tolerate the use of technology for spying and controlling ordinary citizens."
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/01/opinion/sunday/tiananmen-protests-china-wang-dan.html#commentsContainer&permid=100755217:100755217
Wang Dan makes an interesting point about the chances of improving conditions today and Mr. Trump. As expected, though, you include Mr. Trump in your attack.
"The American president defends a Russian autocrat, a Saudi Mad Prince, a Philippine ruler who presides over a dirty war, a Hungarian authoritarian and others."
Funny that Wang Dan sees Mr. Trump as the savior (albeit in a "perverse" way). Could it be that his perspective is clearer than yours?
4
@Joshua Schwartz Capitalists adore the Red Chinese.
2
Thanks for this.
One thing about June 4, 1989 that is almost always overlooked is that there were two massacres. The People's Liberation Army was also called out in Chengdu, Sichuan, to suppress a rebellion, with the result being hundreds of people being killed. The only difference between Chengdu and Beijing was that the New York Times and CNN were not in Chengdu to report on it.
I have spoken with eyewitnesses to the slaughter that happened in Chengdu on that day. This event needs remembrance, just like Tian An Men Square.
10
First, I must introduce myself, I studied and worked in US for 7 years, and I came back China in 2014. Last year, I was qualified to be issued the green-card but eventually I decided not to continue the process. Here are many reasons I want to clarify here:
1. Based on my 7 years observation, I consider that the democracy that US had is far from perfection. The social status of minority people are way lower than white people. For example, the subway is only built to the urban fringe to make segregation physically possible. And the most effective way to maintain the system not to collapse is to provide as much welfare as the country can or even beyond its capability. Eventually the only thing can be done is to print money and dump them into the whole world. How long it can be sustained? No one Know.
2. History is very complex but will repeat itself. China as a unified nation last at least 2000 years. And in the most time of period, it is possible the strongest power in far eastern region and maybe in the whole world. But, the fact is now Japan is there , Korea is there, and Malaysia is there. So may I ask a question, where are the native Indian? How American African were trafficked? So is there a special day to memorize the tragedy of native indian? At least, I am not aware of it. So probably it is a right time to find out how other people around the world image US history and what US has done in recent years. Then you may stop use Democracy as the only judgmental value
6
"The arrival of freedom in the world's most populous country" will probably come too late for its ethnic minorities in Tibet and Xinjiang. Indeed, Comrade Xi's war on Islam as it affects its Uyghur citizens is one of the most disgraceful actions by an authoritarian leader since the now-deposed Omar al-Bashir began his persecution of Sudan's Darfurian community. Too bad that all President Trump can think about with reference to China is its trade policy.
3
This is a lesson we all have to learn and remember. People paid with their lives and blood. We Chinese keep our historical record thoroughly and carefully, and all Chinese officials, emperors and intellectuals worry their legacy and what our places would be in history. Many hundred years ago when China was divided in many small countries, a powerful official killed the King and took over. The official who was in charge of the historical record recorded such incident. The new King asked the official to delete such case from the record. He refused, so the new King killed him. An Intellectual from the neighboring country heard the incident, packed his belongings and ready to travel to that country to make sure such incidence was properly recorded. He only stopped his journey when he heard that finally the incidence was properly recorded in the historical record of that country. So, Tianamen 1989 will be properly recorded in our historical record. Deng was praised to be the great man to open up the country and be modernized. If not because of Deng, China is still poor and backward today. But his authorization to send in the Army that night to kill the students and common folks would be forever his black mark in history. There was a saying that at that time China was so poor and backward that they did not have rubber bullets nor any knowledge of crowd control which a modern society needs. So they just sent in the army and used real bullets. Of course this is never a good excuse.
I love China, the Chinese people and all aspects of its long rich culture. The art, calligraphy, literature, architecture and history are spectacular. But with equal enthusiasm, I despise the Communist Party, Police State and the PLA. Tibet, Tiananmen, Taiwan, forced organ harvesting from political and religious prisoners (among them pro-democracy detainees), and Falun Gong or Christians. China will evolve, but it must leave other countries alone - Taiwan, Tibet, Palau, New Guinea, New Zealand, Australia. It seeks to sabotage and corrupt democracies everywhere - including Canada and America. Its bullying must stop or be stopped. I will cheer the day of reckoning when the bully is banished from the world.
5
"President Xi Jinping may feel reassured."
Does he? I often wonder why are they so afraid? Afraid of what, or whom?
"But those of us who witnessed Beijing Spring are confident that eventually, unpredictably, the tide of freedom will roll in again. Paradoxically, the Communist Party has helped sow the seeds of its eventual demise by nurturing the rise of an educated middle class that is more difficult to fool, bully and bribe into perpetual submission."
I wish I can share Mr. Kristoff's optimism but I can't. Since that day of the massacre surveying and crowd control technology has made tremendous progress. I understand the need to have hope but I also believe one should at least recognize reality. While we hope let us not forget what George Orwell wrote in 1984. He credited Communist China coming close to a perfect surveying society and the surveying and crowd control technology then was not something Mr. Orwell could have remotely foreseen.
3
Thank you for this and so much more.
1
A witness in China, a participant in the USA. It’s coming, Sir. Trump and his Regime will not go quietly into the night.
There will be Blood.
4
Nicholas, thanks for your reporting:
“That same night, further east, a middle-aged man working as a bus driver used his public bus to block the road and keep truckloads of troops from attacking the student protesters. An army officer pulled out his sidearm and pointed it at the bus driver’s head: Move the bus!
The driver took the vehicle key and hurled it as far as he could into the bushes beside the road.”
This immediately reminded me of the Russian captain of a sub — not a bus — Vasili Arkhipov, who is described as the ‘Man who saved the world’ during the Cuban Missile Crisis, who also had a gun pointed at his head and wouldn’t give up the launch key.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/oct/27/vasili-arkhipov-soviet-submarine-captain-who-averted-nuclear-war-awarded-future-of-life-prize
2
This is powerful -- and I hope a book will come of it some day. The images revealed through words are overwhelming. It is tragic that it takes a tragedy to bring us to such stark attention.
In the U.S., our tragedies occur on a scale somehow adaptable to our contemporary minds: shootings massive enough to shock us for only two or three days. Poverty hidden from public view. Sexual assault sanitized by becoming a media topic. White cops shooting black people. Corporate corruption and greed so pervasive we assume it is just how business functions on a daily basis. Lies from a self-centered president so undermining that damage to the American soul is hard to fathom.
In the image of the bus driver throwing his keys in the bushes, gun to his head, we see heroism in its clearest form: self-sacrifice for a greater cause. We might not have a Tiananmen Square event in the U.S. -- not yet anyway -- but would there be heroism if and when needed?
2
I was not there. But what was seered into my memory is the comments of a work associate, the son of German immigrants who came to the U.S. after the Holocaust that their society imposed upon my people. There was much criticism from the U.S. toward what was going on in China. We didn't know the scope of it but it was clearly a barbaric attack on the principles of Democracy. What he said was "its 'their'country" implying that we should let "them" do what they want. There is barely a day I don't think back on those words. The unsaid part was that who ever controls the country should be able to do what ever they want. No.. No.. No.. we must not be silent. Violence is in sole possession of the state so when it is used unjustly it must be called out, opposed, exposed.
4
This article makes a lot of claims that there was a massacre but has very little beyond that. I know nothing about where or how bad this massacre was. All it told me was about a single instants where the Chinese army opened fire on Chinese civillians who were demonstrating for thewir rights.
1
When will we see an American Tiananmen? When will Americans take to the streets, risking life and limb, to restore our stolen democracy?
4
An amazing remembrance. Thank you.
4
I always learn from Mr. Kristof's columns and relish this reporting that comes from a primary on the ground source.
But as for punitive attitudes towards the Chinese government..we massacre each other every day with the blessing of the government and industry.
5
@Michelle Teas
The US Army is shooting Americans in the streets? Running them over with tanks? Where? Tell me and I'll go join the martyrs!
1
I said earlier that only the Chinese people can change the behavior of the Chinese govt. That's true. It's also true that the mainland Chinese are not likely to do so short of armed revolution ... which is just not going to happen.
The only Chinese people who are in a position to change the communist party's authoritarianism are the Taiwanese.
The Taiwanese cannot do so by military means. They can only do so by example. By example of a better quality of life than mainland Chinese. That will not happen easily or in the short term.
Communist controls over media ensure that the positive aspects of living in a more liberal socio-political state will not be known by the mainland Chinese.
But the threat of the Taiwanese quality of life greatly exceeding the mainland Chinese quality of life consumes Xi and the communist party. Should their domestic rule become threatened or even chaotic, we can expect that the communists will attack Taiwan, or at least blockade it into submission.
That's when the historical push comes to shove will materialize.
4
In my 10 years living in China I have witnessed tremendous progress in the betterment of Chinese lives driven by their economic growth. Self determination is a basic human instinct hard wired into our DNA. It's why the US, the first modern country to truly embody this inevitability, has risen to lead the world. But while democracy may be the ultimate legitimate expression of that reality, it's not the only path. What China has done with their growth approach actually has granted self determination to most of its people, with of course glaring exceptions. The system is far from perfect, and the silence on Tiananmen is shameful. But in China today the basic decisions about school, family and career are up to each Chinese individual to make. The way this happened was from opening to the outside world. I remember years ago as a young shipping clerk I would daily talk with Tammy, one of the 4 staff in our new Shenzhen office. As we became friends, besides work we also talked about things like what life was like in America. These direct contacts are what brings the global human family together, and it is these contacts that must be preserved and nurtured forever. Pure openness in China won't happen overnight but it will happen. One year later our Shenzhen office swelled to 100 staff and 100 conversations about America.
12
I was at the University of Minnesota student union building when the t.v. news came on in one of their student lounges of what happened in China. There were several Chinese students watching. I watched as one young man threw himself against a wall and cried joined by others who stood in shock or broke down in visceral grief. On that day I took stock of my freedoms with a new awareness of what it means to have rights.
13
"China has saved lives, built universities at a rate of one a week and lifted more people out of poverty than any other country in human history..."
That's not so hard to do when a country receives more FDI than all other developing nations combined over a 30 year period! Why is it so smart to say "yes" to money being offered by western corporations?
As to Mr. Kristof's optimism that affluence will lead to democracy in China, it seems the rest of the world is becoming less democratic not the other way around.
5
Throughout the thousands of years of Chinese history, the strongest forces have prevailed. We have less than 300 years of a sometimes functioning democracy. Whether China becomes a different culture in measurable years seems optimistic.
5
"... I believe we will witness the arrival of freedom...". It's also possible the world might instead witness a kind of "end of history" in the People's Republic with authoritarianism winning a permanent victory. With the combination of widespread prosperity, ever more powerful technology to control the populace, and the multi-millennium tradition of authoritarianism, perhaps the iron-fisted rulers will prevail. The Western commentariat has hoped and predicted that China would become a more open society for 30 years but China has moved in the opposite direction. The lesson of the Russia should not be ignored either. The Russians flirted with a more open society but snapped right back to their old system with the arrival of Vladimir Putin. It's nice to dream that the People's Republic will adopt Western ideals, but
Westerners need to acknowledge the realities of China and respond without vision distorted by rose-colored glasses.
5
@Norm Weaver
I believe Mr. Kristof needs to convince himself that "engagement" will eventually work as originally sold because he was such a strong proponent of that policy.
It has failed!
6
@Norm Weaver
"It's also possible the world might instead witness a kind of "end of history" in China.
I think this is going on in our country as well, and around the whole world. I am not offering this as a "what-about-ist" apology for any form of authoritarianism given the authoritarian president and Republican Party we have running our country.
When Mike Pompeo can stand in front of world leaders and say what an exciting prospect open shipping lanes are in the Arctic, and say this with a straight face, is a measure of how deep we have fallen into a morass of Orwellian authoritarianism.
I think China would be much better off if Tianemen square successfully led to openess and transparency; at least the people wouldn't constantly be fed a bucket of lies about the state of affairs in the world.
1
Thank you Mr. Kristoff. Please translate this article into mandarin and have it distributed all over Asia. I will hand out a few thousand when I am in Asia.
5
The question of democracy in China is more complex than Western elite’s one size fit all idea of democracy - all cultures in the world are not same. The history of evolution of China and Europe is very different - China is a very old civilization and Confucius thoughts are deep rooted in their culture. Western educated students started the freedom movements at the universities did not mean the vast rural population of China are behind them. It was an elite movement resonated with West’s because it is played out of the Western play book. Chinese culture never put freedom over stability and survival - thousands of years this was the basis for Chinese cultural evolution. Why they will put premium on freedom in twenty first century? Freedom will be part of Chinese society, but this will not be in Western template of multiparty democracy, it will be on Single party benevolent government structure with Communist Party acting as platform for people’s aspiration. Very different framework - do not believe on the Greek story of Prokaitia’s bed.
7
@Kalyan Basu
You have stated the best case for the reality here.
6
Obviously you have a grasp of the Culture of China, having learned from extensive history, not headlines and sound bites. Yours is the most realistic view.
6
@Kalyan Basu
"Freedom will be part of Chinese society, but this will not be in Western template of multiparty democracy, it will be on Single party benevolent government structure with Communist Party acting as platform for people’s aspiration."
The primary "freedom" the "benevolent" Communist Party has provided the Chinese people is economic, the freedom to buy things, make things, sell things, but not practice and experience freedom of thought and expression.
Why can't the Chinese Communist Party support the kind of freedom the people of Hong Kong and Taiwan want to preserve and avoid losing if they are subsumed by the massive and mighty Communist government?
I think we need to ask whether American policy over the last 30 years which was hopefully going to lead China toward both economic growth and political liberalization hasn’t just horribly failed on the the second half, but have we actually enabled the brutal regime in Beijing? And given that that they have also been robbing us blind in so many ways what should our policy be going forward? Is a much harsher policy of less cooperation and more containment one that might lead to a better regime for the China people, especially the ethnic minorities going forward?
7
@Todd
I don't think we need to ask ourselves any more. "Engagement" was the biggest foreign policy failure of the late 20th century. Yes, even bigger than Vietnam.
4
Xi and the Communist Party have a limited time to stay in control. In their economic choice to appease the population with increasing affluence, they chose to educate them to accelerate the process. But they made that too wide spread and too well done. If they had done as in the US, they'd provide a middleing education to the masses but conserve the power of an elite education for just a few percent of the population - say 1% but not more than 10%. That way the 90% gets by and they don't complain too much. That's because in the US, they have been taught since childhood that they are "exceptional", they live in the best conditions in the best country in the world - the best education, the best healthcare and the most level justice system. The American exceptionalism myth is powerful and the general population is not educated well enough to "do the math" to test the truth of it.
Beyond that, their major source of continuing education, the free press, has been denounced as an "enemy of the people"and so neutered.
Xi did get it that control of the press and writing Tiananmen Square out of the history books would help maintain control but he really needs to get it written into law that no matter what crime he may commit, as long as he's in office he can't be prosecuted or even accused - now there's control.
10
I agree that liberal democracy will eventually take root in China, if, and it's a big if, we can find a way to accept that it's up to Chinese people (as it was up to American people) to build their own institutions in keeping with their own traditions.
The hostility building in the West against China will enhance the influence and power of antidemocratic political forces.
4
@Molly ONeal
Gee, it's been 47 years since Nixon's trip and about 35 years of "engagement." We went from brief consideration of local elections to Xi changing their constitution. Seems like Roundup has been sprayed on those roots of liberal democracy!
2
Of course we all must condemn the violent reaction of the state at the demonstrations culminating in the protests at Tiananmen Sq. However one cannot help but wonder what China would be like today had the students been able to reflect in mid-May on how incredible much they had been able to achieve & agreed to stand down and savor the results.
But of course they didn't, & lived out once again the mindlessness of mob rule. An authoritarian regime ceded a great deal, but when its very survival was threatened, it did what all such regimes do; it fought back.
3
If you think China can become a democratic country by just snatching its fingers, then you would believe that we are a race neutral or race blind country as well. After more than 200 years of our independence, we are still fighting for racism and inequality, it says a lot about the problems or the challenges. Mr. Lee Kuan Yew, the Singapore Founding Father, once said that democracy requires 60~70% middle class citizen in order to function properly. Other than that, it is popularism at best that creates chaotic situation out of control. China has 400 million middle class citizen out of 1.3 billion people. I see a long way to go before China can accept democracy. We can do all the talking and shaming, but reality is far from ideal to adopt democratic process. Our Russian Gate event during 2016 election is a very good example that voters were easily influenced by fake news. If more middle class citizen participated the democratic process, Trump probably will never get elected.
8
Spot on!!!!
2
Thank you Mr. Kristof for sharing such a painful memory with us. Being a witness to brutality is a burden.
Maybe one day, all humanity will live in a way in accord with our highest ideals. I thought the US would be immune from a president so deeply in love with dictators. Turns out, democracy is indeed a very rare, precious thing.
25
@Mark
Almost no one at the NYT was a more fervent cheerleader for economic "engagement" with China than Mr. Kristof. That was AFTER the massacre.
Engagement has strengthened the very regime that he now so laments.
4
Thank you Nicholas Kristof for this sharing of historical moments it must have been terrifying to witness this.
17
My daughter and her family hosted an intelligent and gifted student from China a few years ago. He was an aspiring concert pianist, a gracious young man. But he knew nothing of the events of Tiananmen Square and my daughter's family was warned not to discuss it.
Thank you or reminding us, Mr. Kristof. Even with the astounding economic success in China I believe education and prosperity can never replace our more basic need for freedom and self determination. I often wonder if that young man was able to see those great ideals through the haze of our materialistic and sometimes violent country.
9
Warned not to discuss it! That would be my cue to talk about it, unless you want the Chinese Communist Party to dictate what you say in your country.
2
Maybe he also saw how our messy process drove legalization of same sex marriage, taking on policing and our political leaders, freedom of religion, and so on. Problem with democracy is that those in it often don’t see the value through the “haze.”
1
I often get the sense in most reportage on China contends that it is "the Chinese century"—that China's growth will continue unabated.
China is supposedly invincible because of the Belt and Road Initiative and the New Silk Road; its competitive trade policies; its growing influence in the South China Sea; its mastery of the surveillance state in the internet age; its hoarding of American capital; the advantages of state capitalism; and so on.
Indeed, beware of The Dragon.
But I also suspect that China's apparent invincibility is resting on sand and mud—the social contract the CCP has with its citizens is not necessarily respected by either side; its economic numbers are opaque and belie a stressed, corrupt, over-stretched economy; its global economic influences are tenuous and backed by a paper tiger; its mastery of the internet forever compromised by an alternative 'dark net' that most Chinese people use, who have little respect for Chinese authorities.
And also, Tianamen, 1989—not as forgotten as China's policy of obfuscation contends.
The world may yet be influenced by the 'China Century'—not because the PRC will continue tightening its grip on its people and the global economy—but perhaps because of the chaos that would be unleashed upon the world if the lid blows off of 1.3 billion people.
6
"Most Chinese" do not use the dark web, a small minority do, and from what I hear they are not doing it to conspire against the Party. Most Chinese use the web the way most Americans do, for trivial entertainment or biased feeds that reinforce their views. Online personalities who stare in the camera spouting nonsense get literally hundreds of millions of followers, while few are aware of or pay attention to an Ai Weiwei.
1
I was a freshman taking a class on the history of Communist China at the time. The protest sparked much discussion and hope among those of us in the class. I wondered then, as I do now, whether I would have the courage of the Chinese dissidents if our roles were reversed. I still do not know the answer to that question. Western governments need to tie economic policy with China to human rights abuses. Threaten the country's economic might and we just may see incremental change. If we simply ignore China's brutality toward it's own people, we are complicit. All of our talk about the bravery of the students in 1989 is just that. Talk.
12
@Christine
"Western governments need to tie economic policy with China to human rights abuses. Threaten the country's economic might and we just may see incremental change. If we simply ignore China's brutality toward it's own people, we are complicit."
Our corporate lobby made sure that DIDN'T happen when they paid for China to be allowed into GATT and then the WTO. Before that, we at least had the pretense of "tying economic policy with China to human rights abuses" through the annual Most Favored Nation vote in Congress.
3
Thank you Kristof, for sharing memories that mirror mine one to one. Our campus was just off Chang'an Ave, hence the many weeks leading up to June 4th and the final two nights imprinted deeply. Thank you for underlining the courage of the people, too, it's one of the aspects that always stood out in my mind.
29
And American kids now are no more aware of Kent State and Jackson State than are Chinese kids aware of Tiananmen Square. (Reference for the unknowing: In May of 1970, at Kent State University in Ohio, National Guard troops fired on students protesting the Vietnam War, killing 4 and injuring 13. A few weeks later, state police fired on protesting students at Jackson State in Mississippi, killing 2 and injuring 11.)
And, just as the Chinese patched up Tiananmen Sq. to erase the history, so did we. Despite massive protests by students who wanted a memorial erected at the site of the Kent State massacre, the university insisted on building a large gym on the site, arguing that there was nowhere else it could be built, and ensuring that there was no room for any memorial.
In the 1970's, the Charter 77 movement began to link human rights with international relations, putting pressure on the Soviet Union. The western world's linking of human rights with trade and diplomacy helped contribute, along with Reagan's arms buildup and Soviet economic mismanagement, to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
One would have thought that that success provided a blueprint for dealing with the Chinese. Instead of making the world safe for democracy, we made it safe for global trade, ignoring human right entirely in China in favor of its low-wage cornucopia of cheap goods. Walmart won; American and Chinese workers both lost.
86
The story is more complicated than you think. I worked in Shanghai in 2005 in IT. The people I worked with (including Chinese minority groups) were very well educated about international affairs, have done very well & travel the world. Everywhere I travel, in the US, Europe, South America, etc, I meet Chinese people traveling on their own not just in groups. To me, it ‘s a quandary.
4
It’s interesting to see how many people who, upon reading Tiananmen anniversary coverage, are compelled to remind all of us that the U.S. is no better. It would be too bad if we allowed ourselves to get all judgey just because of a massacre and a giant coverup
Kent State isn’t the same as Tiananmen and in any case it’s plainly untrue that US kids are no more aware of Kent/Jackson St than Chinese kids are of Tiananmen. Even if it were so, kids who are ignorant of history isn’t the same thing as government obliterating that history and jailing those who don’t cooperate. You think China would allow a Tiananmen protest song similar to Neil Young’s “Ohio?” The lines between U.S. liberal democracy and China’s authoritarianism aren’t as blurry as the “we’re not much better” scolds make them out to be
I didn’t know the story about the memorial vs the Kent St library but there is indeed a substantial memorial there at the campus
8
@Aram Hollman
Can we please stop with the comparisons of Tiananmen Square to Kent State and Jackson State? The terrible tragedies on those US campuses were not the state sponsored massacres that Tiananmen Square was. And yes, while Americans of all ages are poorly informed when it comes to our own history, the events at Kent State and Jackson State have hardly been whitewashed, and are available in the historical record for anyone who wishes to look.
5
A painful lesson for many people globally: capitalism has revealed itself compatible with authoritarian government.
The socialism of centrally planned economies was not to blame, nor alone are charismatic strongman leaders or fascist social movements animated (as classically in Europe and Latin America) by opposition to socialism or a strong left.
Common opinion held that tolerance of greater inequality and poverty was worth the price of liberty and (representative) democracy. But everywhere now it is the worst of both worlds. Squalor and danger/risk + surveillance and policing, including social work and "mental health" care that is profitably controlling, or managerial. We could call it the neoliberal precarity therapeutic police state.
The challenge is to find ways to counter these developments that is driven by some positive vision of a post-capitalist or at least post-neoliberal world. We must reinvent democracy (which is not the same as liberty) and distribute the massive wealth accumulated from labor productivity to provide living and working conditions that are far freer, happier, smarter, and less precarious and barbaric.
Returning to a welfare state model; insisting on constitutional rights; or the nation-state idea; and communitarian appeals to "natural" collectivities or religious virtues--these solutions ignore too much.
We need political and ethical invention, beyond the figures of the laboring society and precarious self-managing cynic.
12
I was only 22 and a senior in college with no real interest in world issues. I remember seeing this horror on television and reading a bit in the news. Unfortunately, like most remote horrors, we forget and move on with our lives. Thank you, Mr. Kristof for bringing the atrocity back fresh in my mind. The bravery of those protesters and those who aided them is immeasurable.
18
Great writing.
Brings us back to 30 years ago, what has transpired, and what must be inevitable.
30 years ago this week I graduated from MIT - It was a solemn day I'll never forget. No joy despite the pageantry of the ceremony. The speeches were all rewritten the night before to reflect on the massacre, and it became a protest.
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The bloody protest by Chinese known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre remains a symbol of courage under fire.
What perplexes me to this day is report from a former Washington Post bureau chief, Jay Mathews, who wrote in Columbia Journalism Review in 1998 that, "as far as can be determined from the available evidence, no one died that night in Tiananmen Square."
Mathews said hundreds of people, "most of them workers and passersby, did die that night, but in a different place and under different circumstances." He says most of the victims were shot by soldiers on stretches of the Avenue of Eternal Peace, which Mathews said was about a mile west of the square.
So is the term "Tiananmen Square Massacre" a recognizable and symbolic reference, but is it also a geographically inaccurate location for one history's most memorable pro-democracy protests? And does it make a difference in historical accounts?
4
@GMK Good sources have estimated that the number of those murdered outright and those sentenced to China's widespread gulag of prisons to top twenty thousand.
Other articles discussed how one Army official gave the crowd so long to clear the Square only to see machine-gunning troops under a different general opening fire within minutes.
Unarmed citizens actually thought their Army would never murder them.
1
Nicholas Kristof, thank you for your very moving account of events in Tiananmen Square.
On Christmas Eve 1969 in Saigon, a group of twenty Christians (Catholic, Quaker, Mennonite, Unitarian, etc.) plus International Voluntary Services (like Peace Corps, but non-governmental) who were volunteers helping in refugee camps, medical relief and community services -- plus several American troops -- planned to hold a Peace Vigil at the Notre Dame Square in downtown Saigon.
We had each seen first hand the horrors the war had wrought on civilians, especially women and children. We intended to pass out hand-made 'Peace Cards' urging China, Russia, and America to cease military support and activities in Vietnam and let the Vietnamese work out their own future.
When we arrived at the Square, we were met by scores of South Vietnamese police and US Military Police (our plans were not secret). The GI's with us were ordered to disperse or face court martial. We civilians moved to the US Embassy but soon herded by the Saigon secret police into a dark alley next to the Embassy where they set upon us with batons.
We called for help to the Marines guarding the Embassy's north gate. They asked just one question: "Are you Americans?"
"Yes!"
Flood lights lit up the alley, and with bayonets fixed the Marines stormed out and saved us from a vicious beating and arrest.
Wish the Chinese military had protected their civilian protestors like the Marines did for us that dark night in Saigon.
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I hope Trump will read this piece and say something. He should tell Xi Jinping about how he feels about this tragic event happened 30 years ago. In fact I was inside the Peking Hotel but we were not allowed to go out but stayed in our room. Will China be a country with freedom and liberty 30 years from now. I know I won't be here thirty years from now. Xi Jinping will not be around also thirty years later. But another Chinese dictator will take over China. there are plenty dictators in China and Chinese history.
5
The question I am asking myself is whether the progress China made in the last 30 years would be possible if the students got their way and the Communist Party capitulated and lost its face. I don't know the answer and nobody knows either.
However, it is not hard to imagine the Chinese Communist Party loosing respect and disintegrating the same way the Communist Party of the former Soviet Union did. What would be a result? Again, most likely the turmoil, former party bosses, criminals, state security forces filling the power vacuum. Power struggles, corruption, hunger, possibly disintegration of China could be also a likely outcome. Does this hypothetical justify the murder of the students? No. But it cannot be ignored either.
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@MB
... or it would have thrived in peace and democracy as South Korea has, Taiwan has, several of its neighbors have. Xinjiang might have split off instead of having its people oppressed and thrown into reeducation camps. Tibet might finally be governing itself as well. Taiwan might not have to live under the threat of a Chinese invasion. Odds are the world would be at least as prosperous, and East Asia a much safer place.
Even following the Russian fate, there is not much reason to belief that China would not have become the world's manufacturing hub. Perhaps some dams and highways would not have been built, or at a slower pace.
As for your scenario of the Soviet Union: Party bosses, corruption, state security, power struggles and hunger... Sounds very much like you are describing the time before the fall of the Berlin wall. Even with Putin in power and his gang of thugs, it is still looking up.
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i often thought about that myself, about the road not taken. I believe it would be the disintegration of China much like the Soviet. I further wonder what possible outcomes those protestors were having in mind then and now.
3
@Dan that is a dystopian scenario, but so is a society in which historical events can be erased from knowledge. What other events and actions have been and will be erased?
2
Recently read your book on your time in China. It tied together many pieces form other books covering the same time. I hunger for another book from you on China today. China is so complex.
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@fraser
Read, Red China Blues by Jan Wong. She witnessed the massacre at Tiananmen Square, being in the square and in the line of fire at the time, and with this has written an exceptional history of contemporary China from the end of the Mao period onward.
1
Real news; real journalism; real courage demonstrated by the protesters and by Nicholas Kristof.
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The Chinese people have a tacit (informal) agreement (for the most part) with their government - allow the middle class to flourish and grow for reduction of privacy and human rights. (so long as it is not one of them or their family/friends that suddenly disappear, or worse)
The west fuels such agreement whenever people drive all the way across town (bypassing their local economies and jobs) to prop up the box store that imports almost everything from them.
For any pressure or trade ''war'' that ensues, then it is the west that gets punished from the tax that is merely relayed onto the consumer. Leaders, insiders and their backers are the ones profiting as they make insider trading moves on the sectors affected and the massive destruction that follows.
What is ultimately going to change the status quo will be climate change and the dramatic effects. - NOT any particular political ideology or government.
When people (across the world) have nowhere to live (droughts, temperature, lost land), nothing to drink (no potable water) nothing to eat (not enough crops for mouths), or air to breath(too much pollution, then the government will reach a crisis point and change or collapse. They are already experiencing this.
It is that simple.
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@FunkyIrishman
there is a tipping point to man made global warming/climate change, when it will be too late to stop it. We can't wait for the scenario you describe to occur, though it is already starting to happen. The United States must lead here, and the rest of the world must follow. This will take a Pro-Democracy movement to triumph over our current fossil fuel robber barons government, and their open alliance with oil oligarch foreign governments, including in the 2016 election, and as far as we can tell, plans to continue this.
4
In '85 we were honored to be among a group of Psychologists from universities across the US invited to visit hospitals in China and share the latest in treatment now that China had opened up to the World. Returning, we could not wait to share with dear friends who had escaped for their lives during the Cultural Revolution. We told of the beauties, the friendliness, the hunger for knowledge. ( our "minder" told us "the Russians gave us buildings, You give us knowledge") We told them they must take their children to see their heritage. Give them an appreciation for this amazing country their parents had to flee.
They finally got the courage to return without the fear of not being detained. They bought tickets, made their plans, contacted those they knew who still lived in their villages... all was set. Then before they left on their journey home Tiananmen Square erupted. Losing their trust that they could return to the US they cancelled their trip.
Knowing how beautiful the people we met were, how much love they showed us... we cried as we watched their hopes being dashed and screamed in horror at the brutality.
51
My parents were visiting China that week and had been in Tiananmen Square the day before this cruel tragedy. They had also been in Golan Heights the day before shooting there. As a result, I asked them to stop starting wars wherever they went.
This was my humorous way of expressing fear for their safety. But there is nothing funny about soldiers shooting into a crowd of people who are asking for their human rights.
36
I was just a girl when this happened and I remember watching the news for hours as it was breaking. I could hardly comprehend the courage of those students, not much older than I was, really. I felt so confident at the time that I lived in a nation of unprecedented freedom, that something like this could never happen in America, that our belief in free speech and a truly free press would always save us. Now I'm not so sure. I hope that all of us can muster even a fraction of the bravery shown by the Chinese people in Tiananmen Square as we protect what those students were willing to die to have for themselves.
109
@CiaoAMS I certainly hope all people who believe women have a right to control their own reproductive decisions will be out in the streets if a Roe case comes to the Supreme Court.
7
The Tiananmen massacre was definitely a tragedy and enormous black mark on the history of the Chinese government. But it is easy to focus on this tragedy and ignore similar tragedies around the world - even here in the good ol' US of A.
I'm talking, of course, about the Kent State tragedy, when American soldiers fired on American college students. The Kent State incident differs from Tiananmen only in scale, not in substance. In both cases students were protesting unfair government policies and seeking a more enlightened approach; in America, however, students were protesting an unjust war. Viewing today's military activity around the world I have to wonder if anything has changed.
Meanwhile, I was in Cairo from 2012 to 2015, when Egypt tried to rebuild itself after its successful overthrow of Mubarak. In Egypt, soldiers refused to fire on Egyptians, and instead instructed Mubarak to leave. I saw Morsi being elected, and his overthrow a year later - and then I saw Egypt slaughtering hundreds of its own citizens for insisting that Morsi remain in office. Considering Sisi's authoritarianism today, again I have to ask: what changed?
Suppose the Chinese military had succumbed, had removed the communist government from power, and facilitated an attempt at democracy in China. Would they now be a thriving democracy, or would they have returned to another form of military dictatorship, like Egypt?
28
@TL Mischler
There is no comparison. At Kent State the Guardsmen were firing over the heads of the protesters and the bullets accidentally hit students far from the protests.
China has only been making progress only relative to the primitive economic conditions which were the result of Mao's repression and cruelty. Most of China's progress has come from copying and stealing Western technology. President Xi seems determined to take China back to the near-stone-age days of Mao.
25
I feel one of the important differences between the two events is that the Kent State shooting was well publicized and known across the United States. While those students died, their deaths contributed to the anti war movement in the U.S., and in the end, probably aided in stopping the U.S. participation in that war. The deaths of the students in China have resulted pretty much no changes and it could be argued they died in vain.
5
Ouch...
Please, at the very least, read the Wikipedia article on the Kent State shootings.
To call these shootings an "accident" is an injustice in itself.
2
We must all remember. Great work, Nick.
89
The memory of the rickshaw driver who purposely swerved to plead with you to "tell the world" is an amazing example of courage. Yet in our government today we have wealthy, educated (mostly) men who know loud and clear what democracy is yet show little to no courage in defending or protecting it.
242
I am trying to hold on to the belief that events like Tiananmen couldn't happen here because of the democratic and constitutional government we live in and not a dictatorship or authoritarian regime. But there are ongoing events that put bedrock norms and constitutional principles like First Amendment rights in increasing jeopardy.
Tiananmen was government sponsored terrorism. In America, our terrorism has become homegrown but only in the last two years has it included a government component, targeting immigrants and other select groups.
I'm not sure I can hold on to my optimistic beliefs much longer, but I'm trying.
117
@A Goldstein I am not optimistic at all. We have too many people in gov't, the military, the police, and most important the judicial who think what tRump is doing is just fine. And this is in 2yrs time. We can't even be sure we will have fair and honest elections. So where does the hope come from? The queen is going to act like DJT is a friend of England.
13
@A Goldstein It makes me weep.
3
@A Goldstein
On a far smaller scale but just as important to the victims, the Kent State massacre in 1970 of four students protesting the escalation of the Vietnam War drew little concern, much less condemnation, by anyone in the federal government.
The oligarchic rulers of the US government have always been primed to kill anyone in their way, including their own people.
6
Thank you for your witness, Mr. Kristof. We will not forget.
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