Over the past decades, I have been highly conflicted about the Tiananmen crackdown. The Western media has repeatedly emphasised the brutal suppression of the thousands of Chinese students at Tiananmen Square in Beijing in June 1989. These noble-minded young people had assembled by the hundreds of thousands that spring, demanding reforms, democracy and the end of corruption and nepotism in the Communist Party.
The reports in the Western press gave the impression that Chinese troops and tanks fired indiscriminately into the crowds of students, massacring thousands of them on June 4, 1989, staining the image of the Communist Party forever and ending the West’s hopes for the democracy movement.
However, WikiLeaks’ release of diplomatic cables from the US embassy in Beijing to Washington revealed that there was no mass shooting of students in the square.
Troops proceeding into the square were met by barricades and fierce resistance put up by protesters, including workers. A few soldiers were beaten up and the troops opened fire, resulting in hundreds of casualties among the brave protesters.
By the time the troops arrived at the square, the students had already begun to disperse and no mass slaughter took place there, although there could have been several sporadic challenges resulting in death. In all, a thousand people could have succumbed to the troops’ onslaught.
The fact that China has suppressed all news of this event has not helped and begets a guilty conscience. There could be more clarity if China acknowledges what transpired 30 years ago and reveals the true extent of the casualties.
Perhaps the tragic event truly shocked the Chinese government to its core in the bloody way it ended and so it has tried to scrub it from the history books. If thousands in fact died, it would be better to let the truth prevail, own up to mistakes made and not to let such a catastrophic event fester and cloud the history of China.
Truth will liberate our minds and perhaps eliminate the collective amnesia of the Chinese people on this tragic event.
People who were present at the square also have a responsibility to speak truthfully and not use innuendos to further their cause. It could well be that China has been maligned by the West with the scale of the suppression exaggerated. Nonetheless, the entire world deserves to know the truth, one way or the other.
L.K. Cheah, Toronto