Just as the Pentagon Papers laid bare the secret American decision making behind the Vietnam War and changed forever our view of the nation's political leaders, so too has The Tiananmen Papers altered our perception of how and why the events of June 4 took the shape they did. Its publication has proven to be a landmark event in Chinese and world history.
Just as the Pentagon Papers laid bare the secret American decision making behind the Vietnam War and changed forever our view of the nation's political leaders, so too has The Tiananmen Papers altered our perception of how and why the events of June 4 took the shape they did. Its publication has proven to be a landmark event in Chinese and world history.
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Overview
Just as the Pentagon Papers laid bare the secret American decision making behind the Vietnam War and changed forever our view of the nation's political leaders, so too has The Tiananmen Papers altered our perception of how and why the events of June 4 took the shape they did. Its publication has proven to be a landmark event in Chinese and world history.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781586481223 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | PublicAffairs |
| Publication date: | 06/06/2002 |
| Edition description: | Reprint |
| Pages: | 580 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d) |
| Lexile: | 1330L (what's this?) |
About the Author
Perry Link is professor of Chinese language and literature at Princeton University. In 1988-89 he served as Beijing director of a subcommittee of the National Academy of Sciences. He is the author of many books, including Evening Chats in Beijing: Probing China's Predicament (Norton).
Orville Schell, dean of graduate studies in journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, is considered one of America's foremost experts on China. His most recent book on contemporary China is The China Reader: the Reform Era (Vintage).
Read an Excerpt
Chapter One
April 8-23
The Student Movement
Begins
EDITORS' NOTE: The death by heart attack of the popular pro-reform leader Hu Yaobang on April 15 fell like a spark into the highly flammable atmosphere of elite division and popular disaffection. For the Party leadership, Hu was a "loyal Communist fighter" and "great proletarian revolutionary," but for students he was a symbol of liberal reform and clean government. They launched spontaneous mourning activities, using Hu's death as an opportunity to express their dissatisfaction with the pace of political change. These activities spread rapidly, surprising the leaders and eliciting much foreign attention.
At first, most of the students were careful to remain on the right side of the regime's ambiguous ground rules for action and speech. They marched to mourn rather than to protest, and they focused their attention on Hu Yaobang's contributions to the Party, the need to accelerate political reform, and opposition to corruption. But a minority raised more dangerous issues, such as democracy and press freedom, or voiced slogans with a hostile edge against the Party or certain leaders. The leaders were divided in their evaluations of the student movement's threat.
Because officials refused to meet student petitioners at the Great Hall of the People, a sit-in developed in front of Zhongnanhai's Xinhua Gate starting the night of April 19. The security ministries and local governments provided almost hour-by-hour and campus-by-campus reports on student activities in Beijing and throughout the country.Two reports from Beijing municipal authorities to Party Central depicted the student movement as dangerous. The emergence of autonomous student organizations sharpened the challenge to the regime. Opinion hardened among the Elders.
When the leaders gathered for Hu's memorial service on April 22, they encountered a peaceful but vast demonstration outside the Great Hall of the People. Although the demonstration was extremely worrying, Zhao Ziyang nonetheless won the approval of the supreme leader, Deng Xiaoping, and prevailed on his Politburo colleagues to take a relatively soft line with the students. The leadership seemed to assume that the students had made their point and would now be willing to go back to classes. It was a wildly inaccurate assumption, but Zhao was confident that all would be well as he departed for a week-long state visit to North Korea. His absence from China was to prove crucial in the decisions to come.
April 8-15
The death of Hu Yaobang
At 9 A.M. on April 8, in Qinzheng Hall at Zhongnanhai, Zhao Ziyang chaired a Politburo meeting to discuss views on a document called "Central Committee Decision on Certain Questions in Educational Development and Reform (Draft)." Hu Yaobang, although relieved of his position as Party general secretary in January 1987, remained as a member of the Politburo and attended this meeting. Commissioner of Education Li Tieying briefed the members.
Based on participants' notes of an oral report given by Wen Jiabao, in his role as secretary of Party Committees of units under Party Central and director of the Party Central Office, to the senior working staff of those offices, and of an oral report given by Luo Gan in his capacity as secretary general of the State Council and secretary of Party Committees in ministry-level state organizations, to senior staff of those offices
During this briefing, Hu Yaobang sat with a pinched look. Minister of Defense Qin Jiwei later recalled, "I sensed something wrong about Comrade Yaobang from the time the meeting opened. His face was ashen. But he was straining to keep up appearances." About three quarters of an hour into the meeting, as Li Tieying was reviewing the education budgets of recent years, Hu appeared to be fading. He rose to request permission to leave. But as soon as he rose to his feet, he collapsed back into his chair.
"Comrade Ziyang ..." His voice broke off as his hand faltered in the air, describing a semicircle. Everyone present, caught by surprise, stood up and stared at the ashen-faced Hu.
"It's probably a heart attack.... Don't move him!" someone said.
"Anyone have nitroglycerin?" Zhao Ziyang asked urgently.
"I do!" It was Qin Jiwei, who also had a heart condition. He took two pills from his briefcase and put them into Hu Yaobang's mouth. Then to Hu Qili, who came rushing over, he said, "Hurry and lay Comrade Yaobang on the floor."
Hu slowly opened his eyes as staff members telephoned Liberation Army Hospital 305, which was only a block from Zhongnanhai. Paramedics were on the scene in about ten minutes. That afternoon, after Hu's condition had improved slightly, he was transferred to Beijing Hospital for observation.
Everyone was alarmed about Hu's condition, but no one expected him to die. Beijing Hospital sent daily reports to the General Office of the Central Committee, and these were relayed to Zhao Ziyang and other members of the Politburo. All reports indicated that Hu was on the road to recovery.
Thus the news of his death on April 15 was that much greater a shock. Zhao Ziyang immediately summoned all Politburo members who were currently in Beijing to attend a meeting to plan arrangements for a funeral and obituary. He also instructed the General Office to "notify elder comrades such as Xiaoping, Chen Yun, Xiannian, Peng Zhen, Yingchao, Marshal Xu, and Marshal Nie." The meeting was somber and yet rushed.
"We're deeply saddened and shocked at Comrade Yaobang's passing," said Zhao Ziyang.
"Really a pity," added Yang Shangkun. "Who'd think he'd go so soon?"
Then Zhao turned the discussion to practical issues, including the formation of a funeral committee. He began with his own brief assessment of Hu's life: "Comrade Hu Yaobang was a loyal, tried, and tested Communist fighter, a great proletarian revolutionary and politician, an outstanding political worker for our army and a prominent leader who held many important Party posts over a long period of time. His funeral should accord with the norm for standing members of the Politburo."
"I entirely agree with Comrade Ziyang's suggestion," Yang Shangkun offered.
"Comrades," Zhao then asked, "are there any objections to the assessment or the funeral recommendation?"
When no one objected Zhao went on, "The assessment of Comrade Yaobang must 'seek truth from facts.' Let's ask the General Office to forward the obituary draft to the older comrades Xiaoping, Chen Yun, and Xiannian for comment. Comrades [Hu] Qili and [Wen] Jiabao, can you please consult with Comrade Li Zhao about funeral arrangements?"
Zhao Ziyang also raised the matter of social stability at the meeting. "Comrade Qiao Shi," he said, "please keep a close watch on how Comrade Yaobang's death might impact society."
"At the moment, society's in pretty good shape," Qiao replied. "Things are fairly stable. There are no signs of any large or organized disturbances. Personnel at all levels of the security and legal systems will keep close tabs on responses in society to Comrade Yaobang's death."
"Consumer prices are rising fast," Yao Yilin commented. "And the gap between rich and poor is getting bigger. We'd better watch that some people don't use the mourning for Comrade Yaobang as an excuse to make their complaints."
"Comrade Tieying," interjected Li Peng, "we should keep a close eye on the universities, especially ones like Peking University. College students are always the most sensitive."
"Things are good at the universities," Li Tieying replied. "It's not very likely there'll be any trouble."
Li Ximing, Party secretary for the Municipality of Beijing, pronounced, "We absolutely must protect social order in the capital and guarantee social stability during the mourning period."
"Comrade Qili," said Zhao Ziyang, "can you ask the news agency to prepare an announcement, and also watch for overseas reactions to Comrade Yaobang's death?" Then, to Secretary Rui Xingwen of the Central Committee Secretariat, who was in charge of propaganda and public opinion, Zhao said, "Comrade Xingwen, tonight Party Central is going to release an announcement on Comrade Yaobang's funeral for joint broadcast by Central People's Broadcasting and China Central Television (CCTV). Can you ask the Broadcast Ministry to notify the stations to be ready?"
Deng Xiaoping's secretary, Wang Ruilin, observed the senior leader's reaction when he heard the news of Hu Yaobang's death on the morning of April 15: "He immediately ground out his cigarette and crossed his hands weakly across his chest. Then, a moment later, he lit up another cigarette and puffed at it fiercely." That afternoon, when Zhao Ziyang went to Deng's home at Miliang Lane, Di'anmen District, to report Hu's death in person, Deng had recovered from his shock and had already asked his wife Zhuo Lin to telephone Hu's widow Li Zhao to express condolences. He told Zhao Ziyang that he agreed with the Politburo's statement on Hu, approved of the funeral arrangements, and would attend the memorial.
The news of the death elicited various reactions from other senior leaders, according to members of their staffs. Chen Yun, who was ill at the time, had little to say.
Li Xiannian's reaction was to say over and over, "How could that be? How could it be? I called him only a few days ago, and he sounded fine." His tone of voice seemed to reflect his sadness at Hu's death and remorse over his earlier insistence that Hu resign.
Wang Zhen, known for his strong "peasant ideology," let out a long sigh at the news of Hu's death. Wang and Hu were from the same county, Liuyang in Hunan Province, and the two had been close until the younger Hu became Party general secretary. After this promotion, Hu did not listen to Wang as he had before, and Wang seemed envious of Hu as the new "number-one citizen of Liuyang County." Wang waited for his chance, which came in 1987, to topple Hu Yaobang.
The top leader most deeply affected by the news of Hu's death was Marshal Nie Rongzhen. He sent Comrade Li Zhao a letter of condolence that said, "It is extremely painful to me that Comrade Yaobang has left us before I have! I am old and frail and must rest my hopes on younger generations. I mourn Comrade Yaobang's death deeply. The Central Committee's obituary is a good assessment of Comrade Yaobang, so I will add only this note on his performance during the War of Liberation: When he was successively a military column commissar and corps political director, he was very good at political work.... Officials and ordinary people who met him had only good things to say about him. He made outstanding contributions to the liberation of North China."
April 15-17
Initial reaction at home and abroad
From the time of Hu's death to the morning of April 17, some fifty reports flowed into Party Central and the State Council from local governments, the two security ministries (State Security and Public Security), and the Xinhua News Agency describing responses to the death among officials and ordinary people. Throughout the 1980s Hu had earned a reputation as the top leadership's strongest advocate of leading China out of the stifling constrictions of the Mao years. Although most Chinese were satisfied with the Center's evaluation of Hu, some complained that he had not been given enough respect in the years after his forced retirement. Spontaneous mourning activities occurred on campuses. People gathered at the Monument to the People's Heroes in Tiananmen Square with wreaths, flowers, and couplets praising Hu as a reformer and a democrat. In Shanghai large and small protest posters appeared on university campuses. In Xi'an young people brought wreaths to the square in front of the Posts and Telecommunications Building. The police reports made clear that the spontaneous mourning reflected Hu's popularity as a voice for values that young people believed in.
Over the same period, Xinhua and other agencies provided top officials with more than one hundred reports on foreign reactions. The story of Hu Yaobang's death and the way the government was dealing with it received worldwide coverage, most of it favorable. The foreign press praised Hu for his pragmatism and honesty and commended the government for announcing his death promptly. Most foreign media anticipated that the loss of Hu would have no impact on Chinese politics. But the Japanese Kyodo and Jiji news agencies both raised the possibility that against a background of widespread feelings against inflation and corruption and student demands for more democracy, popular mourning activities could develop into a challenge to the government, especially if the government tried to brush them off too lightly.
April 17-18
The student movement begins to spread
On April 17 student mourning activities began to spread from the Beijing campuses into the nation's symbolic central space, Tiananmen Square. The Square lies at the geographic center of the capital city and just southeast of Zhongnanhai, where the last dynasty's emperors had their hunting park and where the top Communist leaders now work. Beginning with the May Fourth Movement in 1919, Tiananmen has also become a traditional site for popular protests. These protests have often been led by university students, who are especially numerous here because Beijing is the country's preeminent center of higher education.
Party Central and the State Council had ordered the Public Security and State Security Ministries to keep close watch on the students, which they did. According to their reports, on the afternoon of April 17 some six hundred students and young faculty from the Chinese University of Political Science and Law (CUPSL) entered the Square with mourning banners and wreaths. They shouted slogans in favor of freedom, democracy, and the rule of law. Police officers were unable to disperse the crowd. More than ten thousand student marchers and onlookers gathered, staying until 4 P.M.; six students from CUPSL placed a flower wreath at the foot of the Monument to the People's Heroes.
Foreign reporters made recordings, took pictures, and tried to find out whether the students harbored antigovernment feelings. In one such interview overheard and recorded by a security official, a demonstrator insisted that the students' only purpose was to express their respect for Hu Yaobang in a law-abiding way. Questioned further by the foreign reporter, the student added that the demonstrators favored reform and that opposing dictatorship did not mean opposing the government.
Groups of students from other Beijing universities also conducted mourning activities, and by 5 P.M. some nine wreaths marked with the names of institutions of higher education had been placed near the monument. In the early evening a crowd of two to three thousand gathered in front of the monument and heard spontaneous speeches and readings of poems praising Hu. The group included Beijing residents, people from out of town, and foreigners. At 9:10 P.M. a foreign TV reporter recorded an interview with a citizen from outside Beijing who said that students from his town would follow the example of Beijing's students in taking to the streets. By dawn the next morning there were still two or three hundred people at the monument, and they showed no signs of dispersing.
Meanwhile, a column of about a thousand marchers had set out from Peking University. They were joined by an additional two thousand or so from other universities along the route. Significantly, the column included nine cars registered to foreign embassies, with embassy officials and foreign reporters mixing with and talking to the marchers. About 4:30 A.M. the column entered the Square, unfurling a banner of mourning for Hu on the monument and setting wreaths. A student speaking from the monument said the students were self-organized, had nothing to do with the officially sponsored student organization, and had elected representatives to negotiate with the government. He said the students were demanding, among other things, that the government resign to apologize for having made mistakes in policy. Prompted by other students, he added that the students demanded freedom of the press and of speech, democratic elections, and greater transparency in government. All this was recorded by foreign reporters.
According to another report, students from the Beijing Institute of Aeronautics marched to the gates of Beijing Normal University to try to get its students to join them but were turned back by staff and guards.
At dawn on April 18 several hundred students from Peking University and People's University started a sit-in in front of the Great Hall of the People and demanded to be received by a leader of the rank of NPC Standing Committee member or higher. They announced seven demands of the government: (1) affirm as correct Hu Yaobang's views on democracy and freedom; (2) admit that the campaigns against spiritual pollution and bourgeois liberalization had been wrong; (3) publish information on the income of state leaders and their family members; (4) end the ban on privately run newspapers and permit freedom of speech; (5) increase funding for education and raise intellectuals' pay; (6) end restrictions on demonstrations in Beijing; and (7) hold democratic elections to replace government officials who made bad policy decisions. In addition, they demanded that the government-controlled media print and broadcast their demands and that the government respond to them publicly.
A standoff prevailed throughout the day. At 8 A.M. and again at 5:30 P.M. lower-ranking officials met with student representatives Guo Haifeng and Wang Dan, both from Peking University. But the students were not satisfied. Meanwhile, students from many campuses continued to converge on Tiananmen Square; they were joined at the end of the day by others who had been sitting in before the Great Hall of the People, where the NPC had its offices, at the edge of the Square. Students praised Hu Yaobang as the "soul of democracy" and sang the worldwide Communist anthem, the "Internationale."
By 10:50 P.M. about two thousand students and onlookers had moved from Tiananmen to the Xinhua Gate of Zhongnanhai. The crowd was disorderly, and transport along Chang'an Boulevard was obstructed.
The leaders' vigilance
On the morning of April 17 the Politburo continued work on the draft decision on education, which they had been discussing on April 8 when Hu Yaobang had his heart attack. That afternoon, Li Tieying reported separately to Zhao Ziyang and Li Peng on some of the campus memorial activities for Hu Yaobang around the country. He said that He Dongchang had alerted him to some worrisome trends and that the State Education Commission (SEC) would immediately issue an instruction on how to deal with them.
Zhao Ziyang said that the students' patriotism should be affirmed, although any inappropriate methods of action should pointed out to them, and that they should be instructed to take the broad view and let reason be their watchword. Li Peng said that problems should be nipped in the bud. The same day Yao Yilin warned Li Peng that there were advocates of bourgeois liberalization who had been waiting for just such an opportunity as Hu Yaobang's death. He said that they would try to take advantage of the students' patriotism to promote their ideology and that their activities must be blocked.
That evening Li Peng telephoned the mayor of Beijing, Chen Xitong. The premier had just read a batch of materials that had been sent over, from which he understood that there was a large gathering of students in Tiananmen Square. He wanted to know what was going on. Chen gave Li a simple report and the next morning sent over a fuller report.
Excerpts from Beijing Municipal Government, "Report on
mourning activities for Comrade Hu Yaobang at Beijing institutions
of higher education," April 18
Mourning activities for Comrade Hu Yaobang by Beijing university students began to show signs of heating up on April 17.
According to data compiled this morning by the Municipal Education Bureau, since Comrade Hu Yaobang's death, students from twenty-six Beijing universities have held spontaneous memorials. More than seven hundred eulogies, memorial couplets, and posters have appeared on campuses.
On the morning of April 17 the situation at Peking University remained fairly normal. At noon a few people began shouting outside the student dormitories, which brought many students downstairs. Within twenty minutes, one thousand to two thousand students, mostly freshmen and sophomores, had congregated in the Triangle area. They were shouting and highly emotional. After making wreaths and banners, they left for Tiananmen. At People's University a "Democracy Wall" appeared on the evening of April 17. Spontaneous memorial activities took place on other campuses that until now had been quiet. In addition to pasting up eulogies, memorial couplets, and posters, students made speeches, set up symbolic biers, and delivered wreaths to the Square. Some even demanded to attend the funeral. In a single day, ninety-three handwritten memorial couplets appeared at the Beijing University of Science and Engineering.
Analysis of more than seven hundred posters, memorial couplets, and eulogies shows that their contents seem to fall into three categories: (1) normal expressions of mourning (most are this), (2) protests against injustices that Comrade Yaobang suffered during his life, and (3) inflammatory attacks on the current state of society.
According to some students, activities of this sort had been talked about for quite a while, and Comrade Hu Yaobang's death only provided the occasion for them to emerge. Accordingly, we will watch developments closely, will warn potential manipulators against distorting the direction and purposes of the mourning activities, and will take steps to block the activities of certain key persons.
The SEC issued its promised notice on April 18. It ordered provincial education departments and officials of those universities it administers to "carry out painstaking thought work to strengthen guidance of students ... [and to] keep a clear head in dealing with certain people with ulterior motives who would use this occasion to attack the Party and government."
Student mourning in the provinces
On April 17 and 18 province-level Party Committees sent reports to Party Central describing the mourning activities for Hu that were occurring in their jurisdictions and reporting how they were handling them. In Shanghai, groups of up to several thousand students conducted spontaneous demonstrations, with one group unsuccessfully demanding to be received by officials of the Municipal Government. After holding an urgent meeting, the Municipal Party Committee, headed by Jiang Zemin, issued a notice ordering that mourning activities be carried out within work units and not beyond, in order to avoid effects on public order.
In Tianjin the police managed for the most part to confine student demonstrators to the campus of Nankai University. In Nanjing students applied to the police for permission for a march by an estimated ten thousand students from several campuses. The police attempted to dissuade them, citing the difficulties of keeping order, and the students relented, but comrades in the provincial Public Security Department expected them to carry out a large-scale mourning activity of some kind anyhow.
Student mourning activities for Hu were also reported in Xi'an. In Hunan the Provincial Party Committee warned that the apparent calm on some campuses was deceptive. An uneasy mood prevailed among students and faculty. Mourning activities might peak during the official meetings to memorialize Hu. Some were even saying that mourning activities for Hu should be combined with the activities to commemorate the upcoming seventieth anniversary of May Fourth. To deal with this possibility, the committee had ordered all relevant departments to step up their work guiding students and to provide round-the-clock staffing to keep watch on the situation.
Foreign reports see a
confrontation emerging
Foreign reports forwarded to Zhongnanhai on April 17 and 18 all concentrated on events in Beijing, with the exception of one Associated Press story that mentioned student activities in Shanghai. The reports stressed the confrontational nature of student demands. Reuters quoted some diplomats and China analysts as predicting that the authorities could not prevent the spread of the student movement and might eventually have to use force to suppress it. The Hong Kong Standard noted that the student movement followed upon earlier demands for amnesty for political prisoners and for a broadening of democratization and that it occurred at a time of anticipation created by the impending seventieth anniversary of May Fourth. Hence it was likely to increase in size and to develop into a broader pro-democracy movement.
(Continues...)
Table of Contents
| Preface: Reflections on June Fourth | xi | |
| Introduction: The Documents and Their Significance | xv | |
| Prologue: 1986-Spring 1989: Seeds of Crisis | 3 | |
| Chapter 1 | April 8-23: The Student Movement Begins | 19 |
| Chapter 2 | April 24-30: The April 26 Editorial | 56 |
| Chapter 3 | May 1-6: Signs of Compromise | 100 |
| Chapter 4 | May 6-16: Hunger Strike | 121 |
| Chapter 5 | May 16-19: The Fall of Zhao Ziyang | 175 |
| Chapter 6 | May 19-22: Martial Law | 223 |
| Chapter 7 | May 23-25: The Conflict Intensifies | 277 |
| Chapter 8 | May 26-28: The Elders Choose Jiang Zemin | 297 |
| Chapter 9 | May 29-June 3: Preparing to Clear the Square | 318 |
| Chapter 10 | June Fourth | 365 |
| Epilogue: June 1989 and After: Renewed Struggle over China's Future | 419 | |
| Afterword: Reflections on Authentication | 459 | |
| Abbreviations | 475 | |
| Who Was Who: One Hundred Brief Biographies | 477 | |
| Index | 491 |