Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
09BEIJING1387
2009-05-22 12:37:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Beijing
Cable title:  

TIANANMEN: JUNE 4 MEMORIES REMAIN FRESH FOR

Tags:  PHUM PGOV PREL PROP CH 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO2246
OO RUEHCN RUEHGH RUEHVC
DE RUEHBJ #1387/01 1421237
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 221237Z MAY 09 ZDK
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 4121
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 06 BEIJING 001387 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/22/2029
TAGS: PHUM PGOV PREL PROP CH
SUBJECT: TIANANMEN: JUNE 4 MEMORIES REMAIN FRESH FOR
TWENTY-SOMETHING YOUTH, DISSIDENTS, AND THE PARTY, DESPITE
CENSORSHIP

REF: A. BEIJING 400

B. BEIJING 1249

BEIJING 00001387 001.2 OF 006


Classified By: Political Internal Unit Chief
Dan Kritenbrink. Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

SUMMARY
-------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 06 BEIJING 001387

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/22/2029
TAGS: PHUM PGOV PREL PROP CH
SUBJECT: TIANANMEN: JUNE 4 MEMORIES REMAIN FRESH FOR
TWENTY-SOMETHING YOUTH, DISSIDENTS, AND THE PARTY, DESPITE
CENSORSHIP

REF: A. BEIJING 400

B. BEIJING 1249

BEIJING 00001387 001.2 OF 006


Classified By: Political Internal Unit Chief
Dan Kritenbrink. Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

SUMMARY
--------------


1. (C) Twenty years on, the June 4, 1989 violent
crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators continues
to have a powerful impact on Chinese society and
politics, despite the fact that the event remains a
taboo subject, according to a range of Embassy
contacts. The Party has reportedly created a
special June 4 working group to ensure that that the
anniversary passes "smoothly." Although local Party
officials are warning about the potential for
unrest, and activists plan to commemorate the day by
wearing white, most Embassy contacts believe tight
security will make any significant public protest or
commemoration impossible. Groups of parents of
students killed in the crackdown and of liberal
academics, however, each managed to hold small
gatherings in Beijing earlier this month. On the
Internet, people are using euphemisms for June 4,
such as "May 35," to engage in limited discussion of
the anniversary, and students have demonstrated a
surprisingly high level of knowledge about
Tiananmen. Though many still give the Party credit
for two decades of rapid growth, several contacts
believe that the vast majority of people, both
inside and outside the Party, think the use of
deadly force on June 4 was a mistake. Nonetheless,
contacts predicted the Party would not revisit its
verdict on June 4 anytime soon and would only dare
"reopen" the "Pandora's box" of Tiananmen once more
time passes and China grows more stable. End
Summary.

THE 1989 "POLITICAL DISTURBANCE"
--------------


2. (C) Twenty years on, the June 4, 1989 violent
crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators continues
to have a powerful impact on Chinese society and
politics, despite the fact that the event remains a
taboo subject, according to a range of Embassy
contacts. Public mention of the June 4 massacre is

extremely rare in China today. When
occasional references are made to the event in the
media or in official settings, the crackdown is
almost always referred to as the 1989 "political
disturbance" (zhengzhi fengbo). Typing this term
into the popular (and heavily censored) Chinese
search engine Baidu will bring up links to the terse
official PRC versions of Tiananmen (i.e., that a
small group of "counterrevolutionaries" hijacked the
student movement in an attempt to "overthrow" the
Communist Party),but no recent articles. PRC media
have been silent on the upcoming 20th anniversary.
One of the only places in Beijing where one can see
public reference to June 4 is the Beijing Police
Museum, where a memorial to fallen police officers
includes remembrances for several who lost their
lives during the "disturbance" of 1989.

PARTY LEADERSHIP WORKING TO ENSURE SMOOTH JUNE 4
-------------- ---


3. (C) Maintenance of stability during the 20th
anniversary of June 4, one of the most sensitive
anniversaries in a year full of important historical
dates for China (ref A),is a top priority for the
Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The central
leadership has formed a special June 4 "leadership
small group" that is meeting frequently to ensure no
major incidents or commemorations related to June 4
take place, according to Chen Jieren (protect),
nephew of Politburo Standing Committee Member He
Guoqiang and News Director at Youth.cn, a news
website operated by the Communist Youth League.
Chen told PolOffs May 13 that Internet censorship
related to the anniversary was very intense. For
example, a recent blog posting urging motorists to
turn on their headlights on June 4 was quickly
censored.


4. (C) Although discussion of June 4 in the media

BEIJING 00001387 002 OF 006


and on the Internet has been sharply curtailed, the
topic has been mentioned frequently in internal
Party and Government meetings this year. The week
of May 18, PolOffs, using directed Google searches
with the key word "political disturbance" and
".gov.cn" addresses, were able to download numerous
internal Party speeches and documents warning of the
"dangers" posed by the June 4 anniversary. For
example, a document issued by the Party Committee of
Rongshui Miao Autonomous County in Guangxi to
township-level cadres warned that "hostile domestic
and foreign forces" would engage in a "new round of
subversion" in 2009 and listed the Tiananmen
anniversary as a key stability challenge during the
April-to-July period. PolOffs found similar
references to June 4 in internal speeches by local
leaders in Jiangsu, Jiangxi, and Zhejiang provinces,
among other places. (Note: PolOffs have found that
governments at the district and township levels --
the lowest in China's governing structure -- tend to
be more lax about what they save on their open web
servers.)

WEARING WHITE THE ONLY WAY TO PROTEST?
--------------


5. (C) None or our sources predicted that any
significant protests or public events would take
place June 4 due to extremely tight security,
although they did not rule out the possibility of
"isolated incidents." Wu Jiaxiang (protect),a
former CCP General Office official and advisor to
late General Secretary Zhao Ziyang who was jailed
following the crackdown, told PolOffs May 18 that
"nothing is going to happen" on June 4. The more
sensitive the date, Wu observed, the more "stable"
China becomes as security services clamp down on any
perceived source of unrest. Guo Yushan (protect),
the founder of the pro-reform private think tank the
Transition Institute, said he and other activists at
the Institute had already received warnings from
state security agents to refrain from any
commemoration. Guo said he and his friends would
wear white June 4 but otherwise had no plans for
additional action. Other Embassy contacts,
including some journalists, have also told us they
intend to wear white on June 4 as a way to
commemorate the date (ref B).

GRIEVING PARENTS HOLD MEMORIAL
--------------


6. (C) Although Embassy contacts predicted that no
Tiananmen-related meetings would be allowed on the
anniversary itself, two significant commemorations
have already taken place. On May 17, as many as 50
parents whose children were killed in the 1989
crackdown attended a memorial service in Beijing,
according to the South China Morning Post and the
Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights
and Democracy. The Ministry of State Security
reportedly allowed the service to take place
provided it remain low-key and indoors. However,
security agents, the report said, confined Ding
Zilin, the founder of Tiananmen Mothers, to her home
to prevent her from attending. The second event was
a small conference on the "June 4 Democracy
Movement" that took place in Beijing May 10 and was
attended by 19 academics, including liberal scholars
from Tsinghua University and the Chinese Academy of
Social Sciences.

REMEMBERING "MAY 35"
--------------


7. (C) Despite intensifying web censorship as the
anniversary approaches, there has been significant
discussion of Tiananmen-related topics online.
Blogger Zhao Jin (protect),widely known by his pen
name "Michael Anti," told PolOff May 19 that to fool
censors, some Chinese Internet users had adopted the
term "May 35th" as a euphemism for June 4. (Note: A
recent search of fanfou.com, a Chinese copy of
Twitter, revealed 15 posts mentioning May 35.)
Zhang Dongchen (protect),an aide to Baidu CEO Li
Yanhong (Robin Li),told PolOff May 12 that, while
online discussion of June 4 was difficult, Internet
debate about the mistakes and accomplishments of
late CCP General Secretary Zhao Ziyang was somewhat

BEIJING 00001387 003 OF 006


easier and served as a proxy for discussion of June

4. (Note: Zhang made these comments a week before
the news broke of the publication of Zhao Ziyang's
memoirs, which has led to intense online censorship
of any article mentioning the new book. Zhao Jin,
however, said news of the Zhao Ziyang memoire was
spreading quickly in China via Twitter, which
authorities have less ability to control.)

NOT-SO-IGNORANT TWENTY-SOMETHINGS
--------------


8. (C) Recent discussions with university students
and other Chinese in their 20s and early 30s
revealed a widespread awareness of June 4, with some
having highly detailed knowledge of the events of 20
years ago. Those who were small children in 1989
carried vivid memories of those events. Baidu's
Zhang Dongchen, for example, was 12 in 1989. In the
weeks prior to the crackdown, Dong's family moved
from central Beijing to the city's outskirts. Dong
said he remembered clearly the People's Liberation
Army (PLA) barracks that were located within sight
of their temporary home and how, as June 4
approached, university demonstrators arrived to
block the gate of the barracks to prevent the
soldiers from exiting. Another Beijing native, Lin
Yuzhe (protect),who was seven in 1989, remembered
the crackdown because a tank was parked outside her
family's courtyard for one month after June 4. Li
Xiang (protect),a native of Inner Mongolia born in
1982, said Tiananmen was "the most terrifying event
of her childhood." Although, unlike Zhang and Lin,
Li did not personally witness any protests or
violence, she told PolOff May 15 that graphic, post-
crackdown television coverage (used by authorities
to dramatize the crimes of the
"counterrevolutionaries") remained seared in her
memory. Li, who now lives in Beijing, told PolOff
that with the 20th anniversary quickly approaching,
June 4 had become a frequent discussion topic among
her friends, most of whom are well educated but
apolitical Chinese in their 20s working in the
public relations and fashion industries.

THE POWER OF PIRACY
--------------


9. (C) Young people with whom we spoke credited the
Internet for giving them access to information about
June 4. The blogger Zhao Jin told PolOff that he
first learned "the truth" about Tiananmen in 1999
when he watched a videotape of the 1995 documentary
"Gate of Heavenly Peace" that a friend had smuggled
in from Hong Kong. Zhao estimated that "at least
one million" Chinese had surreptitiously watched the
film, which is available via peer-to-peer
downloading on the Internet. Liao Zhimin (protect),
a law student at Peking University, told PolOff May
20 that, while he remembered watching television
images of the crackdown in 1989 from his hometown in
Sichuan Province, he only had a vague understanding
of events until he arrived at Peking University
(PKU) in 2001. At PKU, Liao said he watched an
"American documentary that was several hours long"
that described the use of the PLA to crush the
demonstrations. (Note: Though Liao could not
remember the film's title, based on his description,
it was almost certainly Gate of Heavenly Peace.)
Zhao Jin stated that the documentary had both "a
good and bad influence" in China. On the one hand,
the film taught a generation of Chinese about the
"abc's" of June 4, but in Zhao's opinion, the
documentary unfairly placed much of blame on the
student leaders, particularly Chai Ling, because of
their unwillingness to compromise to avoid violence.
Liao, however, said such information has been harder
to find in the last two years, following a move by
PKU to eliminate sensitive content on school
Intranet sites. Chen Zirui (protect),a recent law
graduate from Tsinghua University, claimed that he
and his friends "all know the truth about Tiananmen"
based on Internet information they accessed at
Tsinghua.


10. (C) Aside from the Internet, our contacts cited
family and teachers as the second most common
sources for information about the student movement.
Liao's wife, Chen Xiaofang (protect),a first-year

BEIJING 00001387 004 OF 006


Ph.D. student at Renmin University who was born in
1982, said she had no personal recollection of 1989.
Like Liao, she grew up in Leshan, Sichuan Province.
Chen said she nevertheless learned about Tiananmen
from her school teachers, several of whom had been
involved in the student movement in Beijing and
Shanghai and were then "sent down" to teaching jobs
in Leshan upon graduation.

HOW MANY STUDENTS KNOW ABOUT JUNE 4?
--------------


11. (C) Embassy contacts varied in their estimates
for the number of university students who have heard
about the Tiananmen crackdown. Most nonetheless
agreed that only a minority fully understand the
events of 1989, especially the fact that the PLA
opened fire on unarmed civilians. Chen Ziming
(protect),an economist the Chinese government
designated as one of the "black hands" behind the
1989 student movement and who afterward was
sentenced to 13 years in prison, told PolOff May 16
that 90 percent of students know that "six four"
(liusi, the colloquial term for the June 4
crackdown) was a "big event" involving student
protests. Only 10 percent of those with some
knowledge of Tiananmen, however, know the "full
details," Chen said. Chen noted that his nephew,
now an undergraduate student in the United States,
was completely ignorant of June 4, much less Chen's
own involvement, until he traveled abroad. Chen's
sister-in-law forbade him from speaking about
Tiananmen with the nephew for fear of "harming his
prospects" in China. Now that the nephew is in the
United States, Chen said, he e-mails constantly with
questions about 1989. The Transition Institute's
Guo Yushan gave a similar assessment: a large
majority of students know about "six four" and as
many as 20-30 percent were aware of the more
sensitive details. Guo credited the Internet for a
steady improvement in young people's knowledge of
June 4. Journalist Chen Jieren, however, gave a
bleaker assessment, saying that only two to three
percent of university-aged Chinese have a
"comprehensive understanding" of June 4. The United
States "must help China remember Tiananmen," Chen
said, because knowledge of the events was still so
limited among students.


12. (C) The Party, by covering up the worst aspects
of the crackdown (i.e., the use of deadly force by
the PLA) and emphasizing China's economic
achievements of the last two decades, had been
successful in shaping popular opinion regarding
Tiananmen, contacts universally agreed. Chen Ziming
said that while few young people agreed with the
official line that the crackdown was fully
justified, most accept the argument that "the
success of the last 20 years partly makes up for
what happened." Recent discussions with three
middle-aged Beijingers, all of whom immigrated to
the United States or Canada after Tiananmen but have
since returned to do business and research in China,
revealed conflicted feelings about June 4. Vivian
Wu (protect),who participated in the 1989
demonstrations, told PolOff she wondered if China
would be as stable and prosperous as it is today "if
the students had gotten their way." Another
returnee, Zhang Shengyu (protect),made a similar
point, saying the use of force was "inexcusable" but
that most people of his generation put a premium on
stability and do not have strong feelings about the
anniversary. "Tiananmen is simply a historical
fact," he said. Winnie Lao (protect),however, the
niece of a high-level CCP official who grew up in
the Zhongnanhai leadership compound, said Beijingers
are still "very, very angry" about Tiananmen, though
they are forced to keep these feelings "inside."
"What kind of Party opens fire on its own youth?"
she said.

LIFE OF A TIANANMEN "BLACK HAND"
--------------


13. (C) Despite the leadership's obsession with
maintaining order surrounding the June 4
anniversary, Tiananmen "black hand" Chen Ziming, who
spent a total of six years in prison in the 1990s
and was eventually allowed to serve the bulk of his

BEIJING 00001387 005 OF 006


13-year sentence while confined to his apartment,
told PolOff he has enjoyed increasing freedom since

2006. Chen was allowed to take his first
international trip, to Australia, in 2008. Ministry
of State Security (MSS) agents nevertheless continue
to monitor his home 24 hours per day and have rented
an apartment across from Chen's residence on the
northern outskirts of Beijing. (Note: Curiously,
the MSS also keeps guard over Chen's former
residence in central Beijing even though Chen and
his wife have not lived there for years and now rent
the property out. The MSS explained to him that
they must watch his old apartment so long as the
property remains in his name. Not only does this
show the bureaucratic inertia of the state security
apparatus, Chen said, but such "blatant waste" also
shows they have huge resources at their disposal.)
Starting in 2006, these agents no longer follow him
at all times, which has made friends and former
colleagues more comfortable about meeting with him.
Chen said he is able to publish in Mainland media
under a variety of pen names. The May issue of
Yanhuang Chunqiu, an outspoken history journal run
by retired reformist leaders, includes an article by
Chen Ziming about the origins of Chinese nationalism
under the pseudonym "Ziming." Ziming is such a
common given name in China, he said, that editors
have plausible deniability should propaganda
authorities investigate.

WILL THE PARTY EVER REVERSE THE JUNE 4 VERDICT?
-------------- --


14. (C) The Communist Party will eventually revisit
the verdict on Tiananmen, but for now the issue is
simply too sensitive, according to Embassy contacts.
Chen Ziming told PolOff a reassessment of Tiananmen
would not take place for "at least five years, but
probably not for ten or more." Chen described a
recent meeting he had with a "bureau-level official"
(juzhang ji) from Hunan Province. The official,
according to Chen, stated that "95 percent" of CCP
rank and file in Hunan Province believe June 4 was a
"mistake" and want to see the official verdict
reversed and Zhao Ziyang and other dismissed
officials exonerated. A real review of June 4,
however, could only take place once former Premier
Li Peng and former CCP General Secretary Jiang Zemin
pass away. Wu Jiaxing (protect),the one-time Zhao
Ziyang advisor, similarly said it would take a "very
long time" for the Party to reevaluate Tiananmen.
Wu similarly asserted that "over 90 percent" of
Chinese think June 4 was a mistake -- or at least
that the use of the military was wrong -- but nobody
in the Party has the standing to challenge either
Deng Xiaoping's decision to crack down or the
official justification that Deng created.

FEAR OF OPENING A "PANDORA'S BOX"
--------------


15. (C) Party-member contacts likewise commented on
the difficulty of reexamining Tiananmen in the short
term. Xue Fukang (protect),Vice Chairman of the
Central Party School-affiliated China Reform Forum
and a former editor of the CCP Central Committee
newspaper Guangming Ribao, said June 4 is "still an
extremely difficult issue for the Party to handle."
"Reopening" Tiananmen would raise many difficult
issues, such as who should be held responsible, who
should be compensated, and who ultimately gave the
orders allowing the military to open fire. There
remain "different opinions" within the Party about
June 4, Xue said, with influential elders like Mao
Zedong's former secretary Li Rui and former People's
Daily editor Hu Jiwei continuing to criticize the
decision to use force against demonstrators.
Moreover, Xue said some PLA military commanders who
refused orders to march their troops into Tiananmen
were also among the "internal critics" who did not
accept the official assessment. The PRC leadership,
Xue indicated, would eventually deal with the
Tiananmen problem, but doing so would take time.
Only through the passage of time, and once China is
more stable, could the "Pandora's box" of Tiananmen
be reopened.

"ZHAO ZIYANG WAS A GOOD MAN"
--------------

BEIJING 00001387 006 OF 006




16. (C) Further demonstrating that support remains
within the Party for ousted General Secretary Zhao
Ziyang, another China Reform Forum scholar, Vice
Chairman Ding Kuisong (protect),told PolOff May 18
that Zhao Ziyang was "a good man" who made
"tremendous contributions" to China's reform and
development. Ding, who said he had heard about the
upcoming publication of Zhao's sec ret memoirs,
commented that it "was a pity" that Zhao was sacked
as Party General Secretary as a result of "political
struggles" at the top of the Party over the student
movement. Reflecting on what the events of 1989
meant for China today, Ding said that no one in
China wanted to see "chaos" and that China cannot
change quickly or radically. The great progress of
the past 30 years showed that China's direction had
been "correct," despite the "unfortunate" events of

1989. Ding did not offer a prediction for whether
or when the Party would revisit Tiananmen, saying
only that further democratic reform and opening was
"inevitable." Politically, Ding asserted, there was
much more space today than there was in 1989, and
the leadership should get credit for establishing a
more stable, rule-based politics. Ding nonetheless
expressed some worry that a "minority" within China,
such as the "New Left," might attempt to "reverse
course." In conclusion, however, Ding averred that
the past two decades have demonstrated that, despite
the violent crackdown in 1989, gradual democratic
reform remained China's "only way forward."
WEINSTEIN