Video shows Gen Xu Qinxian explaining why he refused to deploy troops to crush 1989 student-led demonstrations
Rare footage of a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) general who defied orders to lead his troops into Tiananmen Square and crush the 1989 student protesters has been leaked online, offering a highly unusual glimpse into the upper echelons of the military at one of the most fraught moments in modern Chinese history.
General Xu Qinxian’s refusal to take his troops from the PLA’s prestigious 38th Group Army, a unit based on the outskirts of Beijing, into the capital has been the stuff of Tiananmen lore for decades.
The six-hour video recording of Gen Xu’s court martial hearing the next year sheds light on the rare act of defiance. In the video, Xu said he refused because he did not want to become “a sinner in history”.
For anyone else that is interested in what came of him:
Xu was expelled from the CCP and sentenced to five years in prison. He lived the rest of his life exiled from Beijing and died in 2021 at the age of 85.
A much happier ending than I expected.
No kidding. If this happened in North Korea the trial would have lasted 15 minutes and the execution would have been a public spectacle.
Can’t make a public spectacle of something that “never happened”.
You’re clearly not well-practiced at doublethink.
In Qing Dynasty, the entire family would’ve gotten publicly executed.
Yay CCP is slightly less cruel than a medieval monarch
Somebody did something to make thing better, we need to do it again
(Xinhai Revolution 2025 Edition)
Sometimes I day dream how cool free China would actually be
If I’m understanding correctly he was a general. He was powerful enough to merely be court martialed. I doubt the same mercy extended very often to individual soldiers who refused orders.
Don’t worry, I’ve been told by users that it didn’t happen, and that if it did, it wasn’t what we saw, and it wasn’t that bad, and that, if it was, they deserved it.
It’s all AI anyway. If you saw tank man before, you are being lied to by western propaganda.
Ai in 1989 was so advanced lol
That’s what the CIA is trying to hide! Don’t fall for it!
Imagine if 2020 had AI becoming this popular.
Pretty sure there would be conspiracy theories that accuse the George Floyd’s murder video of being “AI”
The future is so cooked.
Future? Bitch, the present is well done as it is
It is really crazy that this weird china apologism is so common here.
Its the type of shit you’d expect to see more on reddit, but instead its on lemmy way more.
Thats my take on them as well.
I’ve been told by users that it didn’t happen
Don’t be shy. Name some names.
You’re more than welcome to go through alllllll my comments to find some interactions. I couldn’t be arsed
Notice how you cannot state what you saw because in reality the entire thing was recorded by international media and it literally did not happen on video.
“It did not happen” thanks for demonstrating my point
“I was wrong and you provided video evidence but I will persist in being wrong and ignore evidence in front of my eyes”.
Is what you said when you saw the title of this post?
The US media was heavy handed in reporting the Federal response but deathly quiet reporting the mob violence and killing perpetrated by the rioters.
Talking about Tianeman while fixating on Tank Man is a bit like only referring to J6 by holding up photos of Ashli Babbitt taken the day before. Or reporting on the LA Riots exclusively from the perspective of the Roof Koreans. Or holding up photos of Iranian girls in swimsuits any time someone mentions the '79 revolution. Or quoting Elon Musk on White Genocide In South Africa. Or doing the “Haitians are eating the dogs and cats” line to explain our modern immigration policies.
It’s the same right wing propaganda liberals seem to recognize in their own backwards, but refuse to accept could have been applied to poison them against another country’s people.
General Xu was 100% correct. The entire CCP and high ranking PLA officers should have been thrown into a courtroom and sent to prison for murder.
Qinxian made a decision that saved countless lives, much like Arkhipov in the 60s.
Great, now reveal all epstein files without black outs.
Time to change some of my challenge responses on some of my equipment to include him as the greatest chinese citizen. I have the standard remember Tiananmen Square response. Always fun to let them port scan and attempt to brute force with those responses.
