- One PLA general refused orders to take Tiananmen Square by force, saying: 'I'd rather be beheaded than be a criminal in the eyes of history'.
- Stephen Mcdonell writes that Beijing deals with Tiananmen differently to other sensitive issues:
So now unlike Tibet, unlike Xinjiang, unlike Taiwan, unlike recent regional tensions, unlike the death penalty, unlike pretty much any other sensitive issue you can come up with, the Government does not put its line on the Tiananmen crackdown.
- CNN has published a great collection of photos from the events leading up to Tiananmen.
- Kate Phillips, now an author, recalls how politics started to infiltrate daily life on her university campus during her stint teaching English in 1989 Beijing.
- Han Dongfang is one of the few activists from Tiananmen who has been able to translate ideals into real change for thousands of Chinese, according to Jamie Kelly in The National.
- Fascinating New York Times interview with Chen Guang who in 1989 was a 17-year-old soldier with the 65th Group Army, which was instructed to clear student protesters from Tiananmen Square. It's hard to distill this interview down into one line. On the one hand Chen describes the fear of going out into the crowd, saying that he decided to only pull the trigger if directly threatened. On the other, he adds that many believe what they did was right:
At the time, I wasn't sure if what we were doing was right or wrong, but in the end I didn't think it was right. That's why I decided to leave the army. Most of the others believe what they did was right.
- This piece in The Economist argues that despite a mainstream Chinese view that the crackdown paved the way for a stable China, it was Deng Xiaoping's 1992 southern tour that really drove the necessary reforms leading to prosperity and stability.
- The video of 'tank man' is still compelling viewing: