Ed Nachtrieb's Open Salon Blog

History is Real Part 12 - Carnage

Thu, 4 Jun 2009 09:06:27 -0400

PEK01:JUN04 -A student with a gunshot wound to the head is wheeled into Beijing Number One hospital early Sunday morning after troops opened fire on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square.

PEK28-JUNE4 - protesters rush a gravely injured person to medical help after he was shot by the People's Liberation Army in Tiananmen Square.

PEK11:JUNE 5 -- A Chinese People's Liberation Army tank moves into position to secure an intersection as citizens peer cautiously from below.

PEK02:JUNE 6 - A Chinese army tank soldier stands atop a tank and points a gun at a Peking citizen Monday evening. The person was seen being escorted away from the area

PEK09:JUNE 5 - Students kneel before a memorial for their killed comrades during a memorial service at Qinghua University. Estimates of the number of people killed during the assault range into the thousands.

The last entry in this series.

The image at the top sticks with me. Early in the evening, that same guy had tried to persuade me to get on a bus with him and charge into the square. I declined and then witnessed the bus being riddled with bullets before crashing. The frame after this picture, which I never transmitted, shows a big hole in the side of his head.

I hope this kind of post won't be necessary on the 30'th anniversary of the "Tiananmen Square Massacre" Perhaps by then, the events of that night will have been discussed and explored openly both inside and outside of China.

I've posted a sequence of images starting from April 16 onward at Historyisreal.com if you want to get a feel for how things unfolded with one click.

History is Real Part 11- First Blood

Wed, 3 Jun 2009 02:06:50 -0400

June 3 1989 - Beijing ...

After being beaten by soldiers in front of the Great Hall of the People, this man staggers forward trying to find help for his wounds.

I'm not sure how to comment on this picture. It sums up for me all of what happened from this point forward - a bloody unarmed man surrounded by soldiers.

This was literally the first blood of the Beijing crackdown. The students, who had been pretty disciplined about maintaing a non-violent approach, were shocked. As that day 20 years ago wore on, more and more people were either beaten or struck by rocks thrown by soldiers. Injuries mounted but even so, the idea that in a few hours fresh groups of troops would move into the city and unleash their firepower directly into crowds of civilians seemed far fetched. It wasn't.

I just learned Twitter, Facebook and perhaps even this blog are being blocked in China. The reason is that this image, and others like it, undermine an official but false image of Chinese history.

This is part of a series that began here:

http://open.salon.com/blog/ed_nachtrieb/2009/05/11/history_is_real

History is Real Part 10- Family Day

Tue, 2 Jun 2009 02:06:17 -0400

Part 10 in a series... June 1989

BEIJING--Chinese children flash "victory" signs for their camera holding parents.

One this day 20 years ago there were no police on the streets, the students controlled the square and rumors filled the air. June 2 was the last day of any hope or optimism before things became very dark.

I was looking for images from June 1 and 2 in the back of a file cabinet and while squinting at the negatives I realized a large number of people were bringing their kids to Tiananmen Square to pose in front of the Goddesss of Democracy on those days.

I dug a couple of negatives out of an old envelope and scanned them and saw them for the first time. I wonder what happened to the pictures that thier parents took?. These same kids, now in their 20's, probably have little memory of the event and the historical record has been erased.

These images were never transmitted or "moved" on the newswire. I'm including them here because we're so used to seeing the usual sets of images from that time that many of the small details..like the presence of children, can easily be forgotten.

This is part of an effort to post images from exactly 20 years ago in Beijing. The original post:

http://open.salon.com/blog/ed_nachtrieb/2009/05/11/history_is_real

History is Real Part 9 - The Goddess

Fri, 29 May 2009 21:05:21 -0400

PEK11:MAY29--Student activists work on what they call the "Goddess of Democracy" at an art school campus. The protesters plan to erect the statue in Tiananmen Square throughout the night.

More images reflecting on the hopes and dreams from exactly 20 years ago in Beijing.

At this stage things appeared to be at a stalemate. The government wasn't making any overt moves and the students were on the square...waiting. The protesters opted to make a bold PR move to shore up both foreign support as well as to attract larger, protective crowds around their base in Tiananmen.

Art students reworked a statue originally designed as a heroic worker to carry a Statue of Liberty style torch instead of a farm implement and assembled it facing the giant portrait of Mao. The Goddess of Democracy was born.

It was literally a "face" to the government. One lady marveled at the Goddess and said,"They have to do something now. They can't let this stand!"

It was a taunt to the government and everybody knew "something" would happen.

PEK03:MAY30- Student Protesters erect the "Goddess of Democracy" on Tiananmen Square May 30. the statue is modeled after the USA's Statue of Liberty. In the background is the Monument to People's Heroes, the headquarters of the students protests since May 13.

The Goddess pumped new life into the encampment. Its optimism was in stark contrast to the foreboding mood of previous days. Tents went up and more people arrived to join what was clearly a final stand. When a nasty storm cell ripped down the tent city, it felt like the whole scene was playing out like a real life tragic poem with even the weather cooperating in the metaphor.

PEK14:MAY 31 - A protester secures rigging for a new tent. Many new tents are sprouting on the square as it appears the protesters will continue their occupation.

PEK16: MAY 31 -- Students and workers scramble to secure their tent city after their tent city in Tiananmen Square on wednesday after a sudden and violent rain storm belted the area. The students have occupied the square for 19 days.

This is a part of a series I began in early May to post images from China exactly 20 years ago (almost to the day) leading up to June 4. My reasons are detailed in the original post :

http://open.salon.com/blog/ed_nachtrieb/2009/05/11/history_is_real

History is Real Part 8 - The Dawn of Fear

Tue, 26 May 2009 15:05:30 -0400

PEK05:MAY 28- A student protester wears a mask during a demonstration on Tiananmen Square. After an apparent victory by hardliners in the government power struggle, some protesters are wearing masks so they won't be recognized by the authorities for reprisals.

BACK TO BEIJING IN 1989

A week into martial law and the mood was shifting. A flurry of leaflets were being produced on the square and the general population seemed supportive of the students and their goals. As the students were busy debating what their strategy should be, so was the government behind closed doors. The appearance of masks and other disguises was, for me, an ominous sign . I found in my trunk of old negatives tons of images of people with sheets over their heads. I chose this image originally because you could actually see this man's eyes.

The unease was clearly growing and everybody wondered what would happen next.

PEK15:MAY 26 - An elderly man talks with soldiers guarding the Communist Party headquarters. A power struggle behind this gate was apparently won by the hardliners backing Premier Li Peng.

PEK05:MAY 25- Student protesters print leaflets in Tiananmen Square. Martial law, declared six days ago, ended a brief perid of media freedom but spawned a rich crop of posters, handbills and China's first underground newspaper.