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”.
I’m not sure how this is “anti-China”? it’s historical footage, it seems worthy of news to me
And why compare with events that are 80+ years old ? you’re talking about it like concentration camps and Tienanmen are the same
You’re debating a tankie, so rhetorical fact-based argument is not going to yield positive results.
It’s not anti China on its face. But the timing and context are, as well as the comments here. No, one here is watching the video even. They’re just jumping to a conclusion they already had that makes them feel good about their shit hole western country by comparison.
We are being lead by war hawks that want to escalate a cold war with China. You’re going to see more and more “leaked” information on China framing them as different and incompatible with “the West”. That’s all this is. That’s why it’s on “World News” and not a history sub discussing it in a meaningful way.
Seriously, go read the comments here and tell me how many are actually analyzing this in a historical context. It’s just garbage talking about how China is bad and is still bad today. Half the comments replying to me are just “.ml/tankie bad”. The same people that have been saying “China is going to collapse in X days” for the last 5 years.
ah, sure, I get how this is information warfare. But it’s honestly pretty mild and I think on its own it presents more historical interest than confirmation bias. I do appreciate however how these things are meant to pile up and slowly manufacture consent.
tbh I haven’t read once a prediction about China collapsing soon, maybe I haven’t been looking in the right places. But anyone paying attention should be able to tell the opposite is happening
and to be entirely honest I stopped short at reading the article… given that the audience recording is apparently 6 hours long
Well, that’s a mature response. My initial comment was mostly not really appropriate to this article in a vacuum; out of the context of the rest of the “World News” post that have been just a constant stream of cold war agit-prop against China. It’s why it just bothers me.
Nothing is being posted to learn from China’s success. It’s not even being posted to learn from their failures. It’s just being posted to manufacture consent as you said. That’s where my frustration comes from. It’s just western people eating up slop as we pay higher rents for everything in life. And accept that bombing brown kids and starting wars for oil are just part of our life.
You mean the six hour video that I’m assuming is in Mandarin? How about you tell us all about it since certainly you watched it, right? Right?
That’s literally my point. My comment is in frustration to all the comments just using this article to uphold an incorrect world view of China as some authoritarian state that ships innocent people to foreign prisons for torture (shit, sorry, that’s the US).
I never said I watched it. But literally no one here has. Or, honestly, even read the article. It’s just being used for the purpose of cold war agit-prop.
Do… Do you expect people to watch a six hour video in a language they don’t speak?
Yes. That’s what I said. Definitely what you should take from that comment. Absolutely. /s