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”.
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 and close relatives 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.