The protests grew from hundreds of thousands to millions, spreading to other Chinese cities. With the whole world watching, it seemed as though China would enjoy - like the Philippines in 1986 - a People Power moment that would reform the government from one-party authoritarianism to a multi-party government, surely as cumbersome and ineffective as any other parliamentary system but at least an open system.
And then the night of June 3, 1989.
The day after the tanks rolled in and violently quashed (The actual body count may never be known, but nearly everyone eyewitness or researcher on the crackdown notes at least a hundred soldiers and thousands of protesters dead) the student protests, before the Chinese government could completely close off the media and censor anything and everything about Tiananmen, cameramen caught on film a lone protester standing in front of a row of tanks, challenging the horror that the army brought on their own people.
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That's my sentiment. It's been twenty years. I hope he's still alive. I hope there's still a chance in my lifetime to see China end its insane and corrupt one-party rule. I hope.
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