True power to the people - democracy movement in China

National Review, June 30, 1989 by George Jochnowitz

BAODING-Hebei University is located at the eastern edge of Baodin , an old industrial city two and a half hours by train from Peking. Immediately to the east of the campus there are farms where cabbages, tomatoes, and melons are raised. On the west, the campus is bounded by Qian Wei Lu (Early Defense Road), the main highway to Peking. On May 19, students heard that the 27th Regiment was passing through from Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei Province, to Peking. They left the campus and blocked Qian Wei Lu. The president of Hebei University-a quiet, scholarly woman-went out to the street to persuade them to go back to their dorms. She failed; the students delayed the army for several hours.

April 22 was the day demonstrations began in Peking, the day of the funeral of former Premier Hu Yaobang. That was also the day big-character posters (da zi bao) began to go up on campus. A surprising number of students got on the train to Peking that day, feeling that there was no way tbey could express their sentiments in quiet old Baoding. But on Monday, April 24, there was a demonstration even in Baoding, the first of many. Students left Hebei University and headed for the campus of the North China Electric Power Institute, but the students there had been locked in and could not leave the campus. After the Hebei University students had walked to Baoding Communist Party headquarters and back to their own campus, they heard the university loudspeakers exhorting them to stick to their studies and stay out of trouble.

Except for the week of spring holiday, when almost everyone left the campus, demonstrations continued ftom then until now. More than once, our students were joined by students ftom the other universities in Baoding, and by workers from local factories. On many occasions the students tossed bottles from their dormitory windows, a practice I did not understand until someone pointed out to me that the second part of Deng Xiaoping's name sounds exactly the same as xiao ping, meaning "little bottle."

When I woke up on the morning of Tuesday, May 16, my daughter was not home. I assumed she was out jogging, but I learned at breakfast that she had gone with a demonstration that had left the campus at 6 A.M. She returned at ten and said the students had been asking for me. I hopped on my bicycle and rode to the Party headquarters, where I saw about a thousand people sitting in front of the entrance. A group of people surrounded me and began asking me questions in Chinese. I answered as well as I could, saying I thought the students were the hope of China and predicting that in a year China would be a free country.

That evening, almost everyone I met told me they had seen me on the local television news program. The next day, two policemen came to the campus to visit me. My daughter joined me, and the officers told us that I had broken the law, and that I would be responsible for any consequences if I did so again. We asked if it was illegal to demonstrate in China (I have been told that the Chinese constitution says protest is allowed) and were told it was illegal for foreigners to interfere in Chinese internal affairs. My daughter asked for a definite answer to our question: Are demonstrations legal or not? Yes or no? The man acting as our interpreter tried to conceal his delight. The policemen refused to answer.

On Friday the 19th, we went to Peking to buy airplane tickets. There were posters on the walls, in subways, everywhere: "The people love students," "Workers love students," even "Communist Party members love students"! Ambulances were everywhere, carrying hunger-strikers to the hospital. Demonstrators had assumed the almost impossible job of directing traffic, in order to keep lanes open for the ambulances, and were succeeding beyond anyone's wildest expectations.

We went to Tiananmen Square to see if we could recognize anyone from Hebei University. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, but we found the needle. Our students spotted us, applauded, shook our hands, and gave us headbands announcing our support for the hunger-strikers. We didn't know that, at the same moment, other students of ours were blocking the 27th Regiment at Qian Wei Lu.

We spent the next day with old Chinese friends, visiting Peking University and then going out for Peking duck. As we walked through the streets wearing the headbands our students had given us, passersby applauded and made the "V for Victory" sign. All ten million of Peking's citizens were rejoicing; I had never seen so much happiness. It was an important day in the history of the world. Marxism had just died.

On Sunday we managed to get downtown with the help of a delivery man with a tricycle cart. Martial law had been declared, and foreigners had disappeared from the streets. We were relieved to go back to Baoding, where we always feel safe.

Students at Hebei University are still striking and putting up big-character posters. But the joy is gone; Deng Xiaoping and Li Peng seem to have won. The Party's victory cannot last, however. A month ago, every Chinese thought he was the only one who longed for freedom and democracy. Now everyone knows that the Chinese people have held the equivalent of an election and voted down their leaders. The people are beginning to realize how much power they have.