this post was submitted on 11 Jan 2026
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Check the Wiki page. A Japanese journalist argues that it was staged because he wears an unusual white shirt and it happened in front of the hotel for foreigners, to have pictures without violence about the event.
Edit: Read NeilBrü@lemmy.world’s comment!
Edit: That sounds reasonable to me:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank_Man
Read NeilBrü@lemmy.world's comment!
Fuck this drivel.
Everyone (at least in the West) seems to know about tank man, but there's another story that's not as widely known and I never understood why. It shines a whole new light on this and explains why the Chinese government is so heavy handed when it comes to this subject. It was more than just another autocratic crackdown on protestors, which, while terrible, are par for the course.
A good chunk of military units sent in to squash the protestors refused to carry out their orders, refused to brutalize and kill their countrymen. Some actively joined in on the protests, then units sent in to put a stop it joined in as well. This terrified the Chinese leadership so they sent in the 27th army group, largely comprised of illiterate peasant farmers with no connection to Beijing or its people, headed by a politically reliable officer. The 27th army group then proceeded to massacre everyone, not 'just' students and protestors, but their own comrades in arms, other PLA soldiers.
Read the British embassy report and tell me it doesn't completely change your perspective. The CCP wants everyone to think this was just another protest, no big deal. It wasn't, it was the time they almost lost control, and they know it. It's why they're so fearful.
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/UK_cable_on_Tiananmen_Square_Massacre
If that were the case, chinese authorities would deminish the event by always citing this picture and saying it was staged. They aren't - they say it never happened - which is well documented and simply false. So whenever an authotarian regime doesn't pick up on something that is useful to them - it is untrue and would be easily disproven were there the need for it.
Unless the Chinese are patient and strategic. They need to sway the masses when the opinions of the people count. The bad reputation was no obstacle to people buying from China.
The image is still bad because it is linked to whatever happened on the square. If they point out that it is false, people will ask what happened. If they say nothing, people remember this image.
It's the opposite. The negativity of the picture comes from wild associations.
Tanks breaking for a civilian and soldiers not reacting with violence is in itself good.
Tankman was a huge propaganda win for the west. However upholding it in times of wikipedia is silly if the tanks were leaving. The man is not trying to prevent students from being crushed. What's the message now?
To clarify, I don't think that killing the protesters on the square was acceptable.
Then why are you committing so hard to this silly conspiracy? The point of the conspiracy is definitely to make China look better. It's one of the weakest conspiracies I've ever seen. Why push it?
The spreading of the picture makes China look better. I originally thought the man was trying to protect students, showing heartless soldiers. But he is talking to leaving soldiers.
If the picture is Chinese propaganda and staged, it stresses that the cruelty on the square was so big that this distraction was necessary.
If it is authentic then what do we see? Soldiers who respect the life of a protester.
Edit: Read NeilBrü@lemmy.world's comment above.
You don't condone the murder but you condone the cover up of the murder?
Edit: dumb
I don't condone the murder.
Yeah I swapped condone and condemn because I'm dumb
The journalist argues that the picture is a cover up. I don't condone it, I point it out.
Read NeilBrü@lemmy.world’s comment!
That's such an obviously bad take
The guy was carrying groceries. He obviously wasn't one of the student protestors, which completely invalidates the point about his white shirt
If they wanted journalists to witness it, why did they search all of them and confiscate all pictures and footage of the incident? One of the few surviving photos were famously taken and smuggled out by ~~Jeff Widener~~ Charlie Cole. He hid his negatives in the tank of his toilet, which prevented the CCP finding them. Stuart Franklin hid his photo in a box of tea to smuggle it out
The explanation that Tank Man escaped is suspicious, because it's widely agreed the CCP made him disappear
Edit: Clarified information about photo, and a bit about Stuart
Edit 2: It was Charlie Cole that kept his photo by hiding it in the toilet. Jeff Widener smuggled his out by giving it to a hotel guest to bring to the diplomatic compound
yikes