Tank Man

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"Tank Man" stops the advance of a column of tanks on 5 June 1989 in Beijing.Photo by Jeff Widener (Associated Press)
"Tank Man" stops the advance of a column of tanks on 5 June 1989 in Beijing.
Photo by Jeff Widener (Associated Press)
Another photo, showing more tanks. Photo by Stuart Franklin (Magnum Photos).
Another photo, showing more tanks. Photo by Stuart Franklin (Magnum Photos).

Tank Man, or the Unknown Rebel, is the nickname of an anonymous man who became internationally famous when he was videotaped and photographed during the Tiananmen Square protests on 5 June 1989. Several photographs were taken of the man, who is seen to stand in front of a column of Chinese Type 59 tanks, preventing their advance. The most widely reproduced version of the photograph was taken by Jeff Widener (Associated Press), from the sixth floor of the Beijing Hotel, about half a mile (1 km) away, through a 400 mm lens.

Another version was taken by photographer Stuart Franklin of Magnum Photos. His photograph has a wider field of view than Widener's photograph, showing more tanks in front of the man. Franklin subsequently won a World Press Award for the photograph. It was featured in Life Magazine's "100 Photos that Changed the World" in 2003. Variations of the image were also recorded by CNN and BBC film crews, on videotape, and were transmitted across the world.

The still and motion photography of the man standing alone before a line of tanks reached international audiences practically overnight. It headlined hundreds of major newspapers and news magazines and was the lead story on countless news broadcasts around the world. In April 1998, the United States magazine TIME included the "Unknown Rebel" in its 100 most influential people of the 20th century.

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[edit] Behind the image

The incident took place on the Cháng Ān Dà Jiē (长安大街), or "Great Avenue of Chang'an" just a minute away from Tiananmen, which leads into the Forbidden City, Beijing, on June 5, 1989, the day after the Chinese government began cracking down violently on the protests. The man stood alone in the middle of the road as the tanks approached. He held two bags, one in each hand. As the tanks came to a stop, he appeared to be trying to wave them away. In response, the front tank attempted to drive around the man, but the man repeatedly stepped into the path of the tank in a show of passive resistance.[1] By looking at these two photographs and using the painted road lines as a reference: it is evident that the tank has moved forward. After blocking the tanks, the man climbed up onto the top of the lead tank and had a conversation with the driver. Reports of what was said to the driver vary, including "Why are you here? My city is in chaos because of you";[1] "Go back, turn around, and stop killing my people"; and "Go away." Video footage shows that anxious onlookers then pulled the man away and absorbed him into the crowd[1] and the tanks continued on their way. A British newspaper also claimed that he had been executed, several days after the incident, but these claims have not been confirmed either.[2]

[edit] Significance of image

In the West, pictures of the Unknown Rebel were presented as a symbol of the Chinese democracy movement; a Chinese youth risking his life to oppose a military juggernaut seemed a fitting representation of students bravely and spontaneously protesting against the authoritarian rule of the CPC. The image resonated within democracies as a symbol of an individual's power to halt government and force a change in direction.

In the PRC the image was used as a symbol of the care of the PLA soldiers in protecting the Chinese people: despite orders to advance, the driver of the tank refused to do so if it meant injuring a single citizen.[citation needed] As with most matters related to the 1989 protests, the Tank Man topic later became and still remains a political taboo in mainland China.

[edit] Biography

Little is publicly known of the man's identity. Shortly after the incident, British tabloid the Sunday Express named him as Wang Weilin (王维林), a 19-year-old student; however, the veracity of this claim is dubious. Numerous rumors have sprung up as to the man's identity and current whereabouts, but none is backed by hard evidence.

There are several conflicting stories about what happened to him after the demonstration. In a speech to the President's Club in 1999, Bruce Herschensohn — former deputy special assistant to President of the United States Richard Nixon — reported that he was executed 14 days later; other sources say he was killed by firing squad a few months after the Tiananmen Square protests. In Red China Blues: My Long March from Mao to Now, Jan Wong writes that the man is still alive and is hiding in mainland China.

An eyewitness account of the event published in October 2005 by Charlie Cole, a contract photographer for Newsweek magazine at the time, states that the man was arrested on the spot by the Public Security Bureau.

The People's Republic of China government made few statements about the incident or the person involved. In a 1990 interview with Barbara Walters, then-CCP General Secretary Jiang Zemin was asked what became of the man. Jiang replied "I think never killed."[1]

An article in the Hong Kong Apple Daily states that the man is now residing in Taiwan.[3]

[edit] Tank Man in popular culture

  • In The Simpsons episode Goo Goo Gai Pan, Selma stands in front of the tank piloted by Wu, similar to the Unknown Rebel. Moments prior to this scene, she is seen standing in Tianenmen Square with a sign stating that "nothing happened".
  • In The Simpsons Episode Mr Spritz goes to Washington, Krustys face is edited into the photo taken by Jeff Widener
  • On one episode of Family Guy Peter is standing beside "tank man" as the tanks are coming, then says "screw this I just came to buy some fireworks" and runs off.
  • In the novel Hong Kong by Steven Coonts, the "Tank Man" is featured as one of the main characters, leading an anti-communist resistance movement.
  • Heavy metal band Nevermore wrote a song about the event titled "The Tiananmen Man" on their album The Politics of Ecstasy.
  • The Hooters mention the event in their song "500 miles" (published in 1989, the same year at the protests) with the lines "A hundred tanks along the square/one man stands and stops them there". The music video of the song also features images of the man and additional footage from the protests.
  • Skinny Puppy wrote a song titled "Tin-Omen" which discusses the event on their album Rabies.
  • The Jon Stewart book America (The Book) claims that Tank Man was "an OCD sufferer who only felt comfortable standing in front of large objects."
  • John Vanderslice imagines alternate whereabouts of Tank Man in a song he wrote called "Do You Remember?" for his Time Travel is Lonely album. The lyrics include "Do you remember the man?/Standing in front of the tanks that/Rolled on Tiananmin Square/He just stood there/I heard the Red Guard went door to door and/They found him hiding under the floorboards."
  • In the Animatrix title The Second Renaissance, an unruly robot shows passive resistance towards a human tank commander but is run over.

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c d The Unknown Rebel Time Magazine's profile. Last accessed January 10, 2006
  2. ^ Frontline: The Tank Man
  3. ^ (Chinese) Wang Weilin by tank file, Apple Daily, June 2, 2006, Page A1

[edit] References

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