Tiananmen Incident

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For the protests of 1989, see Tiananmen Square protests of 1989


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The Tiananmen incident, which took place on April 5, 1976 in Tiananmen Square, was a popular protest against the repression of the Chinese regime nearing the end of the Cultural Revolution. The death of Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai on January 8, 1976 prompted the protest. Zhou Enlai was a widely respected senior Chinese leader, and for several years before his death was involved in a political power struggle with other senior leaders in the Politburo of the Communist Party of China. Premier Zhou's most visible and powerful antagonists were the so-called Gang of Four led by Jiang Qing, who was married to Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong. To defuse an expected popular outpouring of sentiment at Zhou's death, the Communist Party of China limited the period of public mourning; for example, the national flag was lowered to half-staff for only one hour.

In Chinese culture, people celebrate the 106th day after the winter solstice as Qingming Festival (Tomb Sweeping Day), a holiday. In 1976, Qing Ming Jie fell on April 5. Even before the Qing Ming holiday that year, citizens mourning Premier Zhou's death began to place paper wreaths and white paper chrysanthemums at the foot of the Monument to the People's Heroes in Tiananmen Square. On April 4, for example, hundreds of thousands of Beijing residents came to the square to lay wreaths at the Monument. Hundreds of mourners posted handwritten poems there as well. Many of the poems seemed to refer to and to commemorate ancient Chinese historical events, but most were intended to criticize China's current leaders in a way designed to limit the possibility of detention or arrest by security forces (see Jan Wong's account of these poems in Red China Blues). For example, one poem implicitly criticized Jiang Qing by attacking the Empress Wu Zetian, a 7th century Tang Dynasty empress who ruled after her husband died.

The large number of mourners and intensity of the public outpouring of sentiment alarmed government and Communist Party officials. The Politburo met in emergency session in the Great Hall of the People, which lies a few yards west of Tiananmen Square. The leaders decided to remove all the wreaths, flowers, and poems, and public security forces acted during the night of April 4-5 to clean the area around the Monument. On April 5, tens of thousands of Beijing residents returned to the Monument in Tiananmen Square and were dismayed to find the wreaths and other commemorative materials removed. In addition, public security officers cordoned off the area around the Monument, preventing mourners from approaching. The large crowd in the Square became vocal and unruly.

China's leaders feared that the popular gathering would get out of control, and consulted with Party Chairman Mao Zedong, who authorized the use of force to clear Tiananmen Square, a directive carried out by the Gang of Four. Mao instructed the Politburo, however, not to permit the use of firearms against the mourners. During the evening of April 5, when the number of mourners had declined to only a few thousand, the Police used truncheons to drive the remaining mourners from the Square. The Police detained about four thousand people in or near Tiananmen Square.

The media subsequently linked the event to Deng Xiaoping, then carrying out the daily duties of the Premier. It was rumoured that the Gang of Four had become apprehensive of Deng's influence and thus attempted his removal. Deng was an ally of Zhou Enlai, and was placed under house arrest in Guangzhou. After Mao's death and the fall of the Gang of Four in October 1976, Party leaders rehabilitated Deng and brought him back to Beijing, where he emerged as China's paramount leader in 1978.