I’m aware that the protests had wildly different requests, from hardliners opposing Reform and Opening Up to the “Pro-Democracy” student-led movement. The student-led movement had CIA connections at the leadership level, and by the time of June 4th the “Pro-Democracy” movement was all that was really left.
There wasn’t an “unarmed column of PLA soldiers,” you’re confusing the events of June 3rd with June 2nd. June 3rd saw clashes between rioters, who had taken PLA arms and were fighting, while reports are admittedly mixed on whether or not rioters murdered the PLA officers on the morning of the 3rd alone, or in addition to June 2nd. Either way, the rioters did jump unarmed soldiers who were not deployed as a part of the main force moving in, even wikipedia backs this up.
The CPC narrative has not been credibly countered. Eyewitness accounts do not point to hundreds of extra deaths in concrete terms, they just point towards that being a possibility. As for you walking a point back, I mean when you went in and saw the twitter account saying that the lynched PLA officer had murdered 4 people, which the twitter account stated came from the ones lynching him. I pointed that bit out and then you seemed to have walked it back.
The only thing that Wikipedia mentions in regards to violence on June 2nd is this paragraph:
On the evening of 2 June, an accident occurred in which a PAP jeep ran onto a sidewalk, killing three civilian pedestrians and injuring a fourth. This incident sparked fear that the army and the police were trying to advance into Tiananmen Square. Student leaders issued emergency orders to set up roadblocks at major intersections to prevent the entry of troops into the centre of the city.
Regarding the unarmed soldiers, that was an intercepted bus that was moving soldiers in who had been ordered to take up arms and disperse the protests. There were beatings but Wikipedia does not mention any deaths here.
As for you walking a point back, I mean when you went in and saw the twitter account saying that the lynched PLA officer had murdered 4 people, which the twitter account stated came from the ones lynching him.
Perhaps that was a simple misunderstanding then. You brought up the thread in order to reinforce your claim that the protestors were killing unarmed soldiers (at least how I understood it). Yet the only claim the account made is that the soldier supposedly killed 4 people, so the killing was retaliatory. It does list “the murderers” as the source, but we don’t have a better one (at least not one provided there). I mostly pointed it out since that account doesn’t come across as very reliable or informed, they posted a couple pictures to set a narrative, but when questioned seemed to walk back the claims they made.
As far as the death toll, best estimate we have comes from Beijing hospital records:
Records from Beijing’s main eleven hospitals, compiled shortly after the events, recorded at least 478 dead and 920 wounded, though Timothy Brook notes that these figures are an undercount due to lack of information from other hospitals.
This is quite significantly more than what the CCP has claimed (and quite atrocious in and of itself, even if it’s less than the bogus 10k figure).
I wasn’t referring to Wikipedia backing up the June 2nd bit. I don’t 100% disagree or agree with the rest, but I don’t think there’s much to argue definitively anymore due to the nature of how hazy the estimates are.
I’m aware that the protests had wildly different requests, from hardliners opposing Reform and Opening Up to the “Pro-Democracy” student-led movement. The student-led movement had CIA connections at the leadership level, and by the time of June 4th the “Pro-Democracy” movement was all that was really left.
There wasn’t an “unarmed column of PLA soldiers,” you’re confusing the events of June 3rd with June 2nd. June 3rd saw clashes between rioters, who had taken PLA arms and were fighting, while reports are admittedly mixed on whether or not rioters murdered the PLA officers on the morning of the 3rd alone, or in addition to June 2nd. Either way, the rioters did jump unarmed soldiers who were not deployed as a part of the main force moving in, even wikipedia backs this up.
The CPC narrative has not been credibly countered. Eyewitness accounts do not point to hundreds of extra deaths in concrete terms, they just point towards that being a possibility. As for you walking a point back, I mean when you went in and saw the twitter account saying that the lynched PLA officer had murdered 4 people, which the twitter account stated came from the ones lynching him. I pointed that bit out and then you seemed to have walked it back.
The only thing that Wikipedia mentions in regards to violence on June 2nd is this paragraph:
Regarding the unarmed soldiers, that was an intercepted bus that was moving soldiers in who had been ordered to take up arms and disperse the protests. There were beatings but Wikipedia does not mention any deaths here.
Perhaps that was a simple misunderstanding then. You brought up the thread in order to reinforce your claim that the protestors were killing unarmed soldiers (at least how I understood it). Yet the only claim the account made is that the soldier supposedly killed 4 people, so the killing was retaliatory. It does list “the murderers” as the source, but we don’t have a better one (at least not one provided there). I mostly pointed it out since that account doesn’t come across as very reliable or informed, they posted a couple pictures to set a narrative, but when questioned seemed to walk back the claims they made.
As far as the death toll, best estimate we have comes from Beijing hospital records:
This is quite significantly more than what the CCP has claimed (and quite atrocious in and of itself, even if it’s less than the bogus 10k figure).
I wasn’t referring to Wikipedia backing up the June 2nd bit. I don’t 100% disagree or agree with the rest, but I don’t think there’s much to argue definitively anymore due to the nature of how hazy the estimates are.