Hard to imagine that it’s been 20 years. There is something so cold, so chilling, about armed soldiers pulling guns on and aiming tanks at unarmed civilians. Their own civilians. And yet, it’s not the first time …
4 tanks, one man
Many would not call Tiananmen Square a genocide. The numbers are too small. Estimates vary, but something like 2500 people died. Perhaps another 7,000 to 10,000 were wounded.
A slaughter. A massacre. A genocide. Only the quantities are different. The essential elements are the same. An armed, threatening, trained military against unarmed, unthreatening, untrained civilians.
If you lost your mother, your father, your spouse, your sibling, your child, the tear in the fabric of your life is the same. After that, does it matter how many other people died at the same time?