Ziyang is immortal
Hu was pacified
January 2005
Mr. Zhao Ziyang’s passing has sparked widespread and profound resonance around the world. An eighty-five-year-old man, an elderly man who lost power and freedom for sixteen years, and disappeared from the public eye for sixteen years—his passing could have triggered such a strong reaction. This is extremely rare throughout history and across cultures, with no precedent.
Regarding Zhao Ziyang’s death, the CCP authorities initially issued a short message of less than sixty words, intending to brush it off and get by. Unexpectedly, the pressure from within the Party, civil society, and the international community was so great that the authorities were forced to make concessions and allow a farewell ceremony at Babaoshan. At the same time, the authorities openly went on the battlefield, deploying large numbers of plainclothes military and police, and relentlessly suppressed and threatened those trying to mourn them, fully exposing their brutality, shamelessness, and weakness.
Even more extreme, in the Xinhua News Agency’s report released that day, the authorities dared not state that Zhao Ziyang had served as Premier and General Secretary, and openly disregarded the previous practice of only recognizing merits and faults for the deaths of party and government leaders, and brazenly violating the promise made to Zhao’s relatives to avoid merits and faults, forcibly including the phrase that Zhao Ziyang had “committed a serious mistake.” We know that Li Jingquan, who once served as the First Secretary of the Sichuan Provincial Party Committee, was frenziedly pursuing an ultra-left line, causing the number of starvation deaths in Sichuan, the Land of Abundance, reaching as many as eight million; Additionally, Li Jingquan carried out large-scale persecution within the Party under the pretext of opposing rightist movement. Even by the CCP’s own standards after the Cultural Revolution, Li Jingquan was considered to have made serious mistakes. However, when Li Jingquan passed away, the authorities issued an obituary and eulogy, which as usual concealed his wrongs and highlighted his faults, without mentioning his faults at all. This shows that the CCP can tolerate any mistake you make, except that it cannot tolerate you opposing shooting and suppressing the people; It doesn’t matter how many people you starved to death, nor how many of your revolutionary comrades you persecuted, but you opposed shooting at the people—this is absolutely unforgivable! This time, the authorities forcibly added the clause that Zhao Ziyang “made a serious mistake” in the report on Zhao Ziyang’s funeral, thereby exposing their own anti-people nature in full force.
All these points indicate that the differences between us and the CCP authorities regarding Zhao Ziyang ultimately boil down to one point: the ’89 incident, the June 4th incident: during ’89, Zhao Ziyang insisted on dialogue and firmly opposed the use of force to suppress peaceful protesters. We affirm Zhao Ziyang mainly because of this point; The CCP authorities persecuted Zhao Ziyang precisely because of this. The difference between us and the CCP authorities lies in whether we recognize or not recognize the people’s natural rights such as freedom of speech and assembly. The fundamental difference between authoritarian tyranny and liberal democracy lies in the question: when facing peaceful protesters, do you suppress or not, kill or not kill? This is the moral bottom line for being a person, and also the moral bottom line for governance. Zhao Ziyang’s opposition to suppression seemed ordinary because it was merely upholding the most basic human moral conscience; Yet this simple stance of human nature holds immense significance under communist autocracy. Communist autocracy is a vast and complex state machine, but for this machine to function properly, it must continuously carry out political persecution and violent repression. Once violent repression stops, this massive autocratic machine is paralyzed, stopped, and dies. Communist autocracy never eats vegetarians; it must drink human blood and human flesh every day to survive. Once it stops eating human blood and flesh, it immediately dies of thirst or starvation. Therefore, opposing violent repression, although it only reflects the most basic moral conscience, is a way to strike at the root of autocratic tyranny, which means the entire country is beginning to move onto the right path of peaceful democracy. We can simplify the distinction between democracy and autocracy to the difference between “counting heads” and “beheading people.” A country, as long as it no longer resolves political disagreements by beheading, cannot avoid counting heads. That means it will inevitably switch to democracy. Therefore, we must fully assess the significance of Zhao Ziyang’s opposition to the suppression. Mr. Zhao Ziyang devoted his entire life to upholding this fundamental moral principle, unyielding and unwavering, unwavering until death, establishing a great character and setting a shining example.
Zhao Ziyang (October 17, 1919 ~ January 17, 2005).