The Rift that Began in Tiananmen Square

The world changed in 1989.

At the start of the year, the globe's strategic map looked much like it had since the end of World War II. Communist leaders in China and the Soviet Union held power. Their American counterparts, skeptical of recent calls for change throughout the communist world, prepared for a reinvigorated Cold War of unknown duration and ferocity. Meanwhile, Europe prepared for another year divided along fault lines imposed by conquering armies nearly a half-century before.

A year later, communism would be dead in Eastern Europe and dying in the Soviet Union itself. China would be once more in the grip of hard-liners wary of reform, and once more on the precipice of isolation. Washington would be looking to capitalize on its Cold War victory. Europe would soon be rejoined. The future -- our 21st-century present -- would be at hand. And no one had seen it coming, least of all perhaps China, where the first of 1989's cracks in communism would begin.

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1989: The Lost Year

For Gorbachev and Bush Sr., it was 12 months of missed opportunities.

By David E. Hoffman

Following decades of enforced deprivation, justified by the quest for ideological purity, Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping and his ruling cadre sought to change their country, but without simultaneously losing the communal zeal and nationalism that had largely defined China since its 1949 revolution. More immediately, they sought some means of managing the social and political transformation sure to result from their economic reforms, believing only strict government control could ensure that the mayhem and violence of China's recent past did not reappear.

In March 1989, dismayed by the growing power of reform movements throughout the Soviet-dominated half of the communist world, Chinese Communist Party officials met to discuss "the unrest in Eastern Europe," concluding that "every effort should be made to prevent changes in Eastern Europe from influencing China's internal development." What was undermining communist rule abroad, they worried, might infect their own country. In 1989, they proved right to worry.

By April, Chinese masses were demanding change to a degree unseen in a generation. Students began to march in favor of reform. Others quickly followed their lead. From the hinterland, protesters surged into the city. While Chinese officials debated, the crowds continued to grow in size and enthusiasm. By May 15, more than 500,000 people filled Tiananmen Square. Just two days later they would number more than a million.

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