The China Chronicle
The history of Tiananmen Square and such
Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong led communist forces in China through a long revolution beginning in 1927 and ruled the nation’s communist government from its establishment in 1949. Along with Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin, Mao is considered one of the most significant communist figures of the Cold War.
The Long March
In October 1934, during a civil war, embattled Chinese Communists broke through Nationalist enemy lines and began an epic flight from their encircled headquarters in southwest China. Known as the Long March, the trek lasted a year and covered some 4,000 miles.
The establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949
On October 1, 1949, Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong declared the creation of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The announcement ended the costly full-scale civil war between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang (KMT), which broke out immediately following World War II and had been preceded by on and off conflict between the two sides since the 1920’s.
Tiananmen Square
The Tiananmen Square Massacre left an unknown number dead, with some estimates in the thousands, and smothered a democratic movement. But after a quarter-century—and a thorough attempt by the Chinese government to conceal the events that unfolded that June—our collective memory is sometimes limited to not much more than an image of a man defiantly standing in front of a tank.