Tank man, the brave man who stood down five tanks that could have easily run him over. No one really knows who he is, or what happened to him after he stood down the tanks. Most young Chinese do not even know who he is or what he did. He fueled a revolution in the USSR, and what he did changed China forever. What he did changed the world forever.

On June 4^th, 1989 Chinese troops open fired on innocent civilians, killing hundreds, maybe even thousands, of people in the Tiananmen Square. There were tens of thousands of people in the Tiananmen Square, ranging from little children to old people, but mostly there were a lot of students protesting. The government would not have cared if it was just students, but since almost everyone was protesting the government got scared. They sent in troops to get rid of the protesters without causing any bloodshed. The troops started firing on the protesters though because they would not move. This got them to move.

This incident cost many people their lives and caused many more to get injured. The students decided to leave the square and not risk any more deaths. A day later five tanks came rolling down the street, and one man stepped out into their way, that man was tank man. The tank turned several times to pass him but he kept getting in front of it and once climbed on top of it. He was then pulled of the road by two people, who are also unknown. Tank man was a symbol, a symbol that showed that even a small force could stop a seemingly unstoppable force.

 The sad thing is that China has totally forgotten about this, actually it is more like they covered it up. They do not tell students about this, it is not on their Google. The Chinese government has basically covered the whole thing up pretty well. The only good thing that came out of this is that China gave freedom to economics; people can get as rich or as poor as they can. China has become paranoid about their people revolting against them, so they are very strict with the internet, cameras, what people say, like if your being interviewed you have to say things that will make China look like the best place in the world. Let us just say that if China had the ability to monitor what people think, they would. If the Chinese people could be shown what happened June 4^th and 5^th of 1989 I am sure that they would protest maybe even try to revolt against the government, like many other people are doing these days.