China’s Jiang Answers Letter From Cal Poly

When nine Cal Poly Pomona students wrote to China’s top Communist last March seeking an explanation for last year’s bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing, what they expected was a form letter in reply.

Instead, they were invited to the Chinese Consulate in Los Angeles on Friday to receive an extraordinarily detailed, 10-page answer from Jiang Zemin, general secretary of the Communist Party in China.

The response, hand-delivered to them by Chinese Consul General Ma Yuzhen, amounted to a lengthy defense of the government’s actions against what Jiang called “a handful of people . . . who whipped up the turmoil.”

While Jiang’s letter included scant new information about the disturbances and crackdown of last summer or the Chinese government’s policies, the very sending of such a response constituted a remarkable diplomatic gesture and was seen by its recipients as a clever public relations gambit.

College campuses across the United States were hotbeds of protest against China’s moves to crush the student-led pro-democracy demonstrations with a ferocity that shocked the world. Last March, the nine political science students were moved to write Jiang demanding an explanation for the crackdown.

Their respectfully worded letter questioned, among other things, whether it was “the gloomy reminder that although the Communist Party presides in the name of the people, it only maintains its power by the sword.”

In a pleasant but well-choreographed ceremony at the Chinese Consulate, the students received their reply.

“We were very surprised,” said Valerie O’Regan, 33, a spokeswoman for the students, all of whom are enrolled in an upper-division course on Chinese government and politics. “We expected a general response of two, maybe three pages . . . or a form letter.”

Ambassador Ma presented the letter to O’Regan, Victoria Engbarth, Jeffrey Jacks, Laura Brown and David Shui in a ceremony in his office. Students Steven N. Samuelian, Reggie Akenzua, Tom Payne and Shawn King were unable to attend.

Ma called Jiang’s lengthy letter “a new beginning” in Sino-American relations at a time when the two countries “are undergoing a very difficult period.”

“We want dialogue, we want sincerity, and we want goodwill,” he told reporters invited to the ceremony. “These are the most important elements in terms of repairing damaged relations between these two great countries.”

Ronald M. Peterson, chairman of Cal Poly’s department of political science, however, dismissed the contents of the letter as “propaganda.”

“They talk about friendship, but friendship is impossible without frankness, and frankness is impossible without a free press,” Peterson said, moments before sharing a light lunch of vegetables, rice and flower wine with Chinese officials. “Without a free press, there is no hope.”

In his response to the students, Jiang covered topics ranging from the “disturbances that arose in Beijing in the spring-summer of 1989” to political reforms in his homeland and the future of socialism.

For example, he declared, “We do not blame the students and the young people” for the government’s decision to crush the Tian An Men Square demonstrations with force.

“During the long protest period of 50 days, the government displayed maximum patience in the hope that a solution could be found in a democratic and legal manner,” Jiang wrote. “However, the patience was seen as a sign of weakness. This, plus the divergent views emerging at the top leadership of our party, led to a delay in the action at a critical moment.

“At the time, Beijing was already in a state of anarchy, and some elements with criminal records surfaced again in society, posing the danger that such a phenomenon might spread across the country.”

Jiang also warned against viewing recent changes in Communist countries of Eastern Europe as a “setback in the course of socialist development.”

“One should not conclude from this that socialism has failed or collapsed,” Jiang said. “A new system with innate vitality, the socialist system is not a weak system; it is capable of withstanding the test of frustration.”

“As a Chinese saying goes,” Jiang added, “A fall into the pit, a gain in your wit.”

Chinese proverbs aside, Cal Poly Prof. Marshall H. Shen said that, although Jiang’s letter was “still very much at the level of generalities, I believe it’s a new beginning.”

Ma, however, insisted that Jiang’s words “clearly show that nothing will happen to those who demonstrated last year due to a misunderstanding” and that Chinese students in the United States should feel welcome to return to China and “take part in reforms.”

Ma said that 900 people arrested during the unapproved demonstrations last summer have been released from custody, proving his country’s goodwill.

“I believe more will be released,” he said. “That is very positive.”

He declined, however, to estimate the number of people still detained or imprisoned.

According to unofficial estimates, 10,000 to 15,000 were detained nationwide at some point, but most have been released, State Department officials in Washington said. Chinese government figures leave hundreds of people unaccounted for.

“I don’t think you can forgive anybody for that sort of violence against your own people,” O’Regan said. “But we still don’t know exactly what happened over there.”