China Blue Smoke and Mirrors

By Lisa Beyer

The move was trumpeted in a nationally televised address and was well received by foreign governments. But when China finally lifted martial law, which was imposed on parts of its capital eight months ago to crush the pro- democracy movement, the response in Beijing was "Wu suo wei" -- it makes no difference. Despite official repeal of the decree, the government appeared to have ended the crackdown in name only: soldiers who had switched into the uniforms of civilian police were cropping up all over town, and there was no sign that their orders to suppress any hint of new unrest had changed.

In fact, the show of moderation was mainly aimed at appeasing critics abroad. Beijing is eager to break out of its international isolation and revive the lines of foreign credit and investment it needs to stoke its stalled economy. It also wants to bring back tourists, most of whom have stayed away from China since the June massacre in Tiananmen Square, costing the country more than $1 billion in lost revenue.

Washington and Tokyo commended the action and moved closer to resuming normal ties. Japan, the largest provider of economic assistance to China, announced that it was sending an envoy to Beijing to discuss resuming negotiations on pending loans. In the U.S., President Bush called China's decision "a very sound step," and Washington immediately softened its blanket opposition to World Bank loans to China.

But few Chinese were taken in by their government's maneuver. "Maybe ending martial law is good for international relations," said a history major at Peking University, "but there will always be soldiers and plainclothes police around." Despite Premier Li Peng's claim that "a great victory has been won in . . . quelling the counterrevolutionary rebellion," his government remains extremely wary of any revival of the protests.

Although most of the rifle-toting troops in Tiananmen Square have been gone for months, guards armed with bayonets remain in place at the Monument to the People's Heroes. Overall, there have been no reductions in the security forces controlling the capital. Many of the restrictions on demonstrations and strikes in Beijing have been codified in municipal regulations every bit as tough as the martial-law decree, and the independent student associations that mobilized demonstrators last spring remain outlawed. In any case, the dissident vanguard has been shattered as dozens of student leaders and their intellectual mentors have fled the country or gone underground; many more have been jailed or executed. In this atmosphere, disgruntled students and faculty alike have been lying low, stoically enduring hours of brain-numbing political re-education, until another opportunity for change presents itself.

Nonetheless, the overthrow of Rumanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, a close ally of Beijing, has emboldened China's dissidents. When news of Ceausescu's execution began to circulate, Beijing experienced a temporary shortage of beer as students bought up cases and smashed the bottles -- just as they did last spring to show their opposition to the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, whose given name in spoken Chinese can mean "little bottle."

The elite minority of restive students is not the primary worry of the Chinese leadership in the wake of events in Eastern Europe. Of graver concern is the growing resentment among workers and peasants, who are increasingly strapped by the government's austerity policies. "We are not demanding democracy and freedom in the same way as those naive students who laid down their lives," said a worker at Beijing's state-owned Capital Iron and Steel plant. "However, our families are waiting for food. If we cannot receive our wages, we will certainly become indignant."

Like workers in ailing state factories across the country, this man was angered by management's failure to distribute anticipated bonuses. Many plants have had to cut production because of credit restrictions imposed by the government over the past year in an effort to cool the overheated economy. The post-massacre restrictions on aid and investment by Western countries and Japan have squeezed the economy further.

A secret Communist Party document has reportedly revealed that in more than 30 cities, workers hit by recession have applied for permits to stage demonstrations. One group in Chongqing, in southwestern China, gave as its proposed slogan, "We want food to eat." China's leaders are well aware that economic deprivation, at least as much as political repression, motivated the popular uprisings in Eastern Europe.

But Beijing may not find that easy to fix. Leaders of the U.S. Congress, where sentiment is strong for imposing new sanctions, were unmoved by China's modest gesture, and are likely to demand more concessions before restoring full ties. Michigan's William Broomfield, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, summed up the reaction when he called Beijing's announcement "more blue smoke and mirrors ((that)) would not fool anybody in Congress into believing that the Chinese leadership was moderating its oppressive rule." He might as well have said, "Wu suo wei."

With reporting by Sandra Burton/Beijing