Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang (39 page)

Y
UAN
M
U
(1928–) was director of Premier Li Peng’s office and director of the Research Office of the State Council. Yuan became the official spokesperson during the Tiananmen crackdown in 1989.

Z
ENG
X
ISHENG
(1904–68) was the Communist Party’s secretary of Anhui Province. From 1959 to 1961, he promoted the policy of contracting land to farmers instead of forcing them into people’s communes. He was purged in 1962 for opposing Mao’s wishes.

Z
HANG
G
UANGNIAN
(1913–2002) was a prominent poet and literary critic, known for his 1955
Chorus of the Yellow River
.

Z
HANG
J
INFU
(1914–) was director of the State Economic Commission from 1982 to 1988 and secretary of the Central Committee’s Economic and Financial Leading Group.

Z
HANG
S
HUGUANG
(1920–2002) was the Governor of Hebei Province and Secretary of the Party Committee of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in the 1980s. Zhang became a member of the Central Advisory Commission after 1987.

Z
HANG
W
EI
(1913–2001) was vice president of Tsinghua University and member of the Degree Commission of the State Council from 1980 to 1987.

Z
HANG
X
IANYANG
(1936–) was an outspoken liberal intellectual who was in charge of the study of Lenin and Stalin at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Zhang was expelled from the Communist Party in 1987.

Z
HANG
Y
UEQI
(1938–) was both deputy director of the General Office of the Central Committee and Zhao Ziyang’s secretary from 1987 to 1989.

Z
HAO
J
IANMIN
(1912–) was governor and Party secretary of Shandong Province and a member of the Central Advisory Commission from 1987 to 1992.

Z
HENG
B
IJIAN
(1932–) was a special adviser to General Secretary Hu Yaobang in the 1980s. In 1992, Zheng became Deputy Director of the Propaganda Department.

Z
HOU
E
NLAI
(1898–1976) was one of the founding leaders of the People’s Republic of China. Zhou held the position of Premier from 1949 to 1976. Zhou’s mostly pragmatic and moderate approach, in contrast to Mao’s radicalism and ruthlessness, earned him enormous admiration among the populace. His death set off the “April 5th Incident” of 1976, the first large-scale public demonstration in the People’s Republic of China.

Z
HU
H
OUZE
(1931–) was Director of the Propaganda Department from 1985 to 1987. His moderate stance was not tolerated by the Party elders, and he was removed from his post after Hu Yaobang’s ouster. Zhu served as deputy director of the Rural Development Center of the State Council from 1987 to 1988.

T
he editors would like first of all to express their sincere gratitude to Bao Tong, whose efforts were instrumental in making this publication possible. With his inside knowledge of China’s recent reform efforts, Bao Tong—who was once Zhao Ziyang’s top aide—provided us with insight at almost every stage of this endeavor. Bao Tong, who is the father of Bao Pu, one of the book’s translators and editors, spent seven years in prison for siding with Zhao in opposing the Tiananmen crackdown. At his home in Beijing, he remains under constant surveillance.

We would also like to thank Adi Ignatius’s wife, Dorinda Elliott, a Chinese speaker who was
Newsweek
’s Beijing bureau chief during the period described in this book. She provided valuable counsel and editing ideas throughout the development of this project. Without her sustained fascination with China and her ability to cross cultural divides, this material would have had a more difficult time finding its way to the English reader.

We’re grateful for the wise and elegant contribution of Roderick MacFarquhar, the Leroy B. Williams Professor of History and Political Science at Harvard University and the author of many books on China, most recently
Mao’s Last Revolution
(coauthored with Michael Schoenhals, Harvard Universtiy Press).

We have been impressed at the speed and competence of the team at Simon & Schuster. Our wonderful editor, Priscilla Painton, and publisher, David Rosenthal, were enthusiastic from the start about a project they could only refer to as “Untitled” by “Anonymous” as it moved through the publication process. Aileen Boyle, Irene Kheradi, Lisa Healy, Linda Dingler, Michael Szczerban, and Daniel Luis Cabrera brought their usual rigor and high standards to the making and marketing of the book, and made sure it was handled with care.

Lastly, we want to thank our friend and literary agent Rafe Sagalyn, who helped us shape an idea into a book.

There are many who must remain unnamed who have worked behind the scenes from inside China. They took unimaginable risks to safeguard, preserve, and transport Zhao Ziyang’s secret tapes to safety outside the country. We only hope that this publication gives them gratification and that in the future their own stories can be told.

Zhao in 1948, just before the Chinese Communist Party won the civil war. Already a county administrator with a successful record in land reform, Zhao was soon to be sent to Guangdong and eventually became the Party Secretary in the coastal province.

Zhao was very public about his love of golf, cultivating an image that would have been unthinkable for a Communist Party leader in Mao’s era. That image probably reinforced the impression among conservative Party elders that Zhao had learned “too much foreign stuff.”

The reform-minded General Secretary Hu Yaobang and Premier Zhao Ziyang operated in a political environment where the Party elders dominated. From left: Hu Yaobang, Deng Xiaoping, Li Xiannian, Zhao Ziyang, Deng Yingchao (widow of deceased Premier Zhou Enlai), and Peng Zhen.

Deng Xiaoping warned Zhao before the 13th Party Congress not to include anything resembling the Western-style tripartite division of powers. The final report should include “not even a trace of it,” Deng said.

President Ronald Reagan, right, escorted Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang following a White House meeting on January 10, 1984.
AFP/Getty Images.

After thirty years of rupture between the Soviet Union and China, President Mikhail Gorbachev paid an official visit to Beijing, where he was greeted by General Secretary Zhao Ziyang on May 17, 1989. Zhao, who advocated talking with pro-democracy student demonstrators on Tiananmen Square during the visit, was later ousted from his post.
© Jacques Langevin/CORBIS SYGMA.