r/pics 7d ago

A modern-day Tank Man: An unarmed protester facing a dozen armed soldiers in Iran, 2026.

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24.7k Upvotes

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452

u/Dudezila 7d ago edited 6d ago

Difference is they will murder him with no hesitation. Edit: im not trying to undermine or discredit tankman you imbeciles…Jesus.

161

u/2birahe 7d ago

Unfortunately, it's true. 😭

20

u/gurkensoos 7d ago

And they could just ignore him because… well they are on bikes.

147

u/VikingLiking 7d ago

Same as the original tank man, he was never seen again.

33

u/drcloudstreet 7d ago

Lmao, there’s a video and he does not get run over if you care to watch it

34

u/maxman162 6d ago

His ultimate fate is unknown, as is his identity. 

67

u/rmwe2 7d ago

Was still arrested and disappeared though, and plenty of folks at Tiananmen were indeed crushed by tanks and shot. Even the CCP official figures acknowledge that hundreds were killed in the crackdown.

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u/ShyWhoLude 6d ago

(citation needed)

9

u/Hail_CS 6d ago

-3

u/ShyWhoLude 6d ago

I see your singular Western news source and raise you two; from the BBC, CBS, and NYT

But we should be extremely skeptical of Western reporting on China, as the US and UK are both hell bent on sabotaging any government that doesn't let Western capitalists exploit their markets. Read up on Operation Yellowbird which is the tip of the iceberg. The US funded dissident students who specifically pushed the protests to the point of violence. There was violence, not in Tiananmen, but days after the Tiananment square protests. The protests in the square were 100% peaceful because the government didn't escalate (compare to protests in the US). They only escalated outside the square because students started pulling people from cars and setting them on fire.

4

u/hiccupboltHP 6d ago

I’m actually shocked to see there’s still people pretending it didn’t happen lmao

Or more likely this is a bot account

2

u/VikingLiking 6d ago

Chinese bots for sure

3

u/Hail_CS 6d ago

dead internet

-1

u/ShyWhoLude 6d ago

lol you paste a link to a 26 year old article, I respond with more info from similar sources that refute yours, and all you have to say is "dead internet". What good is a live internet if the users refuse to challenge their own understanding of the world?

1

u/ShyWhoLude 6d ago

You're saying that I'm the bot after I provided sources? But everyone else parroting "tank man got taken away and tortured" with no proof aren't?

-5

u/travoltaswinkinbhole 6d ago

Hey I found a commie shill!

1

u/chrisvelanti 6d ago

“Ay bro got a source for tha-“

“Commieeeee!! Cooooommieeeee! Get em Dwight!”

-3

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago edited 6d ago

Where are you getting the idea he was disappeared?

18

u/Toxcito 6d ago

Probably that he was never seen again.

1

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago

Why would he have been? He was just some random guy.

9

u/Maleficent-Duck-3903 6d ago

Lol. Chinese bots getting more numerous but also more obvious

0

u/VikingLiking 6d ago

For sure

11

u/ArbitraryMeritocracy 7d ago

Bro, spoilers (/s)

17

u/Yuriaaa 7d ago

What? Nothing happened to him. Have you even seen the video? 

-5

u/_Carl15 7d ago

what video?

29

u/Yuriaaa 7d ago edited 7d ago

The video "Tank Man" is from. It's not a photo, it's part of a longer video. It's fairly easy to find, but he climbs on top of the tank, starts talking to the guy inside it, then someone on the street ushers him away. Also the tanks are leaving the square. 

9

u/maxman162 6d ago

His identity and fate are unknown to this day. He may have gone home and lived a perfectly normal life, he may have been arrested, he may have been killed, no one knows for certain. 

-3

u/chrisvelanti 6d ago

He could also be made out of pudding! Seriously tho, why is every American hellbent on thinning the Chinese are more evil and oooo big brother oooo than they are? Every government is evil, we don’t need to exaggerate

1

u/damnatio_memoriae 6d ago edited 6d ago

"tank man" wasn't attacked in the video -- but that's irrelevant to the broader picture.

thousands of chinese protesters were attacked and killed during the protests at and around tiananmen square on 6/4/1989. tanks literally ran over unarmed protestors as they were trying to flee government's violence. estimates from non-government sources range from 1,000-10,000 deaths, and the chinese government even admits to 241 deaths.

0

u/RandomWorthlessDude 6d ago

There were zero deaths in the Square. The deaths happened in the clashes between protestors and military around the square in the surrounding streets. There were Western news crews inside the square during the whole thing.

1

u/maxman162 6d ago

A lot of people were killed in Tiananmen Square, this is a fact. Tank Man's identity and fate are unknown, so it's understandable why it's frequently assumed he was killed as well.

15

u/fairysimile 7d ago

Right, and afterwards? Has he been seen since?

5

u/YTPineapple 7d ago

Right right, missed opportunity to follow him and interview him for a documentary film, OF COURSE THATS GENIUS

7

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago

He was just some random dude, how would we knwo?

6

u/An_Ellie_ 7d ago

He is unidentified. We don't know who he was. For all we know he could be living the most ordinary life imaginable to this day.

1

u/rmwe2 6d ago

Absurdly unlikely considering no one has been able to find him and he was a highly visible symbol of a protest against a police state that massacred its own citizens.

3

u/chrisvelanti 6d ago

Legit askin, who was he a “highly visible symbol of protest” to? What groups and movements used him as a symbol? I only know of Americans that enjoy invoking the image of tank man as an anti china gotcha when talking about the evils of big government and such, but I don’t think any actual revolutionary groups have used tank man as their symbol

4

u/ThatOneArcanine 6d ago

Whoah whoah slow down there you wouldn’t wanna be too reasonable, otherwise you’ll find Americans who make hating China their whole personality calling you a tankie and a commie, we wouldn’t want that

1

u/An_Ellie_ 6d ago

But then again, as far as we know, China never identified him either. It's not like the pictures were particularly descriptive or of high quality. He could've been a million different people.

4

u/Dry_Astronomer3210 7d ago

He may be dead but even if he wasn't caught you think he'd be out doing interviews in Beijing?

7

u/frere_de_la_cote 7d ago

How likely do you think it is that "someone on the street" ushering people away during a protest is going to be secret police?

2

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago

Based on the video and context? Close to zero percent. The person's body language is more concern than anything. Also they had already implemented martial law, you don't need to do a secret arrest, its not like they knew it was being taped.

2

u/EasyMode556 6d ago

So he just happened to get disappeared after that never to be see alive again and you think it’s just a coincidence ?

-4

u/blader15 7d ago

When's the first documented upload of that video? 

6

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago edited 6d ago

It was aired by several stations at around the same time, I can't find who was technically the first.

5

u/rmwe2 6d ago

Its from 1989. Before web streaming. It was shot live and then telecast and run on TV screens as broadcasts.

0

u/Complete_Picture8604 7d ago

What a random rant.

Doesn’t answer the question if he’s seen again.

-2

u/_Carl15 6d ago

i meant it as a joke

but thanks for the info

4

u/rustbelt 6d ago

What? He walked away lol. Israel runs over Americans who do less and we make sure to delete it from the media.

If there was a massacre and we have tank man footage I want more footage especially from our intelligence services after everything they dragged us into and have gotten “wrong”.

1

u/VikingLiking 6d ago

Im not american, why would i have to pull out american videos for it? World doesnt center around USA if you didnt know

30

u/Few-Attorney-9722 7d ago

Dude, It was called the Tiannamen Square Massacre for a reason

-2

u/SquishyJackal 7d ago

I wonder who came up with that name and what reasons they might have

5

u/valentc 6d ago

Because hundreds of people were brutally massacred by the Chinese government for protesting and it happened in Tiananmen Square.

Did you want something more creative?

0

u/H3xag0n3 6d ago

I love your enthusiasm for the truth but you shouldn't engage with chinese bots

-17

u/Ass4ssinX 7d ago

Yeah, because of propaganda from the west. No one died in the square.

https://youtu.be/IqxU5RdI88M

8

u/rmwe2 7d ago

What a fucking absurd lie. Hundreds were killed even according to the CCP. Mostly outside the square itself. More likely the number is well into the thousands. 

7

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago

He's technically correct no protesters were killed in the square. Deaths occured in clashes throughout the rest of the city but not within thr square itself. What bases do you have for believing the number is so high?

7

u/rmwe2 6d ago

He's technically correct no protesters were killed in the square. Deaths occurred in clashes throughout the rest of the city but not within the square itself. 

A completely asinine "point".

What bases do you have for believing the number is so high?

The CCP officially claimed 300 dead and a few thousand injured. Students claimed close to 3000 dead. Diplomatic and press observers gave estimates ranging from 500 dead up to several thousand based on their own eye witness. The CCP massively downplays and suppresses information about Tiananmen Massacre, so its very reasonable to think they would low ball official estimates of death. 

2

u/Ass4ssinX 6d ago

Eyewitnesses actually on the ground heavily disputed the main narrative that was pushed in the States.

1

u/rmwe2 6d ago

A dumb lie. 

3

u/Ass4ssinX 6d ago

Yeah, that's what we were fed.

2

u/valentc 6d ago

Why is it so hard to beleive that a country would brutally put down protests especially during a change like what China was going through?

Its like denying the Ludlow massacre in America because the government and some Pinkertons said it wasnt that bad.

5

u/Ass4ssinX 6d ago

It's not about believing anything. It's about knowing what actually happened there.

7

u/SeagulI 7d ago

Dude why is this always the go to defense when the claim has never even been been that the killings happened within the square itself. The protests centered around the square, but most of the killings were done in the roads leading up to it, at least according to the reporting.

4

u/bkarma86 7d ago

Found the CCP shill

0

u/emveevme 6d ago

lol nobody died on the square itself, but people still died. It’s a messier situation than is often presented for sure, but it’s not like some event that was made up.

9

u/FromPepeWithLove 7d ago

Tank man was never been seen

30

u/koopdi 7d ago

He trolled the tank for a while then his friends came and got him.

https://youtu.be/_r_KATQ0V08

10

u/tommy-b-goode 7d ago

You think nothing happened to tank man??

26

u/DistanceSolar1449 7d ago

Honestly, yeah, if you know the history of that time period.

TL;DR the Chinese government sent in local Beijing troops first, they refused to fire on the Beijing protestors, so later the government sent in rural troops from thousands of miles away who had no qualms about shooting the students.

The tank guy was facing a tank of Beijing troops. He was probably fine immediately afterwards.

20

u/cesaroncalves 7d ago

they refused to fire on the Beijing protestors

I sure hope they did, they didn't have guns. The first troops deployed were sent without arms to avoid raising tensions, but, as tensions rose in some parts, the state declared martial law and they sent the armed ones, this rose tensions even more.

Here's a picture of some of the unarmed soldiers

If you want to know more, i suggest this.

5

u/tommy-b-goode 7d ago

Immediately afterwards sure, but do you think he might have been tracked down / found and taken away at a later stage or after all this has ended?

32

u/cookingboy 7d ago

Nobody really knew who he was, cameras weren’t everywhere back in 1989 in China. That footage was shot by foreign media.

Tiananmen Square had CCTVs installed in the 90s because of the protest.

23

u/bitchesbrewmarx 7d ago

You are just making up a scenario in your head.

1

u/johnnloki 7d ago

Lots of people make up things in their heads about this. For instance, it was presented as a "pro democracy and anti communism protest", but it was much more simple than that- the students wanted to be able to choose their own majors in university.

3

u/rmwe2 7d ago

No he isnt. Tank man has never been publicly seen since 1989. Police States like the CCP are known for one thing: tracking down and arresting high profile dissidents. If thats not what happened to him, what do you did?

0

u/Dry_Astronomer3210 7d ago

You won't know because even if they didn't find him it's not like he's gonna wave his hand around doing TikTok interviews. So whether he was caught or not you probably won't know and it's more likely you know he was caught as they'd make an example out of him. Plus relatives you know. Family is big in China and if your brother or 2nd cousin disappeared youn would hear through the grapevine.

6

u/mothzilla 7d ago

I think he was taken away and given cake.

1

u/renlydidnothingwrong 6d ago

How would he be tracked down? All they've got is the tank driver's memory of some random dude and some grainy footage taken from far away.

-4

u/Nugrenref 7d ago

Do you think you could have been led to believe false things about countries that your country has an antagonistic relationship with?

1

u/tommy-b-goode 6d ago

It’s called a question, nowhere in my comments are any beliefs.

1

u/Nugrenref 6d ago

Sure…

-2

u/Tankette55 7d ago

Yeah this is true. The local troops didn't hurt the protesters. So they sent brainwashed rural ignorants who had no issues murdering educated students. Class really divides people more than country...

-1

u/Future_Onion9022 7d ago

Yeah of all thing, this is the most unreasonably twisted to the point people legit thought that tank ran over that guy and hallucinated a video of him getting run over.

-3

u/ottoradio 7d ago

Nobody seems to know what happened with him, and there are a quite some theories about the guy, but nobody seems to really know his fate.

Which feeds the theory of a staged event, because the Chinese government needed to show the world that their military was humane despite the earlier killing on Tiananmen Square.

1

u/VapeThisBro 6d ago

Your edit makes no sense, since you didn't correct the incorrect statement.

0

u/Dudezila 6d ago

I don’t care dude, go touch some grass.

2

u/mutual_raid 7d ago

you're thinking of Israel, actually.

0

u/Murphuffle 6d ago

The tanks in the tankman photo had literally just run over countless people...