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Tank Man or the '''Unknown Rebel''' is the Nickname of the anonymous man who became internationally famous when he was Film ed and Photographed standing before a line of seventeen or more tanks during the Tiananmen Square Protests in 1989 in the People's Republic Of China . The photo was taken by Jeff Widener , a member of the Associated Press , from the sixth floor of the Beijing Hotel , about half a mile away through a 400mm lens. The still and motion photography of the man standing alone before a line of tanks reached international audiences practically overnight. It headlined hundreds of major newspapers and news magazines and was the lead story on countless news broadcasts around the world. In April 1998 , the United States magazine '' TIME '' included the "Unknown Rebel" in its 100 Most Influential People Of The 20th Century . Behind the image The incident took place on the ''Cháng Ān Dà Jiē'', or "Great Avenue of Everlasting Peace," just a minute away from Tiananmen , which leads into the Forbidden City , Beijing , on June 5 , 1989 , the day after the Chinese government began cracking down violently on the protests. The man stood alone in the middle of the road as the tanks approached him. He appeared to be holding two bags of some sort, one in each hand. As the tanks came to a stop, he appeared to be trying to wave them away. In response, the front tank attempted to drive around the man, but the man repeatedly stepped into the path of the tank in a show of Passive Resistance . After blocking the tanks, the man climbed up onto the top of the lead tank and had a conversation with the driver. Reports of what was said to the driver vary, including "Why are you here? My city is in chaos because of you"; "Go back, turn around, and stop killing my people"; "Go away." Video footage show that anxious onlookers then pulled the man away and absorbed him into the crowd and the tanks continued on their way. Some suspect the onlookers may have been plainclothes law enforcement. Significance of image In the West, pictures of the Unknown Rebel were presented as a symbol of the Chinese Democracy Movement ; a Chinese youth risking his life to oppose a military juggernaut seemed a fitting representation of students bravely and spontaneously protesting against the authoritarian rule of the CCP . An example of this continuing reading of the image can be seen in the 2000 novel ''Hong Kong'', by Stephen Coonts , where "Tank Man" is fictionalized as a man who goes on to lead a group of political insurgents against the Communist government. The image resonated within democracies as a symbol of an individual's power to halt government and force a change in direction. In the and as a possible Agent Provocateur of Western Governments . As with most matters related to the 1989 protests, the Tank Man topic later became and still remains a political Taboo in mainland China, where any discussion of it is regarded as inappropriate or risqué. Biography Little is publicly known of the man's identity. Shortly after the incident, British Tabloid the '' Sunday Express '' named him as Wang Weilin, a 19-year-old student; however, the veracity of this claim is dubious. There are several conflicting stories about what happened to him after the demonstration. In a speech to the President's Club in writes that the man is still alive and in hiding in mainland China. An eyewitness account of the event published in October 2005 by Charlie Cole, a contract photographer for Newsweek magazine at the time, states that the man was arrested on the spot by the Public Security Bureau . The People's Republic Of China government has made few statements about the incident or the person involved. In a 1992 interview with Barbara Walters , then- Communist Party General Secretary Jiang Zemin was asked what became of the man. Jiang replied "I think never killed See also References
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