Page xxxv:
"Obtaining information from the highest levels of the People's Republic of China is unusual, but not unheard of. During the Cultural Revolution, Red Guards mimeographed two volumes of Mao Zedong's unpublished speeches and conversations that they had taken from Party archives and they circulated them to promote loyalty to his every word. In 1972 Mao's wife, Jiang Qing, gave a series of personal interviews to an American historian, apparently seeking to consolidate her reputation as a partner in her husband's revolution. Less spectacular examples can also be cited of documents and eyewitness reports that have cracked open the shutters on one of the most secretive political systems in the world."
Page xxxvi:
"Tiananmen began as an effort on the part of Beijing students to encourage continued economic reform and liberalization, but it quickly evolved into a demand for far-reaching change. The student hunger strikers in Tiananmen Square gained the support of tens of millions of other citizens, who took to the streets in hundreds of cities over the course of several weeks to demand a response from the government. The government at first tried to wait out the hunger strikers, then engaged them in limited dialogue and finally issued orders to force them from the square. In the course of reaching that decision the party suffered its worst high-level split since the Cultural Revolution."
"What we have here for the first time is the view from Zhongnanhai - the former Imperial Park at the center of Beijing that houses the Party Central Office, the State Council Office and the residences of some top leaders. Although the leaders occupied distinct official posts in a triad of organizations - the ruling Chinese Communist Party, the State Council (government cabinet) and the Central Military Commission -, behind those red walls they acted as a small and often informal community of perhaps ten decision makers and their staffs. They were joined in their deliberations at crucial moments by the eight "Elders", China's powerful, extraconstitutional, final court of appeal. Three of the Elders were most influential and among these the final say belonged to Deng Xiaoping, who was retired from all government posts, except one and lived outside Zhongnanhai in a private mansion with his own office staff. Here the most crucial meetings of these tormented months took place."
Page xl:
"The papers include accounts, from the state security apparatus and other intelligence sources, of the activities of many named individuals, who are now in the West. In a number of instances known to those of us involved in this project and in other cases, where we were able to check with the people involved, we have found the accounts to be corroborated. Because of the need to maintain total secrecy, as we prepared this book, however, we were not able to check most of the accounts with the people they describe."
Page xli:
"In claiming that the documents are genuine, I do not assert that every fact in them is correct. The same would be the case with the documents of any government. State Security Ministry accounts of the activities of intellectuals backing the students seem biased. We believe, accusations of manipulation of the movement by the United States and Taiwan were unfounded. State Security Ministry charges that George Soros was an agent of the Central Intelligence Agency (Chapter 9) are not credible. The death toll given in the internal report quoted in the Epilogue is no different from the death toll officially published at the time and is not necessarily the last word on the subject. Contrary to a State Security Ministry report of May 21 (see Chapter 6), we do not believe, it was Wang Juntao, who came up with the idea of a hunger strike for the students. Such examples warn us to use the documents with caution."
"The compiler at first wanted the documents published in Chinese with foreign language editions coming out, when they were ready. Because of the sensitivity of the project early publication in Chinese proved difficult. Eventually I found it easier to work first with a Western publisher to create an English-language text, from which several foreign-language translations have been made and to seek out a Chinese publisher second. To meet the needs of the Western publishing system, the book had to be shortened, explanatory material had to be added and sources needed to be identified. The result is two separate books. The one in Chinese contains about three times as much documentary material, but little of the explanatory and source citation apparatus of the present work. The Chinese volume is scheduled to be published in spring 2001."
Page xlii:
"In my view the publication of this book is likely to damage the careers of the two most powerful leaders in China, Jian Zemin and Li Peng, and to boost the authority of several of their high-ranking rivals. Since the fault lines in China's leadership run deeply throughout the party at all levels, the fates of millions of officials throughout the political system will also be affected.
Jiang Zemin is China's supreme leader occupying the triple posts of party general secretary, state president and chairman of the Central Military Commission. (These are the three legs of China's political structure. The "state" is equivalent to the Western idea of a government and includes a cabinet called the State Council and a legislature called the National People's Congress. The ruling Chinese Communist Party is the real source of authority. It makes the most important decisions and conveys them to the state apparatus for implementation. The military is a largely independent power structure answerable to the top leadership only through the Central Military Commission.) Jiang's term of office as general secretary is scheduled to end in October 2002 and his term as state president ends in March 2003. Some commentators expect him to try to retain his post as chairman of the Central Military Commission after these expirations, in order to continue to exert influence as a party elder from behind the scenes, as Deng Xiaoping did in the period described in this book."