"The system for repression is not as effective," Walder says. "They're forced to use brute force and military force. The old methods aren't working."

A Crisis of Leadership

Consequently MacFarquhar predicts a major crisis of leadership and of succession within five years. He says Deng had to use up virtually all of his political capital to maintain control during the crisis, and that no one of Deng's stature is waiting in the wings to take a firm hold of the government after he dies.

The army was divided as to how to handle the Tiananmen protests, and MacFarquhar says military leaders are almost certainly still split. "When Deng Xiaoping dies, that essential lid on top of this boiling cauldron will be taken off," he says.

"The cities of China are a tinderbox," he adds. "Events in the cities can topple a government or threaten a government."

Even though 70 percent of the population lives in the countryside, most experts agree that only political events in urban areas really matter. One notable exception of this rule is the political takover of Mao Zedong--but MacFarquhar notes that it took him 22 years to mobilize enough support.

Deng's successors probably will be unable to maintain the systems of repression and will be forced to liberalize, experts say. Deng currently is trying to boost the credibility of those who support his economic reforms, in the hope that his plans will live on after his death.

"Hopefully Deng Xiaopeng will not die first and some of the hardliners will," says Merle Goldman, a professor of modern Chinese history at Boston University and a research associate at the Fairbank Center.

A Call For Moral Deunciation

Both President Bush and china experts maintain that the United States needs to maintain some ties with China, but many academics say the President is bending over backwards to accomodate the current leadership.

Immediately after the crackdown, international criticism of the communist government briefly made China something of a parish among nations. Among world figures, only Nicolae Ceausescu of Romania and Yassir Arafat of the Palestinian Liberation Organization expressed open support for the Chinese government.

But while Bush did admonish the Chinese government for the crackdown, many critics of the regime say he did not adequately express America's moral outrage.

Shortly after the crackdown, for example, the Australian prime minister gave a televised speech in which he tearfully denounced the regime. Walder says, "Morally, I would have liked [Bush] to have been harsher to the leadership."

Later, the press lambasted the President for sending his national security adviser, Brent Scow-croft, on two secret missions to foster better ties with the Chinese leadership. And most recently, while the President has said that the U.S. will not sell China any military equipment, he gave his strong support to a measure that would maintain China's current "most-favored-nation" trade status.

But Bush, a former ambassador to China who has reportedly taken a strong interest in forming U.S. policy there, maintains that keeping good relations with those in power will help pro-democracy forces in the long run.