It's June 4 today, the 35th anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre.

It's not usually on people's radar here in the West. But I think it's an important day to commemorate. It's the day that China, the PRC, the CCP, showed the world its true face.

Yet we (the US, UN, Europe) continued on the path Nixon had set us on a decade prior, recognizing the PRC politically, and integrating with it economically. Three years after the massacre Deng would revive the Reform and Opening-up program during his Southern Tour, and turn China into the world's factory. In two decades we went from injection molded plastics to iPhones.

The Chinese economic miracle fueled cheap global consumerism, and turned the PRC into the world's richest authoritarian state. And as it gained power it become more bellicose, leading to the tense geopolitical situation we live in today.

1989 was a branching point in history. Things could've gone differently in China, if more moderate voices within the party had prevailed, rather than sending in the tanks. But things could have also gone differently for the rest of the world, if more countries hadn't continued to treat the PRC as just another business partner, despite the cold blooded murder of their own citizens.