Yeah, "decent" (read: western) countries can just do it and not talk about it because liberals will gladly work on their behalf and deny that it ever happens or deflect to repost lies about global south countries like they do with China.

A Wikileaks cable from the US Embassy in Beijing (sent in July 1989) also reveals the eyewitness accounts of a Latin American diplomat and his wife: “They were able to enter and leave the [Tiananmen] square several times and were not harassed by troops. Remaining with students … until the final withdrawal, the diplomat said there were no mass shootings in the square or the monument.”

https://worldaffairs.blog/2019/06/02/tiananmen-square-massacre-facts-fiction-and-propaganda/

https://www.workers.org/2022/06/64607/

https://videos.files.wordpress.com/mPSOWUUU/tank-man-2_dvd.mp4

https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/89BEIJING18828_a.html

Here's an interesting video that I hope will make you question if Marxist-Leninists are really the ones you should be calling "tankies": https://files.catbox.moe/rpzgus.webm