By the morning of June 5 (Eastern Standard Time) the "severity of the assault" had become clear to U.S. officials. This intelligence summary, prepared by the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, reports that, "Troops shot indiscriminately into crowds of unarmed civilians, including women and children, often with automatic weapons… Foreign journalists report seeing fleeing protesters shot in the back." The document notes the large number of destroyed military vehicles littering the Beijing streets, and reports that an undisclosed entity had "secured a university campus where students had captured an armored personnel carrier, and issued a warning that executions of students would begin tonight."
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Original source: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB16/documents/index.html#d17
