It's possible English isn't your first language? No worries.

The word "vindicated" doesn't mean "won in the end," it means "they were right." As in, justified in their demands, on the right side of history. Even of the protests I listed in my first comment, half of them didn't actually win in the end (Vietnam, Occupy, Gaza, and arguably more).

From Wikipedia:

...(the Seven Demands) for the government:

1. Affirm Hu Yaobang's views on democracy and freedom as correct.
2. Admit that the campaigns against spiritual pollution and bourgeois liberalisation had been wrong.
3. Publish information on the income of state leaders and their family members.
4. Allow privately run newspapers and stop press censorship.
5. Increase funding for education and raise intellectuals' pay.
6. End restrictions on demonstrations in Beijing.
7. Provide objective coverage of students in official media.[84][83]

I hope that you'd agree that the students were in the right, and that the oppressive CCP was in the wrong?