This is another nail in the coffin of the Hong Kong we knew and loved…
I was a resident for many years, I witnessed the peaceful protests of 2014, I witnessed horrifying wanton violence in 2019, I witnessed the rapid destruction of the freest laissez faire city state in the world. Above all I feel great sadness for the people of Hong Kong.
The CCP cannot tolerate any dissenting voices as a matter of preserving their total grip on power. It was an inevitability Hong Kong would be crushed and silenced although the world and Hong Kong was caught off guard by the speed at which this has occurred. I take some consolation with the G7's recent communique.
The CCP aren't idiots. They knew the time was right to do it, because in western circles, that were a bit slow to understand the world around them, freedom was not in good graces with political leaders. It was the perfect time to tighten the grip.
The G7 was disappointing. It was all talk in my opinion, although there aren't many venues to handle a situation like Hong Kong.
Do you mean that Western leaders started to turn their backs on freedom, too? You are absolutely right, I fear. So much of the talk about China in the West doesn't even mention human rights, just trade imbalance or cyber security. In an age of nuclear detente, I suppose it was inevitable that democracy's most potent opponents would be homegrown. I never considered that this also means abandoning imperiled democracy abroad, but it surely does.
It's actually not true. They did talk about human rights. The German embassy in China specifically released a statement on Xinjiang and how it's discussion should be based on mutual respect. It's not that the West isn't talking about human rights, it's actually that they seem to be more jealous if anything of how China does things.
Oh and if you want to check on how much a country cares about their relationship with another country all you need to do is check which diplomats send there. As an example all the ambassadors Germany sends to Taiwan are completely useless bums which are just wasting oxygen and tax payer money.
Germany has currently a tendency to excel in corruption and nothing else, without it having any consequences. On the topic of surveillance they also fail at every level. The left wing of our government behaves like the Stasi. This is no exaggeration, they will send the police to your home if you say something on twitter. At least judges ruled a case as blatently illegal. No consequences again... The right wing just wants to access any form of encrypted communication.
China is well loved because it is an important market for the largest car manufacturers, so politicians love China too. I really hope they just ignore intellectual property in this case... It is not that laws are currently taken seriously anyway.
'Freedom's' problem has always been that it's a very loose term. Freedom to do what? I can't even go into a grocery store after the federal government said i don't have to wear my mask if i'm fully vaccinated, without my mask. Virtue signalling by other Americans has become more powerful than the centralized federal governments ability to restrict my rights. I believe the US is scarier because it's more akin to mob rule. China is going to collapse when they get a very weak leader but the US is going to tear itself apart.
> Do you mean that Western leaders started to turn their backs on freedom, too?
The last time the Western leaders actually cared about freedom and values instead of resources in a major conflict was 1939-1945... there was no "turning their backs", as said backs were turned all the time. The Western world never had a major problem cooperating with dictatorships, military regimes or other autocracies as long as they either were somewhat (far) right or supplied cheap oil.
China is no different, the whole world is looking away from their attempt to re-enact the Holocaust upon Uyghurs and other minorities as long as China supplies them with cheap crap and/or cheap, no-strings-attached funding for infrastructure and bailouts.
I visited Hong Kong in January 2020 for the second time, having become mesmerized with the development, skyline and freedom during my first visit in 2018. It was a truly sad sight to see, people afraid to speak, red banners everywhere, lots of questions asked at the border etc.
Any idea that this happened only recently? There are already raids earlier along with other punishment. Without new provocation, this one seems totally unnecessary.
A reasonable interpretation about this raid, based on the timing and some knowledge about China and CPP, would be: this is a response to G7's recent communique.
But I bet not many people get the message because with some existing ideology that people usually are not aware of, casual relations among events are often ignored.
This shows the importance of cultural understanding and the lack of it when western commentators look at events in China. July 1st marks the 100th anniversary of the CCP, its pretty simple. It was probably done just to make ensure stability and so that it goes by without a hitch and nobody tries anything stupid. This sort of stuff is pretty typical of them, especially near important dates.
Well it's more complex now. There is a special unit for NSL matters, and the NSL permitted the state agencies to openly operate in HK (they were thankfully already operating but not openly), but I think it's mostly done with the coordination of the NSL unit, which is also connected to police. So probably some of the people in the raid were staff from the NSL unit.
I have the same take a you do. Those implicit signals make sense in a Chinese cultural context but are much harder for the non initiated to pick on. This being said, State actors in the West have their analysts and certainly know what's afoot, cue the official response from the EU and Britain. But the general public can't parse it, which is important in democracies.
But why would this be in any way surprising? We knew since the agreement between China an the UK that this day would come. The whole world knew. Maybe the residents of HK had some vague hope China would give them more freedom than in the mainland (why would they??) but in other parts of the world the picture was rather clear. I expected massive emigration but as far as I can tell people had the idea to stay and fight at home.
But it is early, it was supposed to be left alone for another 30 years.
CCP actions, or rather Xi, imo, reflect a level of nativity or perhaps just typical authoritarian paranoia. People in Hong Kong were warming up to the mainland, more and more were identifying as Chinese primarily. If CCP had left well alone and continued on the course, they would have had a loyal Hong Kong with a new generation that could accept gradual reform, but they've poisoned that well.
PRC scholars warned new HK generations would culturally drift 10+ years ago. The fact that HK has existed in a national security state of exception for 20+ years, while simultaneously operating as a western spy hub outside of Chinese purview is fundamentally an untenable situation that no sane country should accede to.
Reality is PRC who has always had FULL legal authority over issues of foreign policy under 1C2S post handover and was unprecedentedly patient with HK, while HKers have never demonstrated reasonable accommodation for "one country" interests. Apple Daily's Jimmy Lai met with Pompeo & Pence during height of US/PRC rivalry (read: treason) is just one of the many symptoms of why this crack down was overdue.
Newer HK generations growing up on western textbooks were never going to be loyal. Currently tensions could have been mitigated if PRC rammed through patriotic education and NSL 10+ years ago instead of naively assuming an increasingly irrelevant HK relative to mainland would passively accept loss of privilege and integrate as just another mainland city. Expect newer gen of HKers under PRC cultivation to actually align with PRC interests. For CCP, resetting HK culture is the anecdote that was long recognized but administered too late.
> PRC scholars warned new HK generations would culturally drift 10+ years ago.
Data suggests that the drift of HK generations [1] in the past two decades are swayed by what happened in China: Hong Kong people identified themselves more as Chinese during 2008 (especially during the Beijing Olympics), less so after being denied universal suffrage despite promises in the Basic Law (the Umbrella Movement in 2013), and when Hong Kong people started to accept TikTok (Douyin) and the like from China, Hong Kong once again diverged from China after 2019 (the extradition Law, its opposing protests, and the Covid-19 outbreak starting in Wuhan).
> The fact that HK has existed in a national security state of exception for 20+ years... For CCP, resetting HK culture is the anecdote that was long recognized but administered too late.
What you said explains a lot why Hong Kong people, Uyghurs, Tibetans, and others alike, want to distance themselves from China: CCP does not want diversity and inclusion, that the perceived security (of the party) trumps everything else. CCP wants control, not better governance or de facto long term security, which requires leaving minorities alone. To govern by doing nothing that goes against nature, as in Taoism, is an ancient tradition of China that CCP does not get.
> Apple Daily's Jimmy Lai met with Pompeo & Pence during height of US/PRC rivalry (read: treason) is just one of the many symptoms of why this crack down was overdue.
This explains very well what I mean.
The meeting of Jimmy Lai with Pompeo and Pence did not pose any material threat to national security or the security of CCP—after all, in this information age, the US can learn what they need to learn without such meetings, so the meeting is largely symbolic, and to reduce such information flow CCP can only rely on a Great-Firewall-style censorship in Hong Kong, which is considered unacceptable by many. To consider such immaterial meetings as treason shows sheer insecurity (paranoid) of CCP, and this insecurity is what brings its de factor insecurity, because it is worrying too much and overreacting.
Breakdown by demographics and shift in "HKer" identity is driven by 30s and below [0], i.e. the generations influenced by reintroduction of political education leading up to handover. Curriculum under colonial rule was much more apolitical. Clear trajectory of influence. Most countries underling decolonization do not promote politics of their colonizers. PRC allowed this arrangement to persist under 1C2S for as long as tenable, but last 10 years demonstrated those who anticipated blowback were prescient.
Hundreds of terrorist's attacks in XinJiang, Tibetans being weaponized by CIA for decades, HK being vulnerable spyhub into PRC activities... none of this is perceived. XJ/Tibet was left relatively alone by old oblast model and sheer inability for poor PRC to project influence, HK had 20+ years to ratify NSL. Doing nothing failed.
>not pose any material threat
It's pretty charitable to assume Apple Daily had no material influence on protests. There is zero reason for HK media tycoon to coordinate with US Secretary of State / ex CIA Head during period of Sino/US tensions and have it quoted on US state department website as discussions that has material impact on PRC foreign policy [1]. Thinking otherwise is naïve. Or assuming CCP merely over reacting when they have credibly demonstrated ability to expose foreign intelligence assets. HK is spy capital of Asia after all, CCP good at catching spies and crushing foreign influence.
There's probably some alternative chain of events where HK met PRC half way by introducing NSL that would have opened up for some political reforms HKers wanted. No sane government would grand _more_ privileges to subjects not beholden to national security, less flaunts against it, which is an absurd arrangement in the first place.
This happened under British Hong Kong too. The British never tolerate dissenting voice.The 1960 and 1967 protest, the British label it as Riot, end in violence too.
I think Hong Kong can only be peaceful if they solve the huge inequality. The image of wealth and poverty living side by side is very dystopian.
I am not really familiar with Northern Ireland and how it relates to Hong Kong. Most of youngster in HK are quite pessimistic on their economic future. Working hours are long. Houses are very expensive, small and crowded. The strange things is most of the population don't speak English but in corporate the language are English. This make a lot of locals was overlooked in Job Promotion.
Working hours and conditions on the mainland are even worse than in HK, famously so.
If the office language gets pushed more towards Mandarin that doesn't help locals. The uneducated don't speak Beijing'r Mandarin just like they don't speak flawless RP English. They will still get overlooked, but now the their bosses will be princelings from the north instead... Yay?
The N Ireland thing is about British repression, which was mentioned. Some people like to claim the British occupy northern Ireland (they don't, the majority want British rule). If a free press, fair elections, rule of law are what repressing dissent looks like, then I'm not sure how the CCP stack up!
I haven't read as much about Northern Ireland as I would have wished to, but the parallels are quite similar, especially the legal "innovations" used to quell dissent.
For example, the recent National Security Law allows non-jury trials, which seems to me taken directly from the Northern Ireland playbook: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplock_court
There are a some interesting NI court case(s?) which I've encountered in the past couple years relating to riots that were occasionally cited in the Hong Kong court which escapes me right now.
Anyway the point is that while freedoms are indeed being eroded in Hong Kong, it's a fallacy to paint the British colonial rule as benevolent just to make a point. (Most of the freedoms were granted to Hong Kong in the 1990s _after_ UK signed the Sino British joint declaration, it worked as a narrative to kind of force the Chinese government to revert a bunch of freedoms and hence the UK escaped most of the blame for making much of those those repressive laws in the first place)
The British tried to hold democratic elections during that time, but it was the Communist Party that pressured them not to. The riots you're talking about were Hong Kong Communist going against the British.
I read wikipedia. I just realized that the suppresion is more brutal than what I imagined. Are u referring to HK 1997 election? That election is after the British reluctantly agree to handover HK. From the CCP point of view the elections is a plot to sabotage the Handover. It is not that iI agree or disagree with CCP view or British motive. There are many anti colonial politicians in Asia suspicious of the British motive.
I would politely disagree with you on the G7 front - its all talk and no action. In the end the people who will suffer for the comments made in the G7 are these journalists. The fact is all that has been done is a bunch of talking. The fact is yes there are things which CCP is doing that is very wrong, and yes they have a very low tolerance towards dissent. However, any comment coming from USA and England makes the scenario even worse. In part this is because the "west" doesn't have a particularly positive PR impression in Asia. Many view the G7 as a group of countries that take their own decisions without consulting others.
For any protest to be successful, one side has to eventually reach a compromise. When the protests first started in 2019 for months they were peaceful. This was actually the time when they were the scariest for the CCP as its very hard to justify any action against them. Heck, I had friends who were PRC nationals who crossed the border to take part in them (just because they were curious what protest was and no other political reason whatsoever, and yes, they're alive and fine right now). The problems started when a few people displayed xenophobia towards PRC which unraveled into violence. At this point it became incredibly easy for CCP to smear the protests back home as all they needed to show in their local media was the few instances of violence against PRC nationals, juxtaposed against images of their own soldiers who were shown sweeping streets. Once England and USA started making comments about the human rights situation it was essentially a death knell for the protesters. This is because in China many consider USA and England's human rights comments hypocritical given that both countries grew economically by exploiting slaves (in USA's case) and colonies (in England's case).
Personally, I don't think politicians making bold statements from countries halfway across the world will help at all. Xenophobia overseas will make the matters even worse. Rather than turning anti-China and uber-nationalistic what would dismantle the CCP is to actually work towards winning the hearts of the 1 billion+ population, majority of whom actually have benefited from the CCP's reign.
The thing is, the Hong Kong government didn't give a shit to peaceful protests. After 1 million people protested peacefully on 9th June 2019, the official response from the government was "The Second Reading debate on the Bill will resume on June 12.". All these people were ignored. It made people realise they need something else to make the government respond.
People only vandalised at first. Some actions by protesters were over the top to outsiders, but they came after many peaceful protests and after police and triads colluded to attack protesters[2] (the producer of this documentary was arrested and charged). Protesters had to protect themselves at least at first.
In short, China tolerated peaceful protests in Hong Kong for a reason - they did no damage, and the government could safely ignore them and pretend Hong Kong still had autonomy. Once they had impact, authorities were quick to silence the people by any means.
> The problems started when a few people displayed xenophobia towards PRC which unraveled into violence. At this point it became incredibly easy for CCP to smear the protests back home as all they needed to show in their local media was the few instances of violence against PRC nationals,
A nuclear power with 9000 tanks don't need reasons, let alone one which did many worse things with even less remorse.
> Rather than turning anti-China and uber-nationalistic what would dismantle the CCP is to actually work towards winning the hearts of the 1 billion+ population, majority of whom actually have benefited from the CCP's reign.
How is the West supposed to make that happen, against a population that is being actively brainwashed? Almost all ways of entering information into China are censored.
> The dark
side of colonialism is also manifested glaringly in what many people still
regard as the British betrayal of the long-term interests of the Hong Kong
people in the 1982-84 sovereignty retrocession negotiations and in the subsequent British appeasement of PRC infringements of, and non-
compliance with, the Joint Declaration, especially on democratization and
the formation of the Court of Final Appeal.
well that turned out exactly as predicted! your paper did indeed lay valid criticism on the British for abandoning HK to the PRC, not doing enough to safeguard the Joint Declaration and make sure China kept its promises on civil rights and autonomy, and foretold the disemboweling of its constitution and freedoms by the mainland.
I shared your sadness at the time and have lived also there a lot over the last 10 years, including when the FOO was going to be debated in June 2019, triggering the unrest. All this is actually a good thing if you love HK. Apple Daily peddled a lot of divisive fake news, doomscrolling and rumors that 'fake justified' the violence in 2019 - 2020. Slightly more real politic take: having provided a useful pretext for the long overdue NSL, they are shut down.
It's not about dissent. Dissent is useful. It's about narratives that go against the country, sovereignty and threaten security. CPC has no total grip on power. It has many internal factions jostling for power, and > 90% of the population are not party members. That's why it is so sensitive to disturbances, because it's a constant struggle to build something that lasts.
HK is not crushed and silenced, it is liberated from violence and chaos, and empowered to build a new future, if only its youth will take the responsibility and do something constructive to that end. It has not been 'caught off guard' by the 'speed'. The NSL was supposed to have been implemented after the handover, over 20 years ago, and local media and people actively provoked risks to country, sovereignty and security, through 2019-2020 thus providing a pretext for NSL promulgation. Even so, it took more than a year of, as you say, "horrifying wanton violence, where we witnessed the rapid destruction of the freest laissez faire city state in the world", for NSL to arrive.
It's not freedom that was destroyed tho, unless you consider 'freedom to violence and chaos' as freedom. It was a required-by-the-Basic-Law long-overdue legal-loophole that was ultimately the thing that was destroyed by all that violence, and, tragically a few people's lives who suffered terrible injuries and death. Maybe one day they can be remembered as important people who contributed, however unwittingly, to ushering in a new era of peace and prosperity in HK. To the new decade!
While I agree, as a current resident, I also witnessed the insane destructive behavior of Apple Daily, who did exagerate quite a bit the situation and was far from a neutral observer. I'd even say that telling kids the police murdered 2000 people was not exactly helping them strategize rather than throw themselves in desperate waves at the police... These guys all pushed the situation towards a point of no return for the communists, which could have been instead worked around.
Ofc a strong and self assured nation would be able to swallow it, and China shows us how weak and self doubting it is, but I won't cry too many tears for that newspaper.
I'm even a tad annoyed Lai is presented as a glorious press freedom figure when I felt reading it that it was on the abusive side of freedom. I guess we all need now to redraw the line at which we collaborate vs resist and Im not yet at the resist stage.
The situation is clearly asymmetric tough. The Apple Daily is not a great paper and they got more coverage than they deserve but they are symptomatic of a need for people to voice opposing opinions.
Now there is basically nothing left. Local news outlets will censor themselves because the law is overly vague and will be systematically interpreted in the broadest possible way. Journalists are harassed and intimidated, if not threatened physically.
The independence of justice is also in peril with judges being replaced and pressured into compliance.
There is no turning back for HK, it's just terribly sad. It could have been an example for China, an experiment. Anti-China sentiment was comparatively fairly low while there was some token respect for the 2-system.
I agree with you that China only shows us how weak it really is with its display of comically over-the-top caricatural retaliation against any form of dissent.
I'm not sure what resisting can look like though. No cooperation is granted but while I'm a resident, I'm also a foreigner and a guest here. Options are limited apart from being an observer.
I love HK with all my heart and it kills me to see it go through that transformation into a pro-CCP satellite.
The tank has breached the border -figuratively- and I don't think anything will stop it now. I expect freedoms to slowly erode a lot further over the next few years as the CCP increases its hold over the various representative bodies (only patriots allowed!).
We don't cry tears because of the kind of journalism, we cry tears because it was on some level journalism or at minimum freedom of expression and the clampdown means the same it will happen to you if you try that route.
Anyone who contradicts Putin and gets any stickiness or popularity ends up dead. You don't have to agree with Putin's antagonists to realize why that is bad.
I contradict Xi proudly. I wouldnt tell children the police killed 2000 of them in secret, under the cover or repeating taiwanese news, to excite some sort of defensive behavior in them.
If the police killed 2000 kids like this newspaper sometimes proclaimed, then all the violence the protesters used felt justified. That's why im on the fence in this case, and that s also why China is hysterical at that paper that did more propaganda than them.
In every country in the world, when you claim that police murdered 2000 people, you will get in trouble. It has nothing to do with freedom of expression, exept when you have very good evidence but even then it's dangerous to make such claims.
Go on to Twitter right now and say those things. In almost every democracy, nothing will happen to you.
Put up a website and make that claim.
You might get banned from Facebook.
If the Apple journalists published information about the roughly 10 000 people that were killed in Tianamen protests, would they get shut down as well? [1]
Do you see somewhere in the UK or the US where 500 police raid a major news entity?
They might do that if the paper leaked sensitive military information ... but even then that'd be extremely rare and it would not happen merely for making ridiculous claims.
Anyone who challenges Xi or the CCP will end up in jail.
The obvious solution would be to allow Hong Kong residents to vote in their own leaders and decide for themselves.
No you won't. There are lots of conspiracy theory lunatics running around in Western (or many other) countries claiming stuff like this and nobody is arresting them if they don't also propagate or participate in violence.
Yes, I dunno what you call regular, but they repeated taiwanese rumours that were vastly exagerated. In 2019 saying the police didnt kill 2000 people in secret would warrant you a slap in the street, because of these newspapers that were a bit... activist ?
Kids that were arrested were hollered by these Apple Daily journalists to display their ID card to the camera in case they disappeared, creating a climate were they felt like oppressed freedom fighters rather than overly violent political activists.
Honestly me and my wife, at the beginning of Jimmy Lai s arrest were relieved because we felt it could stop the insanity a bit. Ofc China will go too far as usual but that's the feeling some of us have. Dunno how common it is, as it's hard to discuss calmly in HK.
Either people feel their little pride shattered by all this anti China discourse, or they feel invaded and tortured by the fact we're a Chinese city. Hard to discuss a middle ground where we ignore each other like we've done for 2 decades.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Daily
It's interesting that most people here don't read Apple Daily. Those who can read Apple Daily and know the real nature don't want to talk too much because the opinion doesn't align the majority of HNer's belief based on partial information.
It's a tabloid newspaper but more than that, it's full of hate and anger. That's its strength because there's a big market for it.
>These guys all pushed the situation towards a point of no return for the communists
Ah yes, the victim left absolute no choice to the aggressor than to punch them in the face ! What sort of logic is that ?
You don't arrest bad journalists, just like you don't burn bad books or censor bad movies out of the excuse that they're bad. On first principles, the nature of things is more important than their subjective value.
You dont but they do. So we have three choices: lick their boots, throw ourselves at their jails, or discuss alternatives until we find one. I'd rather continue discussing than say it's already too late, but I live in it and you dont so maybe that's why.
> These guys all pushed the situation towards a point of no return for the communists, which could have been instead worked around.
It couldn't have been worked around. It doesn't work this way. There is no other way, in 2048, or in 2022, no other way around. That's the goal of Beijing. Tell us if it's something else.
On other hand, if HK turns into mini-Syria, it would've mobilised way more people, even the most inert, and apolitical.
For Beijing, it will also be a guaranteed loss both ways then. They lose 2048, and HK on the platter as it is, with its access to world financial markets. I believe only a scare of this kind have a chance to make Beijing to back off.
Third, HK is the seat of Western money in Asia. If the bank where their money is will literally burn to the ground, at least then they would've not pretend that nothing happens.
Some times, a solution to violence, is bigger violence.
Well the goal of Beijing is for the party to survive, there are many solutions between murdering us all and let HK become a country.
I mean we're a city, we have no army, what do you propose ? I propose to work around the party, like Macau, sing the anthem from time to time and basta, the problem can only be fixed by China as a whole, not at our level.
Beijing cannot "back off" more violence, they can only double down. Put yourself in their shoe: if they're a mafia in need of legitimacy and survival, that committed too many crimes to welcome honest competition, how can a HK citizen think that burning a local metro station will make them "oh right, freedom is too important for HK, we should maybe even copy them".
Before immediately jumping to desperate violence, maybe we can try to bribe them. Which is what we did before, and what we now do albeit with a bit more cost to re-assure that yes yes we're good patriots until the dragon goes back to sleep...
I prefer to discuss about things in a less free Hong Kong than starve and steal in a mini Syria but you're welcome to solve problems that way where you live :D
Since when is Bulgaria and the Balkans a military industrial complex? I thought the Bulgarians made tomatoes and peppers and the Serbs made slibovitz and plum jam. Both countries are homes to great food. North Macedonia too.
Guessing by your name, you are a local? South-East Europe is a huge producer, and trade centre for small arms, sometimes to the big surprise of their own citizens.
While small arms are peanuts in comparison to jet fighters, and missiles by value on the world's arms market, they are still there, and Balkan makers have good prices, and collaborative governments.
This article[1] sheds some light on small arms proliferation. Bulgaria and Serbia aren't even mentioned. While there are still lots of unlicensed rifles in the West Balkans[2], the bulk of small arms still comes from the US, Russia, China and Western European states. They're sold to dictators or given to rebel groups in conflict areas. The former are then stolen, smuggled and resold to rebel groups and civillians.
This is tragic, the US, Japan, Canada, GB, AUS, the EU need to band together to counter China’s egregious rights abuses instead of solely pursuing their own business and national interests. They could all offer residency programs for the bright students and others that are currently suffocating there. China can’t punish all these countries together. If no one stands up Taiwan will be next to fall and then China would have unprecedented power by controlling the chip industry….
In the current climate if the US doesn't move nobody will (or it will just be a "look at me" gesture)
Why do I think so? Because the US accumulated that unprecedented power you refer to, and Japan or GB or Canada trying anything from themselves just means they'll be pissing in the wind until the US decides to do it as well.
The EU seems to me the only exception to that, but then I am not sure its majority sees a big difference between dealing with China instead of dealing with the US.
PS: GB already offers specific routes for HK residents to come over.
The EU foreign policy needs unanimity, and some of the governments (mostly Hungary right now) will not allow it to take positions against abusive dictatorships.
So it'll be many years before the EU becomes a foreign policy power.
China is also Germany's second largest trading partner. France and Germany basically head the EU, so it's very unlikely that the EU will take a strong stance against China until this changes.
Invest into manufacturing and infrastructure on US, European, African and Southern American soil. The leverage that China has is that way too many Western nations and companies have both their supply chain and the only market that is growing in China.
By investing into a "Western New Belt Road" - not just in terms of infrastructure, but also in other measures like stabilization by drying out the market of drug cartels via legalization or military peacekeeping operations - the EU, India and US combined could turn the tide against China.
What China did was to use market in exchange for access of technology. Many developing countries do not have such ambition, are happy to be in the same position forever.
A reckless disregard for any kind of protection - no matter if for workers or the environment -, generous government subsidies, and an abundance of young and healthy workers ready to be exploited.
There are no actions the US, EU, Japan & Co. can collective take that will alter China's political system from the outside.
It's why whenever people talk about ganging up on China, they're always extremely vague about it. That's because it's entirely bunk. Do something! What? Something! Do a thing! Which thing? The thing! It's identical to bumper stickers that (used to) say: Save Tibet, it's largely empty virtue signaling or wishful thinking. It's not realistic.
You can sanction them. It does not matter. You can stop all trade with them. It does not matter. They're free standing now, their domestic consumer market doesn't need the US & EU. Their banks don't need outside financing. Their government doesn't need outside financing. Their households have $65-$80 trillion in wealth. They don't require the West's technology trade, they can clone most of it. And so on.
The world population count will add two plus billion people outside of the US, Europe and Japan in the next ~30-35 years. Those people will all do business with China, no matter what the US/EU/Japan do. Those 2.x billion people will represent an economy comparable to the EU.
Trump's Admin took a severe counter-China / stop-China position (as staunch as we'll ever see in the US), it made no significant difference. China is more powerful now than they were five years ago, both economically and militarily. Their share of global manufacturing has never been higher.
Their military can't be opposed anywhere near their borders, they're the world's clear #2 military now, and are increasingly superior to Russia (which can't come close to keeping up in either hardware numbers or technology at this point). At the rate that China's military capabilities are accelerating, they'll easily be twice as powerful militarily overall as Russia within the decade, including having at least four aircraft carriers and a vastly superior space program to what Russia has. Russia will soon be a joke compared to China in military terms (which tells you what the EU is going to look like next to China). So, there's zero threat to pose to China militarily to alter their behavior. The US also has no interest in committing suicide to fight with China, eg over Taiwan. The odds are that Taiwan is already gone, it's just a matter of buying as much time as possible to diversify off of relying on Taiwan for tech manufacturing. The US plan is to make it difficult on China, to add expensive drag to the context, everyone in DC knows the US can't stop China from taking Taiwan if they want it.
And China is going to keep getting stronger in most respects for the next decade or two. During that time Russia will be entirely stagnant, and so will most of Europe. China will tower over everyone except the US (China will have an economy twice the size of the EU given a few decades). The US will be borderline stagnant (average US growth will continue to push toward zero across this decade and next, a long-term trend), as it can't afford its present level of military spending or government spending at all. Meanwhile China's military spending and capabilities will expand while the US capabilities go sideways or contract. China knows all of this, time is on their side.
What's left? Nothing. Attempts would be feeble at best, it would change nothing. We're 30 years past the time to try to flip or contain China, if it was ever possible to begin with. The sole reason to blockade China today (politically, economically), is for your own moral reasons (which is an entirely fine reason), not to try to change China (which isn't possible) or otherwise meaningfully restrict them. The West de facto blockaded Soviet Russia for decades, however that's not what stopped them, that's not what collapsed their system. The West barely traded with the USSR. It took 3/4 of a century for that monstrosity to fail regardless. China's system is at least several times more sustainable at this point than the USSR ever was, and dramatically more potent economically.
Whatever change might happen in China will be of their own doing. Whatever leadership follows Xi will be the next opportunity for the people of China to have a shot at altering their trajectory. That could easily be decades away yet. China is unlikely to ever liberalize, the best you're ever going to get is either Deng Xiaoping or Xi/Mao in terms of authoritarianism; it's for exactly the same reason Russia will never liberalize, there is no other means to hold their territory together other than through authoritarianism, it would immediately begin to unspool otherwise. Things that would not exist organically/naturally (such as the USSR, or Russia's present territory), will cease to exist unless you hold them together through great actions of force. Tibet and Hong Kong do not willingly belong to China, nor will Taiwan, as an example of that in action.
The obvious counterweight to China is India, which has a similar population and a rapidly growing economy. However, they're several decades behind China on all fronts (economy, wealth, education, infrastructure, you name it) and with Modi at the helm and COVID continuing to wreak havoc it's entirely plausible that they go into reverse gear again.
India offers no counterweight in the next few decades. They offer considerable further weight, that much is true.
As you note, they're running decades behind. There's some hope that the West & Co. can bolster India, accelerate their ability to help stand up to China in the region. The US will need all the help it can get, as it will be unable to continue to serve that role on its own. When the US was 10 to 1 or 5 to 1 vs China, as in the past (1970-2005), it was still not an easy task to wrestle with them; when the US is 1 to 1 vs China (and in their backyard), forget about it.
It's just an incredible gap for India though. By the time India gets to $5 trillion in GDP (from $3t now), China will be up at $22-$23 trillion or so, and far larger than the EU. The US adds an economy the size of Japan or Germany every seven or eight years and it's still not enough to counter China.
India realistically can't help any more than Japan does. It's a modest push-back potential, some limited regional containment. China does at least value having a veneer of global respect. All authoritarian systems want others to pretend they're moral, to pretend that they deserve respect. They always crave that. That's why the USSR and North Korea always wanted recognition from the US, they crave that fake uneared stature, which they can earn no other way with their type of system (systems that rule solely through extreme violence and force, rather than through any manner of democracy and human rights).
Besides all the economic matters, nobody is going to full-on war with China, and that includes India. I just don't see what significant difference India makes, unless we're talking about the year 2070. Certainly it's far better to have India as added weight on the scales, but it still doesn't matter in terms of altering China's thinking or behavior. The other problem, is that India really can't offer much assistance in restraining China in the Asia Pacific region, which is where most of China's more serious ambitions are in the next few decades.
Modi is a wicked man. It’s really sad what’s happening in India.
I wouldn’t say India is several decades behind China on all fronts, though. Cultural exports (Bollywood) are on par with China. It’s hard to produce exportable culture under severe authoritarian regimes.
So what’s your big plan? Sounds like fatalism to me, and I’m not buying it. China is just the latest authoritarian government to look unstoppable from the outside just like the USSR once did. It does not have the internal agility necessary to thrive long term. Already China’s diplomatic “wolf warriors” are making fools of China on the international stage, and China is increasingly unable to pragmatically adjust. This ossification will continue under Xi.
I feel like different people have different views depending how close they are geographically or financially to China. I don't think the diplomatic "wolf warriors" has any effect on anything tangible. It's not like international stage laughing has slowed down China's geographical expansion so far.
I doubt it'll be the doom of the West anytime soon but it's not going to be pretty for countries near China in the next 20 years. For countries next to China, it's probably about how bad the terms can be, how much land/sea they can keep* and whether that comes later or sooner. The big plan is to help those countries develop and slow down China influence's expansion.
I do think as the population become more educated, more liberal values will take hold so maybe more Western education can help. However, Chinese government control is quite vast and they are flexible as well. China is also doing very well economically so it's easier to turn a blind eye to stuffs.
> “wolf warriors” are making fools of China on the international stag
Firm commitment to XJ / HK crackdown, wolf warrior diplomacy and counter sanctions are sensible strategy that's paying off tangibly counter to western reporting. PRC showing teeth on core-issues is setting norms to be treated as large player who can act with relative impunity on core-interests (like US), demonstrating unwavering commitment and mitigating cost to future actions (read: Taiwan). How many PRC elites have been extradited after PRC retaliated over Meng, how many (non-US) sanctions after PRC clapped back when EU thought it could sanction cost free? None. PRC is seeking level of impunity commiserate with status as #2 global power, and seeing how watered down / theatric diplomatic statements that followed US meetings with partners have been, it's working. Very few countries are credibly committed to PRC containment.
>unable to pragmatically adjust
There's a reason every major bloc is copying PRC's industrial policies. Because it's pragmatic and more agile.
Russia looked unstoppable from the outside, but from the inside it was crumbling.
China is not crumbling. They don't have a controlled economy in the direct way that the Russians did, and as long as they have economic prosperity ... they'll do just fine.
I don't see them screwing that up.
It doesn't matter that much who's diplomats look like fools, it matters what the GDP is, how powerful the military is, how much control and leverage they have.
China probably will never do well on 'soft power' but they're going to probably do just fine with 'regular power' for the forseeable future.
China faces some big challenges moving in to the future.
One is the demographic challenge of a declining population. Most Western countries face a similar challenge of low births, but many of them significantly counteract it through mass immigration; China however doesn't have that and shows no signs of being open to introducing it.
Another is that many people will put up with an authoritarian system as long as they see it producing high-levels of economic growth, but it is unlikely that China can sustain those high levels forever, and people may prove less willing to put up with the lack of freedom in worse economic times.
Another is that while China is good at playing technological catch-up it still hasn't demonstrated much capacity to produce genuinely original technological innovations. And here there is the argument that open societies have an inherent advantage in producing those innovations over authoritarian societies such as China. If that is true, then that is going to give the US and its allies a permanent economic advantage over China.
These challenges are not going to be the immediate downfall of the CCP. But in another 30 or 40 years?
China is beyond playing 'catch up'. They might not be making the world's best software or jet engines, but they are making their own innovations in a wide variety of areas.
I don't think they will ever become the export powerhouse like the US, but we will see them move up the chain.
A lot of the low-level R&D in products already comes from China.
Also - the Chinese will put up with authoritarian culture because 1) they look at it entirely differently 2) they've never known anything else and especially 3) the surveillance of the CCP is orwellian. They will never let any idea challenge their status. The Chinese population at large will never have the opportunity to explore any alternative but what is told to them. Within that bubble, most are 'fine with it'.
Frankly, so long as China tried to have some kind of independendent judiciary and weren't putting people in prison for their ethnicity ... or kind of following the Singapore model I think the 'Rest of the World' would have no problems. And of course, if they weren't grabbing chunks of international waters as their own.
> China is beyond playing 'catch up'. They might not be making the world's best software or jet engines, but they are making their own innovations in a wide variety of areas.
Can you point to some specific examples of significant technological innovations created in China in recent years? Or technology areas in which China is the world leader?
There are still a lot of areas in which China is playing "catch-up" – semiconductor manufacturing (Taiwan doesn't count), aviation (China wants to challenge the Airbus-Boeing duopoly with Comac, but Comac is still a fair way behind both), just to give a couple of examples. What is an example of an area in which China has the technological lead?
> California can't build a single fast train, while China is laying down more rail than anyone in history in a very short period of time.
The US has had high-speed rail since the 1960s (Metroliner service, now the Acela Express), in the same decade that the technology was introduced in Japan and France. The failure of the technology to see further adoption in the US is due to politics, economics, competition from alternative transport modes, etc, not due to any purely technological issues. China's lead in implementation of high-speed rail is due to a political decision to invest in deploying it, not because China has any significant lead in the underlying technology.
> Soon they will start building commercial aircraft and wipe out Boeing and Airbus in everything but domestic markets.
Comac hasn't wiped Airbus and Boeing out yet. That is surely their aim but time will tell whether they actually manage to achieve it. Their main customer base is Chinese airlines, who will follow the CCP’s instructions in buying local. Comac will likely have some success in Africa and parts of Asia, but is unlikely to challenge Airbus and Boeing's lock on major first-world air carriers. The US is unlikely to allow US airlines to buy from Comac, and will encourage allied governments to apply the same policy.
It doesn't sound like fatalism at all. Recognizing and accepting reality - things as they actually are - isn't the same thing as being fatalistic. As opposed to being wildly delusional about the context for example, which is the guiding philosophy of the do-something-to-stop-China cohort. You can't stop China as they imagine it and thinking that it's possible is quite irrational.
Doing a conservative extrapolation on China's economy and understanding how much larger they're going to be than eg the EU given another, say, 20 years, is not fatalism either. It's obvious that China is already exceeding Russia militarily, and the trend is extreme (not subtle), so the gap will get a lot bigger in the next 10-20 years accordingly. That too is not fatalism. Accepting the bounds and facts of reality is not fatalism, rather, it's a necessary first requirement to then be able to generate a practical, rational course of action.
Who said I have a big plan. Why should it be big? What difference would a big plan make against China, it would never (should never) get off the drawing board. The Pentagon has lots of big plans; ask them about their big plans for the Middle East in the 1990s, or their big plans for Vietnam in the 1960s, or Russia in the 1990s.
Pretending things are not as they are, is how you get big disastrous plans of the sort the Pentagon is good at coming up with. That's how Iraq happens, that's how Syria happens. A superpower with a big plan to contain another superpower a world away - gee, that doesn't have an obvious outcome does it. So the US burns its treasure to contain China, while China doesn't burn its treasure to contain the US, the outcome to that is straight-forward (and again, also not fatalism; we don't have to behave that way). The US will expend most of its effort punching itself in the face, while China focuses on extending regional dominance. China doesn't have to go anywhere, it's their backyard; the US has to expend great resources just to be there.
It is not the job of the US to change or contain China, it's highly questionable whether we could contain China much at all, and it's not at all necessary in order for our people to prosper. Similarly, China doesn't have to contain the US for their people to prosper (as witnessed by the past 30 years). Just like we don't need to invade Venezuela, Iran, Myanmar or North Korea so that our people can prosper. The US is in desperate need of a priority adjustment: we need to start improving the lives of our people, or else.
I have a modest plan, which is all that is in reach of the US to achieve in the next few decades. The US is going bankrupt at the Federal level, it has to monetize ever greater sums of its own junk paper to continue normal government function (ie it has to steal from the wealth of its population to keep the lights on). Social spending obligations will continue soaring for decades yet, as such the US faces a dramatic reckoning of having to choose between playing global military superpower and the welfare of its own people. It can no longer do both. The cap on what the US can do in Asia is quite clear. Just start from: "not much," and you'll be in the right neighborhood. Just ask North Korea about their nukes. Maybe the US will sail a few boats off of China's coast, through the Straight, very exciting stuff.
A modest plan that the US can actually put into action that is focused on its own people, not on the absurd notion of a superpower from North America pretending it can afford to contain or control a superpower in Asia.
Sure, China will ossify, somewhat, under Xi. That's unavoidable in a dictatorship. They still have slack to fill out yet, easy gains. They still have a couple hundred million people living on ~$5-$7 or less per day. A quarter of their population is still living a third-world lifestyle. Lifting those people up to the economic level of Bulgaria will add trillions to their economy; things like that are easy wins for China. Technological advancement is not difficult for China, with or without Xi, so they'll continue to make rapid progress in military, tech, space, aerospace, biotech, etc. Momentum often carries large systems a great distance even after they stop functioning well (just ask the US). China isn't done building out its national infrastructure either, they have decades left of that yet. They still have exceptionally inefficient farming, which can be boosted to first-tier levels. They still have a lot of nuclear & renewable energy to build out. There are another two billion new consumers to be born in the next 30 years, to be fulfilled by China's manufacturing. The China economic engine isn't going to stop because of Xi, he's restricting and damaging their max potential. China is still a boulder rolling down a hill as far as Asia is concerned.
- Gradually reduce trade dependency on China. That includes diversifying away from Taiwan on tech manufacturing as quickly as possible and diversifying away from China on rare earth metals. The US has to get a lot more serious about this, the big globalist faux-US corporations will need punched in the face to get them in line (ie more stick than carrot; they've already been given a lot of carrots, it didn't work). This one is a lot easier than sparring with China, yet the US is failing at it. Which tells you how any Big Plans(TM) will go.
- Invest far more heavily in domestic R&D, science, technology, tech manufacturing, and manufacturing in general. That will be necessary just to attempt to keep up with China in the coming decades. The US talks a lot about doing this and its follow-through is often mediocre. Cut the corp tax rate for domestic manufacturing to 15%. Reduce burden and regulation everywhere we reasonably can, make it easier to manufacture in the US (which doesn't mean getting rid of all regulations).
- Reform US immigration. Mirror the approach Canada, Australia and most smart, affluent nations follow. Make it very easy for high-skill labor to come to the US and gain citizenship. This is a huge advantage over China, one they can never possess, we need to maximize on it. This is an easy win (if the US were still high-functioning).
- Double annual US infrastructure spending for at least the next 20 years. That should include: build five regional high-speed rail systems (Federal project, use Federal power to move roadblocks out of the way, including enviro laws, be as vicious as necessary); build several new nuclear power plants per year, should be federal projects treated with national security importance; bolster and rebuild the US grid, we're nowhere near ready for an all-electric vehicle future; build a lot more wind power, including off-shore, it's our best bet for easy gains on renewables. Debt is cheap (we're buying our own paper), and we're going to financial hell no matter what we do now, so we might as well fix our eroding infrastructure and improve the quality of life for future generations while we're at it. The US talks about doing these things, and never really does them. The joke of an infrastructure bill in DC won't do much, like putting a band-aid on terminal cancer.
- Stop trading with China on badly unequal terms. Block foreign investment into China by US citizens & corporations, and block investment into the US by China. Block all real-estate purchases by Chinese citizens and corporations. Block all business acquisitions by Chinese companies across the board. Increase blocks on technology transfer.
- Reduce US military adventurism toward zero. Close at least 3/4 of all US military bases around the globe. Abandon the Middle East militarily, including entirely pulling out of Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, et al. Those days are permanently over. Reduce a lot of the US military presence in Europe, cut it in half. Redirect a portion of that to Asia Pacific; some of it doesn't get redirected, as we can't afford all of it, some of it has to go away.
- Start focusing on treating our own people a lot better (reduce the prison population, get rid of mandatory minimum sentencing, legalize most drugs, decriminalize all drugs). Attempt to regain some of the moral stature that has been burned up by various DC stupidity across decades. This matters if you plan to appeal to the rest of the world in a forever confrontation with China. We have to represent positive, humanist qualities that the CCP doesn't and can't. Otherwise what's the point.
- This goes with the last item. Refocus US military spending on improving the lives of Americans, not blowing up the Middle East or foreign adventurism in Europe or Asia. It doesn't matter what the subject is, whether it's healthcare or infrastructure, our money is better spent there than on sprawling our military around the globe. Redirecting $300 billion per year from military spending to healthcare, education and infrastructure would be a good start. Our healthcare system has failed, it's time to start using Federal power to squeeze costs out of the system and implement universal coverage. There's no reason we can't reduce healthcare costs by 15-25% over time given how out-of-line our expenses are, which helps pays for expanding Medicaid up the ladder to achieve universal coverage. Biden should be abusing executive orders like crazy in this direction.
- Continue to gather as many allies in Asia as possible and get them pointed in the same direction as a cooperative. Pull NATO's interests into Asia a bit more. The US is already doing some of this (eg with Vietnam, India and other traditional allies in the region), but it's not easy, China has lots of carrots to offer as well as sticks. The US has already peaked in Asia, China's influence in Asia will get far larger yet. The US can only slightly slow down China's gains in Asia, not stop the process. The goal should be to make China's adventurism very expensive, that's the best that can be realistically accomplished.
- Invest more heavily into accelerating the development of regional rivals to China, including India and Vietnam. Our interests align on this matter. The more they can do for themselves, the less we have to do in the region, the better. For the same reason it was in the US interest for France, Britain and West Germany to reboot quickly after WW2 (less need for the US presence in Europe), it's in our interests for India, Vietnam, Indonesia, etc to develop even faster.
You'll notice my plan isn't focused primarily on confronting China in Asia. That's because that shouldn't be our focus at all. No more than it should be the focus of Germany, Britain or France. The primary focus should be on improving the US, not worrying about containing China. We can't contain China.
The CCP isn't going anywhere, and we can't dictate human rights within China. Trying to deny reality isn't useful in such a context. You can't stop them from doing whatever they want to Hong Kong, you can't force them to adopt some other system of government, you can't stop genocide within their borders if they're intent on it, just as you can't force them to accept freedom of expression/religion/press/speech. The US & Co. can't even accomplish such aims in weak nations like Myanmar, North Korea or Cuba.
The US as a superpower has long been living beyond its means. Those days are coming to an end one way or another, just look at the credit card bill. We'll be well served to focus on the quality of life of our people for a change.
> It doesn't sound like fatalism at all. Recognizing and accepting reality - things as they actually are - isn't the same thing as being fatalistic. As opposed to being wildly delusional about the context for example, which is the guiding philosophy of the do-something-to-stop-China cohort. You can't stop China as they imagine it and thinking that it's possible is quite irrational.
Accepting reality? Years of life in China will make anybody lose touch with one, especially living in the most Potemkin town of them all.
> It's why whenever people talk about ganging up on China, they're always extremely vague about it. That's because it's entirely bunk. Do something! What? Something! Do a thing! Which thing? The thing! It's identical to bumper stickers that (used to) say: Save Tibet, it's largely empty virtue signaling or wishful thinking. It's not realistic.
First, the West has a giant arsenal of means not simply "to do something", but outright destroy China as a state. The West remains the preeminent political, military, economic power of the world by a giant extend, way more than China, Russia, Iran + 10 other rouge states combined. You don't "contain" your enemy, you defeat him, this is how the West needs to start thinking.
— It's a giant power, the West only needs to use it. The West has a way more means than China has to do anything to the West. The direct military attack being only one of many things possible on the list. It's just the Western unwillingness to admit that it can do something, because admitting to it will be be followed by a compulsion of doing so.
West's internal problems are a malaise of heart, while its problem with China is a malaise of mind. The material problems can be fixed, but what's being kept created by your own mind cannot: the Western fixation on impotent "realpolitik China strategy" is one of this kind, and its fixation on China's economic strength is another.
China as a state entity existing in a physical world is much a lesser threat, and danger than the China which exists in the heads of Western elites, and all kinds of wormtongue "strategy advisers", Kissingers, and co.
I'm fully agreeing on the point that the West can't win without a dramatic change happening inside their heads first. For the West to defeat China, first it will need to defeat itself, and own weaknesses, all what holds it back.
Foreign policy making wormridden by "political strategists," pathological addiction to backstabbing of critical allies, refusal to look at politics from classic military dimension;
Elite culture dominated by defeatist people selling wholesale "China model" koolaid like Tim Cook, and Sundarajan Pichai, universal hostility to useful business, and industry by political backstabbers, useful idiots, and wanton saboteurs-profiteers;
The giant Trump electorate, you will have to find a way to live along with these people, but that doesn't mean surrendering to them! Propaganda of inaction, and isolationism exactly of this kind led to US staying out of WW2 until it was tool late;
The USSR and China aren't really comparable. At its height, the USSR had an economy about 60% of the size of the US's. The idea of the USSR as a threat to the USA (or even core US allies) was basically american paranoia in the post-Stalin era. What's more, a lot of the institutional dysfunction of the USSR was the legacy of Stalinism - it's hard to have a healthy society when everybody is used to being terrified of the man in charge.
China is already much bigger in terms of relative economy than the USSR ever was. Frankly, I doubt that they are an 'opponent' to the US in the sense that China hawks would have it, but they are way more credible as a 'superpower' than the USSR ever was. The USSR just had a lot of soft power with people in the global south because ex-colonies are typically not that keen on the world order established by their colonizers.
It's to describe the habit of Chinese diplomats and other mouthpieces of the CCP to threaten and verbally assault other nations when China is criticised.
I don't know how it could go long term, but for the moment I think the US actions are not without effect.
Trump's big moves were overly relayed by the press, but I think there are deeper stances that have been continuously influencing other countries decisions.
Euro countries removing Huawei from their infrastructure for instance in not benign, and happened basically as the US shifted its weight around. The US has a history of spying on the EU, so it's not just these countries doing a "safe bet" move.
Now this is such a big subject and most of it is over my head, but I think the current tension is happening mostly because for better or worse things can change.
You’re bullshitting, as evidenced by how hard China pushed against Trump’s changes. One doesn’t need to crush China to change its incentive gradient. Besides, worst case scenario, the non-Chinese countries can isolate their economies from China to at least shield their own autonomy.
Maybe 10-15 years ago it would be possible, right now all the countries you've listed are strongly depended on Chinese manufacturing. Average person in any of those countries will easily swallow restricting freedom in HK, Urguys or Christians persecution, but will be mad without next generation gadgets that are all produced in China.
It would require a really big effort to drop dependency on China, I don't think politicians and societies are ready for this.
One more thing: when it comes to relations with China there is no such a thing like EU. Every country has its own agenda and interests, every country wants to win as much as possible for themselves, right now Germany is cutting a trade deal with China and there is no less important subject for them than some HK rights.
And you are right, Taiwan is next on the list. I've read some analysis that in 6 years China will develop its army to that extent, that US will not be able to defend Taiwan.
Taiwan is buying from the US expensive planes, tanks, which would not matter that much in the future war, where a relatively cheap loitering munition or a drone can destroy very expensive tank or plane. This was good for US military industry, but from the Taiwan defense perspective that's not a smart move.
In 2019 they raided the Australian national broadcaster's headquarters, and the home of a journalist, because of 'national security secrets' [1].
A couple of days ago, a 21 year old journalist and comedian was arrested by a counter-terrorism unit because he helped make youtube videos criticising a government official [2]. Nothing serious about national security is required anymore.
The laws in Australia are terrifying; the government has extraordinary powers that can force you to build encryption backdoors and you're not allowed to tell anyone, not even your employer. So who knows what happens that the public never hears about.
People were also arrested for making facebook posts just talking about covid protests.
That's exactly what the UK has done [1], and to a lesser extent, Australia as well [2]
However, I don't think trying to grab all and all Hong Kong residents who are privileged enough to emigrate is necessarily the solution to the problem. Hong Kong will still fall to totalitarianism, even more so without the intelligentsia.
Taiwan importance is its geography. If China is able to control Taiwan it would not have any restriction for its shipping lanes and military. Its a much more important asset in the long run compared to HK.
> the US, Japan, Canada, GB, AUS, the EU need to band together to counter China’s egregious rights abuses
Countries living in glass houses cannot throw stones on others. Moreover each country has it's own flaws, so before asking others to correct each one of them needs to correct themselves (like those countries ruling establishment in China enjoy majority support and minority like in any system democratic or communist or authoritarian is suppressed or prosecuted). All these system needs to change in which minority are protected from tyranny of majority.
> They could all offer residency programs for the bright students
Agree with you they should also include every prosecuted community in the world in this program not just Hong Kong. Indeed program should be wide open to prosecuted minority from any country not just China. The bastion of democracy can demonstrate it in action not words, to really change the status quo.
I don't hold my breathe for it, given most democracy also works on majoritarian politics it will be hard given national self-interests trumps humanity.
> ruling establishment in China enjoy majority support
We don’t know the support because anyone who dares to speak up is silenced. People are too scared to say they don’t like the government.
The claim is that the CCP has 95% approval rating. But the local governments have a 10% approval rating.
The local governments are The Central government. Nothing the local governments do is done without The Central governments oversight and approval. So that 95% approval isn’t real. But I sure as hell wouldn’t say I disapprove if I lived in china.
I find the 95% figure hilarious, frankly. As if 95% of any population on the face of the planet could agree on anything, much less a population of over a billion.
It being as high as it is tells me it's fake. Not fake as in falsified directly, but definitely fake in that the citizens opinions are manipulated via information control. The later makes perfect sense with the 10% figure for local governments. You can lie to people about how things are going far away, but you can't lie to them about how they're going in their backyard.
5% disapproval is basically the lizard man constant, aka how many people believe our politicians are actually lizards wearing human skin. So claiming 95% approval is essentially claiming 100% approval. Patently absurd. Even in the days after 9/11 when America was memorably united as one, approval of Bush hit 90% (briefly), not 95%.
It’s effectively impossible to have lasting super-high approval as a government anyway, because you’re in the business of picking winners and losers.
Fun trivia: in Italian journalistic vernacular an hyper majority with no dissenting voices like this is called a "Bulgarian majority", referring to the former communist rule and obviously fake data.
As much as times change, dictatorships stay the same.
This is 30+ years of polling showing consistent trend with methodologies scrutinized by multiple parties. And since when are statistics of approval ratings comparable to US election polling?
>It’s not hidden knowledge that a lot of Chinese people are scared to say anything bad.
Because that's not actual knowledge so much as conspiratorial thinking and lazy propaganda. PRC citizens criticize with impunity frequently, especially via methods that has little chance of blowback, i.e. polling, local protests vs public criticisms that goes viral.
Oh please. Local protests in china always result in police brutality and arrests. Just a few weeks ago there was video footage of students protesting the changes to their degrees sitting on steps and the police hitting them. Let’s not try and pretend people are not scared to go against the norm. The vast majority of PRC you talk to outside of china will tell you they absolutely love their country and hate the ccp. Don’t pretend that sentiment doesn’t exist inside china for the vast majority of good people suffering at the hands of the ccp.
Yes and who do they appeal to? Central government, which comports with all studies showing high satisfaction with Beijing's performance. And risk of physical protest is qualifiable different than participating in a poll, PRC folks bitch about politics via relatively cost free methods everyday.
>vast majority of PRC you talk to outside of china will tell you they absolutely love their country and hate the ccp.
Maybe if you hang with FLG crowd and base opinion off epochetimes. Apart from dissidents or minorities who actually suffered repression which are the minority, the vast majority of mainland diaspora acknowledge central gov is what made modern PRC great, even if begrudgingly. Of course negative sentiment towards government exists... 5% against central gov as data shows. Everyone, everywhere bitches about politics, local and central, difference is PRC citizens overwhelmingly feels central gov is performing well. And in context of national approval, one evaluates based on performance of central gov like top executive branches / politburo members. Again this is consensus of 30 years of polling that's been scrutinized every which way by western institutions.
The proof is really in the pudding, if the CCP were as popular as they claim, they wouldn't have a rational reason to crack down on competing political parties and fair elections. They know they aren't so popular, that's why they don't allow the public to have a choice.
Feel truly bad for Hong Kong here.
Sadly nothing will be done here by the west.
Let's not forget a "social justice" warrior LeBron James criticized an NBA owner for tweeting "Stand with Hong Kong" not too long ago. It's all about money in the west.
I hope they’re not inviting us to bomb China until representative democracy takes root. We’re not terribly good at that, but we’re far more effective at that than diplomacy.
My hope is, just as it's commonplace for Chinese people to learn English, it becomes commonplace for Westerners to learn Mandarin. Only once we can communicate can we start to break through cultural and ideological barriers. It would be impossible to stop the flood of readily consumable Western Mandarin media and culture.
Unfortunately I think too many would see learning Mandarin as China winning a culture war, instead of seeing it as building a foundation for expropriating the CCP's control over Chinese ideology.
I definitely think there should be more cultural exchange, but as to your "missionary" plan of attack, it doesn't really work like that. If you really want to alter China having this fantasy that you're simply better than they are all you need is for them to see it will not help.
Many Chinese people already speak English, have lived and travelled overseas, but "dangerous" Western ideas have not penetrated into and changed their culture. The reason is not because: "the CPC controls it", it's because people Chinese people are very proud of who they are, and they accept the CPC is doing the right thing. Not meaning 100% agreement with the government -- it regularly bends to the will of the people to cool their anger when it's done something that didn't work.
Somewhat related to your point: I think people should definitely engage with China more, rather than just the biased hologram of China presented in Western media. That's good for everyone, whatever your goal is.
The culture bias goes both ways, and there's probably people who hope Westerners don't get a clear idea of China, and don't want them to learn Mandarin and engage more, because they're afraid of "Chinese ideas" penetrating and "expropriating" (to use your term) their culture and control.
The owner of Apple Daily should thank his stars that he is not charged under Australian law.
We have a situation here in Australia where people accused of vaguely defined "national security" crimes are charged secretly and tried by secret courts.
We have also had counter-terrorism police raid and arrest journalists and youtube comedians because a minister felt that he was insulted by them.
Daily reminder that the Chinese Government should never ever be trusted.
China agreed not to touch Hong Kong's system politically or economically until at least 2047.
They couldn't manage even half of that, and there are now many Hong Kongers sitting in jail for the "crime" of supporting democracy in Hong Kong (not even China!), which was made illegal by the CCP under "national security" laws.
The writing was on the wall well before it was even handed over. England was in no position to defend the island after the lease on the New Territories ended, nor are they capable of doing anything to prevent the CCP from slowly eroding institutions in Hong Kong now. Everyone else has little to no skin the game to risk anything significant. Their only hope was the belief that the economic development of China would usher in democratic reforms, which hasn't happened.
England never had any leverage in negotiations, so it makes sense that the CCP wouldn't care or honor anything because they correctly predicted that repercussions would be minimal. Over time, the importance of Hong Kong as a financial and economic hub/ gateway to China has waned substantially, so now the instability in the region isn't as costly anymore. The incentives were never there for the CCP to act in good faith.
It is incredibly unfortunate what is happening, but realistically it was only a matter of time before these things happened, the terms they agreed upon weren't much more than window dressing to allow England to exit gracefully.
You are right, that was probably the most significant path not taken, though at the time it probably wasn't attended to with 1997 in mind which is why it was left on the back burner. By the time sovereignty negotiations began in the 80s it was probably too late.
British Hong Kong is not a democracy too. British rule. Hong Kong only have a limited election in 1985 only after the the handover was sealed. The CCP looks at the 1985 election as a British plot to sabotage the handover.
I dont really buy this. HK is apart of China, why should GB be able to dictate Chinese law based on a colony they took from China hundreds of years ago?
Politically? Physically? Culturally? Morally? Currently Hong Kong is ruled by China. Many in Hong Kong might prefer something different. If the government in Beijing allowed them to, they might choose complete independence.
> why should GB be able to dictate Chinese law based on a colony they took from China hundreds of years ago?
Why should a government in Beijing be allowed to dictate policy for people in Hong Kong based on the fact that Hong Kong was under control of a different government in mainland China hundreds of years ago before the British (unlawfully) took it from them?
Should the people of Hong Kong have a say in this? The people in Hong Kong have been asking for the right of self-determination. Is there some reason that the people of Hong Kong should not get this right?
As a Hongkonger, I see some similarities of culture between Hong Kong and China, but the differences are materially stronger, even more so than when you compare some countries in Europe.
I can give one distinct example. Our people's definition of patriotism in general is to make things happen so we can be proud of ourselves, that's why 2 million (or 25% of the population) walked out. Instead of "voicing support" so "we" look good despite terrible decisions or actions by the government. Many Chinese are intelligent and good people, they just can't get over this particular bit because of years of education and cross influence while the counter voices are silenced. (Apologies for the generalization, I do make friend with Chinese, this just represent the sample size of all the Chinese people I've interacted with.)
Personally I think nationalism is just an necessary evil because tribes are stronger. I'd rather identify with people having same believe, interests and thought spectrum. So the thought of "this place or these group of people must belong to us" is just beyond me, particularly if the process involves destroying all the value of this place.
I think everyone would be happier if Hong Kong is independent, and we work out a deal that benefits both sides. Too bad we're human, we love power, so CCP reached an illogical conclusion. Hongkongers are now talking about leaving with the main focus the preservation of our cultural identity. Much easier these days with tech.
Serious question. How common is it for a group of people to have this level of self determination? Eg if people in California decided not to be part of the US, can they?
Well, if the people of California all wanted to leave, they could elect a legislature and a Congressional delegation that is pro-secession. This is farther than China will allow Hong Kong.
After this, the California Congressional delegation could introduce a California secession bill. This bill would be debated in Congress.
If they were really serious, the Californians could support a constitutional amendment specifically allowing secession sort of like Article 50 of the EU.
But there are other example of people having this right. The people of Scotland narrowly voted to remain in the UK (but could have left). The people of Northern Ireland have the option to leave the UK. The UK chose to leave the EU. Puerto Rico could probably leave the US (who currently rules them) if they wanted to.
If the people of California decided to secede, they'd have the entirety of the US military giving them 24 hours to reconsider or else. If somehow California fought back and held out for a few years, maybe the US would give up and let them go, but probably not without intentionally destroying every single valuable asset that state has.
As much as people like to paint China as a villain here, a very solid proportion would support similar actions in the US.
> If the people of California decided to secede, they'd have the entirety of the US military giving them 24 hours to reconsider or else
Maybe. Maybe not. I personally think the US military would give them a couple of weeks just like they did last time when certain southern states tried to break away. However whether or not the federal government waits a few weeks isn't the main question.
If the people of California held a vote on whether they should be allowed to secede, zero US military personnel would interfere in any way. After holding such a vote, if the California delegation to Congress wanted to, they could force a vote on whether to allow California to secede.
While I would be very surprised if they were allowed to secede, I bet the people of California could win concessions from the other state governments. California elects nearly an eighth of the house of representatives. Combine their delegation with right-wing republicans who might be more than happy to eject California and the House might just vote to lose California. Through all of this, the military will do nothing. The Senate will be harder to convince, because every state has the same amount of representation.
Texas discussed secession recently, as did a few other States. While we did militarily crush the states who tried to leave in the 1860s, they attacked us first. Then we invaded them and brought them back.
> Politically? Physically? Culturally? Morally? Currently Hong Kong is ruled by China. Many in Hong Kong might prefer something different. If the government in Beijing allowed them to, they might choose complete independence.
This ignorance and arrogance actually makes strong action by the central (Chinese) government even more popular and supported by the Chinese public.
Western opinion has somehow been made to believe that HK was somehow not China. This is ridiculous.
HK is physically, historically, culturally, ethnically, morally a part of China that was seized by a foreign country in the 19th century (hence political separation). In fact, it was not the only piece of China to suffer that fate. That has always been an humiliation and an emotional issue in China (and I include Taiwan in that because this predates the split between PRC and ROC) and it was a very big event when it was "retroceded" back to China by the UK.
China and the Chinese people will not tolerate any interference whatever we might think of their political system (and even whatever they might think of their own political system).
It is pure propaganda in order to destabilise China to claim otherwise and it has certainly worked with a significant portion of the Western public opinion.
The hypocrisy is sometimes laid bare, like during the G7 when it was reported that President Macron said that Northern Ireland was not really part of the UK. This caused an uproar in the UK. Well, HK is arguably more Chinese than Northern Ireland is British.
Please stop with your grandstanding of what is and is not moral. China has a long imperialist history of taking over areas not culturally, ethnically, or morally a part of China. Tibet and Xinjiang are two obvious examples and the fact that it happened in the past doesn't make it better (especially when there is an active push by the PRC today to further assimilate the areas). The fact that they act like they have some right to annex Taiwan is just another example.
That doesn't mean that the UK was right in its actions, but let's not play games here. These were wars waged between two empires. China wasn't some sort of blameless victim. They are not some victim now.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but are you saying China wasn't an empire? Are you serious? The China that subjugated huge numbers of neighboring peoples? The China that was ruled by an emperor? The China that treated all neighboring countries as vassals? That China?
Or am I misunderstanding you?
edit: I guess I'll just interpret the downvotes as "yes I was understanding you correctly" and "no you don't really have a response other than hiding behind your twisted worldview where somehow China is a victim and not all the victims of China's actions over the millennia".
Hong Kong is China since 1997 with same nationality law that's the reason its called one country and two systems. Obviously the thin layer between two system is getting thinner, because like any law, basic law can be interpreted to suite the needs of how the two systems should be.
I believe all of this is happening given China does not want to be another USSR. Hong Kong was used as a launch pad to do the same and ruling establishment learning from the past actions in cold war between US and USSR cracked down heavily using the interpretation of basic law to suite their needs. It was inevitable, just the time-line shortened due to the kind of chaos Hong Kong went through with violent protests.
China specifically agreed under the terms of the transfer to allow for Hong Kong's continued independence in domestic matters until 2047. Beijing is in flagrant violations of its international treaty obligations.
The New Territories were under a 99 year lease, but Britain was under no obligation to transfer Hong Kong Island and Kowloon back at any time for any reason. They graciously agreed to return them for China, but in exchange Beijing made explicit promises, which it's openly disregarding.
The right to govern extends from the consent of the governed. It's not a question of who "should" own Hong Kong based on some centuries old history. It's a question of who the people of Hong Kong choose to govern them. Had an open referendum been held in 1997, it's almost certainly the case that the citizenry would not have voted to return to the tutelage of the dictatorship in Beijing.
This is something I don't understand as well. Why didn't Hong Kong choose to become an independent state when they had the chance? They could have thrived like Singapore does.
Hong Kong is still a more free society. So probably its not a good suggestion to make it worse than what it is already due to heavy handed approach to national security. Please check report in Hong Kong (52 points) [1] and Singapore (49 points) [2] on freedom.
In Hong Kong one can go for protest if its not breaking the National Security Law, in Singapore no one can protest unless approved by Police, recent case highlights it when a student send a tweet to protest when Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison visited Singapore [3].
Hong Kong is still very good when it comes to internet and freedom of expression. Also it follows common law jurisdictions and judges are able to give judgements against the government in many instances. Also Singapore has POFMA [4], which is worse than rules in Hong Kong.
In Hong Kong anyone can form a company and manage it without having a local permanent resident or citizen as Director. In Singapore one cannot form a limited liability company easily unless has a local permanent resident or citizen as Director (for others need a special conditions and permission).
I have no love for the CCP but I think this type of caricature simplification is both wrong and not insightful. The CCP members are not some cartoon villains bent on world domination.
The British did not allowed them to choose either. The members of legislative created by the British is based on appointment not elections. The British only decided the reform the legislative after the handover sealed.
The CCP prevented the British from enacting democratic reforms and any self-determination in Hong Kong, under the thread of military invasion. This isn't on Britain, they tried decades prior.
Sounds like a good approach. Why not put it to practice by letting China own Florida for 150 years, then see who Floridians want to join at the end of it.
>The right to govern extends from the consent of the governed.
First I must say that what's happening to HK is tragic, and I very much empathize with their situation, and am not at all in agreement with how the CCP is handling this.
But this is quite the take! I don't know if you're US-based, but by that logic if the Native Americans held a referendum, they would have most certainly not allowed the U.S. government to form on their land.
This is simply a case of Big Stick Ideology, something the U.S. is quite familiar with [1]
Yes, that is why people feel that what was done to Native Americans was wrong. By which I mean that Americans believe it was wrong. It was also 200 years ago, and no explicit treaty had been signed to another world power granting them rights (the French and Spanish sold them out).
Unless you think it was right and the Big Stick is right, then HK is more than tragic. It is a violation of international treaty and of human rights.
The U.S. has a whole history with Latin America that was a lot less than 200 years ago. I'd argue that many outside of the U.S believe this policy isn't a thing of the past.
>French and Spanish sold them out
I don't find the suggestion that those that were subjugated needed rights granted to them by outside groups, including those that colonized them to begin with.
Again, I'm in agreement that this is wrong, but I also believe that "Rules for thee but not for me" is not a very productive type of diplomacy either.
If that's the case we would see an effort to reverse those wrongs by reverting all the economic benefit that America gained at the expense of Native Americans. All the land and lives taken, and all the wealth and prosperity they could have generated. The total sum if repaid would probably erase a significant part of America from the map.
So it was wrong. But clearly not wrong enough to warrant erasing America and its wealth from existence. Saying sorry and expressing regret is cheap. Actual action is expensive.
As an aside, I wonder what the psychological effects are from growing up in a nation where the public discourse is all about how the nation was unjustly founded. If a significant part of the next generation believes that America's historical foundations are rotten to the core and that its existence is a tragedy, what happens next?
> If that's the case we would see an effort to reverse those wrongs by reverting all the economic benefit that America gained at the expense of Native Americans.
Note that, like LatinX, Native Americans is something only white people say. They call themselves Indians. Activist/government terms usually end up kind of patronizing for some reason.
(And they were called Indians before people from India were called that.)
India has been used in the English language for over 1,000 years, and in Latin and before that Greek for at least 1,500 years before that, along with Indian and its equivalents in other languages.
This was of course well before anyone used the word "Indian" to refer to Native Americans.
Even before America was discovered, "the Indies"/Indians/indios was used to refer to Ethiopia as well as India. They didn't have very clear ideas of where things were but that also suggests it was just meant to refer to any tropical area.
Or you can use backformation and say it's short for Indigenous.
The name India literally derives from the Sindhu river (aka the Indus river), which became Hindu in Persian (S->H is a common sound correspondence between Sanskrit and Persian), and dropped the initial H when getting into Greek. It was also used to refer to some areas beyond India -- (i.e, modern Indonesia or the "East Indies", but the origin of it was from civilizational India.).
I've never heard of India being used to refer to Ethiopia. Ethiopia itself is a phrase of Greek origin, and dates back at least to Herodotus.
Yeah, as a neutral observer, I feel conflicted. What the CCP is doing feels wrong.
But on the other hand, China was forced to agree to the HK situation particularly since they were at a disadvantage militarily and economically to the British empire.
China (CCP) would understandably not be in a mood to comply with agreements they felt coerced into.
I genuinely don't understand the full situation, and I'm not trying to imply that the CCP is in the right.
I'm just trying to understand if the whole "bullied into a disadvantaged agreement" is a valid world view to take.
Hong Kong was built from nothing by the British. Before the British arrived and settled HK, it was but an empty jungle mountains sticking of an estuary on the Ocean. By comparison, the powerhouse of southern China, Guangzhou, was plenty populated. They ceded some empty land to the brits to build a trading port some distance away.
Why would the Communist Party of China have more of a claim to this land than the brits? When HK was ceded and built, the CCP didn't even exist and wouldn't for a few more hundred years. A different power (the Qing empire) controlled the land from afar. They are from a different ethnic group (Manchurian), from modern day northern China / Russia, and have very little to do with the Cantonese people who inhabit southern China.
> China specifically agreed under the terms of the transfer to allow for Hong Kong's continued independence in domestic matters until 2047
Independence in domestic matters is still there in Hong Kong, as it was before 1997 (at that time also chief executive is not elected). Hong Kong earlier worked under common law system and it still has the same system (China system is continental law system). Nationality law was enacted using provisions of basic law which provided a thin layer between one country and two systems. Also this is in response to threats of using Hong Kong as launch pad for attack on China in cold war.
> They graciously agreed to return them for China
Lived long enough in Hong Kong to know it was anything but gracious. UK left because they milked enough from Hong Kong and risking a war with China for a small gains were not worthwhile.
What city in the USSR was equivalent to Hong Kong? I am not aware of any cities in the USSR that enjoyed freedom of the press and an independent judiciary at the level that Hong Kong did prior to the NSL crackdowns.
I think you mean East Germany, but I think you are right... and if Russia came back for East Germany now, there would be a war and it would likely go nuclear, because it is part of a powerful neighboring country. HK's neighbor is who took over.
"basic law can be interpreted to suite the needs of how the two systems should be."
There is no independent judiciary in China, the law is whatever the CCP wants it to be.
In this case, they didn't like what some newspaper was doing, so they had it shut down, and put out the PR spin though thought would work best. That's it.
FYI the 'violent protests' were not very violent, and definitely favourable to the loss of freedoms with the current regime.
One option would be to let the citizens of HK make the decision on those things.
A reminder that Mark Simon, a senior figure at Next Media (owner of Apple Daily), has literally worked for the CIA and his father was a senior US intelligence officer. [1]
His employment and family history is a fact and has been reported elsewhere also. Hopefully Financial Times is credible enough for you [1].
Would you mind sharing the link to the article about Xi Jinping’s “incestuous relationship” with his daughter? I couldn’t find it.
[1] “The claims are driven by the fact that Mark Simon, Mr Lai’s right-hand man, is the son of a veteran CIA officer and has worked for US naval intelligence.”
>U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said the United States was "deeply concerned by Hong Kong authorities' selective use of the national security law to arbitrarily target independent media organizations
And China's industry has the world by the balls, so there's not much that can be done from an external perspective to prevent this. That said, I'm not sure many nations would do anything even if China didn't have leverage over them.
The best one can do is what some of the commonwealth countries, led by the UK, are doing by offering Hong Kong citizens an accelerated path to immigration.
All you can do when a ship sinks is find a life raft.
And you can't link HK being a Commonwealth colony up until recently... somehow?
I don't want to say that Palestinian people shouldn't be helped. What I want to say is that it's more or less obvious why the UK is more eager to help HK.
I think the British bear some responsibility for the current situation in Israel/Palestine as well, given the region was a British mandate between the wars. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandatory_Palestine
This is a point worth expanding on. Among other things, the British changed the nature of land laws in the region. Under the Ottoman system, a whole lot of land was not owned by the Arab farmers and villagers who had been living on that land for generations, but was instead owned by foreign absentee landlords. Under the Ottoman system, these landlords were entitled to collect rent from the people living on 'their' land, but weren't allowed to kick everybody living there off the land (there were some attempts, but they mostly got rebuffed. The Fula Affair is an example of this.)
The British changed the laws, allowing these foreign absentee landlords to sell the land and eviction of everybody living there. Dozens of Arab villages were depopulated with little if any compensation. Landlessness among the Arab population increased significantly, causing uncertainty and resentment that inflamed tensions with the people who were buying and moving onto that land.
Hong Kong’s fate was sealed in 1984 when the UK agreed to return it to China. And that was when China was far weaker than now, and could have been confronted at far less cost. Instead, the West got played, transferring massive capital and know-how to China while convincing themselves that economic integration would inevitably lead to greater political freedom.
This is true. Sometimes I wonder if the UK thought HK would become a trojan horse. A symbol of good living standards and democracy. That was ignoring thousands of years of wars for unification that built China. It is built on blood and blood will continue to be shed until the whole of China is united. This is what reading books and watching movies will tell you.
> Sometimes I wonder if the UK thought HK would become a trojan horse
You may be in luck - a whole bunch of UK documents and letters from the Thatcher era were unclassified recently. You can search the archive for any mention of "Hong Kong"[1], or any other keyword of interest
Even the domestic products basically say "Assembled in the USA"
( from parts made in China)
But the sad reality is that the raw materials needed for a lot of the things we take for granted in everyday life... require an astounding amount of environmental destruction, something China is still more than happy to do.
I'm not saying we need to loosen environmental laws in the States, we need to instead completely overhaul the way we manufacture things to take as much advantage of recycling as we possibly can.
And nobody cares to do that. Why would we? It's cheaper in China, after all.
Just try. You will be surprised how often (not always) there's an alternative. Then, even if you pay a bit more, in most cases you'll be getting better quality too.
Find me a smartphone that is made in the US with no Chinese parts, then.
Or anything that goes into a laptop.
Or desktop.
Those are the primary components/products that China needs to destructively mine and process raw materials for. Until we recycle electronics as a standard instead of a "we care about being Green(tm)" gesture... manufacturing is always going to go where it's cheapest.
Please don't break the site guidelines like this. They explicitly ask you not to post such insinuations (because the overwhelming majority of them are entirely in the eye of the beholder, and because they poison conversation) and to email hn@ycombinator.com instead if you're worried about abuse. I've posted about this thousands of times, so there's plenty of past explanation if you or anyone wants more:
I will take your question in good faith and assume that you merely missed it due to the way the original statement was worded.
It explicitly states that everyone "over the border" (in Mainland China) are the polar opposite of "genuinely lovely people" which would be to say that every single person living in/from Mainland China is a horrible/nasty person.
This is quite clearly both ignorant and racist - also, provably false.
Depends on who you ask. Race is a purely human construct (and a very nebulous one). The classification of 'human race' is entirely made up and has no biological science to it.
Ethnolinguistically Cantonese is very different from Mandrain. And culturally (in terms of diet, customs) Cantonese is also quite distinct from say Wu (Shanghai), etc.
It's inevitable. There is no chance the CCP will allow a free press under it's umbrella. They just need to find the right bit of populism to excuse the rundown i.e. 'They are causing sanctions'.
They'll get no sympathy on the mainland, and in HK they'll try to go on as normal as though it did not happen.
What the 'Rest of the World' should do is just recognize that HK is not 'China' and remove their special access to markets, currency etc..
China will use HK as their access point to the global economy unless the West does something about it, sadly, they may not.
HK is the financial gateway between China and the Rest of the World and that's how most foreign direct investment happens.
It's because HK is open to the world and also China, but ROW not really open to China.
China, by 'taking over HK' really implies that HK shouldn't really enjoy fee access to world markets.
This is unlikely to change though as the situation benefits everyone financial and it's not based on human rights rather it was based on transparency, commercial law, accounting standards etc..
So as long as investors stay protected, that commercial law remains in place, they can get their money out, that balance sheets still mean what they did before ... it's probably just going to stay that way.
China doesn't need to change those things to control HK, all they need to do is clamp down on the political system and eject anyone 'causing trouble'. Which they can do.
If China went after foreign account holders, or if vaporware mainland accounting standards start showing up in HK companies it may eventually be a problem, but I don't see why that would change.
Due to the fact the lease to UK was a set timeframe, China holds all the cards here.
Change of accounting standards will certainly follow as totalitarian governments are walking hand in hand with creative accounting. You just cant have society of doublespeak and censorship while maintaining transparent financial system.
If CCP will try to preserve financial system degradation might just take longer, but after few decades and several imminient emigration waves it's will be mainland all over.
I was watching HK Apple Daily since the Hong Kong protests and lately a few of their latest videos have been showing up in my feed. While I’ve stopped watching, the thumbnails look incendiary in nature so seeing this happen is not surprising considering the news security law
Every time any Chinese diplomat opens their mouth, something incendiary comes out these days. There will be books written in the future and these times will be used an example on how to lose friends fast. The absolute reverse of soft power.
As far as I can tell, you have US regulatory capture by the same multinational corporations and their executives which are getting rich by marketing products and services driven heavily by Chinese labor and supply chains. They have no financial interest in rocking the boat with the CCP, so Washington’s intervention will never amount to more than empty rhetoric and saber rattling.
Sadly for Hong Kong, US big tech, energy, healthcare, etc don’t care if they’re free so they won’t be.
Well deserved. Apple Daily is not pro democrazy but pro-chaos. It routinely manufatures fake news and rumors that only matched by the mainstream fake news.
I'm all for pro democrazy. But there is a clear line between pushing a democratic agenda for the benefit of Hong Kong people and that of provoking dissidents at any opportunity possible with whatever means possible, to foster agendas by local tycoons and foreign intelligence agencies, which eventually cost Hong Kong people.
If you have never read the published paper on fostering dissidents for "academic" research in Hong Kong pease search for it.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, article 19: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
Notice how there's no clause stating that this right is conditional on "news integrity".
> Well deserved. Apple Daily is not pro democrazy but pro-chaos. It routinely manufatures fake news and rumors that only matched by the mainstream fake news.
Whereas the chinese dictatorship is a bastion of transparency, honesty and democracy?
I was a resident for many years, I witnessed the peaceful protests of 2014, I witnessed horrifying wanton violence in 2019, I witnessed the rapid destruction of the freest laissez faire city state in the world. Above all I feel great sadness for the people of Hong Kong.
The CCP cannot tolerate any dissenting voices as a matter of preserving their total grip on power. It was an inevitability Hong Kong would be crushed and silenced although the world and Hong Kong was caught off guard by the speed at which this has occurred. I take some consolation with the G7's recent communique.