Even if that is held to be an obligation Britain is obliged to follow up on, Britain might have avoided handing it over by holding a referendum in 1996 which will almost inevitably result in them rejecting joining China. The people having voted to remain in free association with the UK, they could claim to be upholding the self-determination rights of Hong Kongers?
Handover of Hong Kong and Macau with horrible Western-Chinese relations
- Thread starter walmart
- Start date
If relations are that bad, is there a chance that Britain and the USA would either end the official "one China" policy, leaving it disputed between Nationalist China and Communist China--with full support to the nationalist claim, or worse, declare that the Nationalist government is the legitimate one, and ask if THEY want the island back.
In the 60’s, the liberal party had an idea to give Hong Kong to the nationalists. I get it would not work, but it was discussed.
Lusitania
Donor
It could of done that and I am almost sure that China would not respect the vote and Hong Kong would become besieged by communist sympathizers supplied by PRC and the world would of witnessed a deluge of refugees and most certainly economic disruption with the loss of Hong Kong.
chankljp
Donor
If we are talking about a version of Mainland China that have extremely poor relations with the West, I am guessing that it will either be a extremist regime (The Gang of Four holding onto power), and/or one that is under heavy Western economic sanctions. As such, they would not have that much to loose anyway from the Western world's reaction. Plus, lets be honest.... The UK is highly unlikely to get the backing of NATO or even the rest of the Commonwealth in backing them in holding onto the city. Once the PLA marches into the city in one-two weeks, raising the five star flag over Government House, and put the Governor in front of CCTV's cameras in chains as a POW... What can the UK realistically do about it beyond protesting?
marathag
Banned
I disagree, that's the whole point of Article 5. Without Nixon going to China with hardliners in charge means that the ROC is backed to the hilt, Red China trying to knock off HK would risk a much wider War
Article five only mandates action if an attack occcurs in Europe or North America. NATO has no mandate to fight the Chinese if they try to take Hong Kong.
Portugal had actually been offering to hand it over since 1974 (in line with the rest of their over night decolonization), for some reason China genuinely didn't want it until 1999, so it probably wouldn't be much of a stretch for that attitude to extend to the present, especially if the government in Lisbon continues to claim it as part of the Portuguese metropole.
Lusitania
Donor
Yeah the idea was that China not want to screw the taking over of Macau and scare the heck out of people in honk Kong.
Can you imagine if they screw up takeover of Macau. No the prize was honk Kong. So Macau could wait.
I'd bet that they also realized that Macau would be the giant loop hole that it is today.
There is a big difference between 1948 Berlin, and 1990s Hong Kong. Berlin was a ruined city in a nation also still in ruins, and was still under the occupation of the West and East. The USSR was still recovering from the War and a year away from any nukes, and at the ealry years of the Cold War.
Hong Kong is at the PRC's doorstep, has little arable land and few natural resources, the economy base around transportation, trade, and manufacturing. Trying to pull a Berlin Airlift would be major pain in every sense of the word. And heck, the US and UK can send all the aid and ships they want, the New Territories and Hong Kong would be in PRC hands long before the UK and the US could put anything together.
....
That would be war.
Hell, the British was the first of the West to recognized the PRC, in 1950. The US did not recognized the People's Republic till 1979. The second the USA and Britain tried that, paratroopers would be dropping into Hong Kong before even Taiwan could do anything about it.
It is simply in everyone's best interest to let go of Hong Kong and Macau when the time comes. There is no where around it.
chankljp
Donor
As someone living in Hong Kong, I will like to add to this by pointing out that what little arable land Hong Kong had were almost entirely in the New Territories, and were no where near enough to feed even a small portion of the population. Back in WW2 during the Japanese occupation from 1941-45, the IJA military administration understood this, which was why one of the first things they did was to deport a large portion of the city's population up north into the Mainland, even allowing them to flee into KMT or communist control territories, since that was the only way to prevent starvation from breaking out... And this was during the 1940s! When the city still had much more farmland, and a much lower population.
The same goes for the supply of fresh water, even with all the reservoirs in the city (The largest ones all being in the New Territories, BTW), 70% of the city's fresh water supplies came from the Dongjiang River, which is under PRC control (And in OTL, even during the height of the Cultural Revolution, the taps were never turned off). The British did experimented with seawater desalination back in the 1970s', but that was quickly abandoned due to it costing way too much.
I hate to say this, but the Mainland government held all the card, and OTL was about the best deal that we could have gotten.
Not how it works. Britain recognized the PRC almost instantly, in 1950. Recognizing a new government means you accept it as the legitimate successor of the old one, which means treaties signed under the ancien regime carry over. Britain couldn’t dodge their obligations by saying, “well, we didn’t sign these with any people’s republic.
Hong Kong is much further away from any staging area than West Berlin was from the rest of the FRG, it’s much more populous, and the allies have far less infrastructure built up in the area. I highly doubt such an effort could succeed.