Once again, the local government has “knelt down” before the forces of darkness. Mustering mass, violent protests, Hong Kong anti-Communists and their backers in the Anglo-American Empire have shown that they can grab the final say on crucial matters in China’s premier Special Administrative Region (SAR). They have forced local authorities to shelve an important, Beijing-backed crime-fighting bill enabling extradition among Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China. While the legislation is explicitly aimed at grave, non-political offenses, the anti-Communists insist it would severely threaten the civil liberties of all Hong Kongers.
The dramatic about-face underlines a number of realities:
+ The Empire, with its “pro-democracy” allies on the ground, wields a veto over HKSAR developments they don’t like. This unholy alliance has repeatedly thwarted important policy initiatives by local authorities. Most notable had been landmark battles in 2003 and 2012. In ’03, the “democracy” alliance led a mass March that spiked national-security legislation required by Hong Kong’s Basic Law, or mini-constitution. In ’12 a similar drive rolled back a bid to introduce national education.
The first initiative would have helped check the alliance’s subversive activities in HK, directed against China. The second would have made young Hong Kongers more knowledgeable about their motherland, impeding the anti-Communists’ relentless efforts to turn them into zombified haters of their own country … and shocktroops for anti-Beijing protests.
+ China, which takes its international commitments seriously, has had its hands tied by Hong Kong’s One Country, Two Systems (OCTS) arrangement. It forbids the mainland’s intervention in SAR affairs. Whatever indirect assistance Beijing has been able to offer local authorities has clearly been insufficient to check the machinations of the Empire and its allies.
+ The ineptitude, even helplessness, of the HK government is bared for all to see. With political novices at the helm and a civil service with colonial genes, it has been repeatedly outmaneuvered by its opponent’s command of strategy, control of propaganda and deployment of thuggery.
The SAR authorities are woefully unprepared to deal with a real, live color revolution. So far, they have given no indication they even recognize the multidimensional beast they’re up against: long-term cultivation of local “pro-democracy” oppositionists; funding, direct and indirect; indoctrination of youth; media propaganda; and advisers on destabilization and uprisings.
Entrenched anti-China, pro-”democracy” forces in Hong Kong control three critical areas: education, the legal system and media. The legions of local youth imbued with a toxic hatred of the Chinese Communist Party and clueless about international geopolitics, testify to the stunning success of the anti-Communists in the schools. Backing them up, the US and UK have in Hong Kong their biggest consulates anywhere (i.e., their biggest spying operations).
+ Should China simply junk One Country, Two Systems? It’s not so easy. If Beijing did so before the arrangement’s official expiry in 2047, it would face a Western propaganda blitz for unilaterally breaking an international accord — at a time Beijing is condemning (US) unilateralism. That’s the least of it. There would be retaliation against Hong Kong by a united Empire as well as Taiwan, led by the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party. The SAR could suffer sanctions, withdrawal of businesses and investment. Above all, perhaps, given US control of global finance, its role as China’s international financial center might be sabotaged. That’s not a scenario either Hong Kong or China has prepared for.
+ China too has been remiss in the handling of Hong Kong. Beijing should break with its scrupulously hands-off approach of the past two decades. Central authorities need to work much more closely with the SAR government to fight the entire ecosystem of subversion nurtured by local anti-Communists and their Anglo-American backers. Since Hong Kong is a babe in the woods on such matters, the Communist Party should second specialists in anti-subversion, intelligence and state security to the SAR. They would, of course, work discreetly, under the formal jurisdiction of the local government if necessary.
+ Hong Kong and Beijing need to prepare for a decisive confrontation with the pro-Empire forces in the medium term. A crucial, strategic target should be the multitudes of Hong Kong youth drunk on the abstract virtues of Freedom, Democracy and Human Rights (FDHR). Many are unwitting stormtroopers for the imperialist, anti-Communist assault on their own country and compatriots. To begin to awaken them, authorities must regain control of the schools and curriculums, as well as counter the force of the pro-FDHR local media.
When they agreed to One Country, Two Systems in the early 1980s, Deng Xiaoping and his colleagues warned explicitly that the HKSAR must never become “a base for subversion” against China. Without a concerted, systematic effort to fight the Empire and its local agents, Hong Kong would surely turn into Beijing’s worst nightmare. Today, as the US-led Empire revs up its multidimensional war against Beijing, Hong Kong is close to becoming a base of subversion against the people’s Republic.