American reacts to Prince Charles handing Hong Kong back to China (1997)
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- čas přidán 3. 04. 2024
- Thank you for watching me, a humble American, react to Prince Charles handing Hong Kong back to China (1997)
Original video: • 香港主權移交：BBC當時如何報導？－ BBC...
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The emotion was because although the Chinese had given assurances that they would not impose Chinese laws upon Hong Kong, most people were, as is now proven, skeptical of that promise. However, the 99 year lease had expired so Britain had to leave.
The lease only applied to the mainland territories; Britain could have kept the island as such.
The lease was on the New Territories, not HK or Kowloon. And it was Lord Wilson who negotiated the handover, which started back in the 1970s.
150 years!
I cried watching this knowing what China is like and what the poor Hong-kong would soon be like,we all knew what China is like and would not stick to it's promise and they didn'f
@@angelabushby1891 I was an HK resident until a year before the handover, having first visited when I was 15 years old, which was in 1976. That was before all of the land reclamation, when the Hilton hotel and Bank of China on Des Voeux Rd were just across the road from the Star Ferry terminal in Central district. The tallest building back then was the cylindrical Hopewell Centre, which is now dwarfed by the many skyscrapers that dominate the north side of the island. It was a fantastic place to live in back then, buzzing with energy. It's sad to see how the Chinese have managed to utterly ruin what was once considered 'the Pearl of the Orient.'
The Governor Chris Pattern negotiated the deal with China to grant HongKong a democratic state with human rights and free trade. the chinese have not kept their promise.
I wonder when we'll finally understand that authoritarian rulers can never be trusted. No one has ever become powerful by being honest.
They never do! Commies are always like that!
The HK people wanted it; they thought they were going to get free trade with mainland China, and keep their freedoms. Gullible mugs.
I don't think anyone expected China to honour any agreement. 😢
And many, many people were already expecting this.
I remember my father explaining to me that this was the reason why so many people were crying.
It will blew your mind once you discover that Macau and Goa were Portuguese colonies.
1494, tratado de Tordesillas. Just after the first voyage of Cristoforo Colombo, Portugal and Spain split the world between them. And that trait is the reason why only Brasil speaks Portuguese of all South America, or Filipinas speaks Spanish. And also why Great Britain and France built their empires with pirates.
We wept in the UK because we knew in our hearts that the Chinese would break their promises..it may seem arrogant but as British citizens we knew the people of Hong Kong were safe and free under our wing and by handing them over it felt like we were letting them down and abandoning them to a fate they didn't deserve...we have many faults over here but lack of compassion has never been one of them... ✌🇬🇧💖
I guess the falkland wars took a toll on the UK. The negotiation on HK began in the same year the war broke out, so the idea that they could not afford another war with China was there, along with many other things at stake. Both the UK and America might have even fantasied China as a potential ally considering that China was undergoing a reform and in a cold relationship with the Soviets (normalised only right before the Soviets collapsed), nobody wanted to offend China during those critical times.
Yes, China has broken almost every promise concerning personal and poltical freedoms and human rights in Hong Kong they had agreed to.
Well what do you expect from commies? Anyone would be a fool to believe otherwise, and yes our politicians are fools!
I have a relative who spent the Majority of his life in Hong Kong he was a member of the Police Force and became a respected and honoured person.
He returned back to England soon after the " hand over to China".
We watched this live as a family. My dad shocked us all by saying the people of Hong Kong were F**ked, that was the first time I ever heard him use the F-bomb. Turns out he was right too.
I was living and working in china in 2000 and visited Hong Kong for the new year. There was still a physical border between mainland china and the territories of Hong Kong and I believe there still is. Back then it was highly unusual for a westerner to be arriving in Hong Kong from mainland china and as I gave my passport to the immigration official at the Hong Kong border his head shot up surprised and said to me "youre British?" to which I said "yes", he immediately shut my passport again without stamping an entry date and said to me "stay as long as you like". The most remarkable border entry I've ever had 🙂
Locals cried too as they knew what was coming!
AND, sadly, it DID arrive... China has ruined HK. So many people want to leave but cannot and are stuck with their lives under Chinese rule... 😢
The people of Britain did not weep but feared for the future of the Hong Kong citizens. A fear that has been borne out by subsequent events.
I had a UK friend living there and enjoying the rich diverse lifestyle before this event! There was a mass exodus into Australia, particularly Sydney and lots of new real estate units built! Interesting history, but it was also sad! 🧐
Under UK rule, HK became the most efficient and successful economy in Asia (for such a small place)
Hong Kong was leased by the British for 100 years. The lease was up. Hong Kong had been under British Rule with British laws and British human rights and was being handed back to the mercy of a dictatorship. I don’t know if people wept but it was a sad event. 😢
The idea back then, was that the rest of china would become more like the (back then) more developed and richer Hong Kong than the other way around…
The island had been ceded to Britain for good, only the mainland territories were a lease.
Incorrect. The New Territories were leased for 99 years. Hong Kong and Kowloon belonged to Britain in perpetuity.
@@gigmcsweeney8566 NO you are wrong. The islands were not included in the lease.
Edit: The New Territories is the land north of the mainland part of the city to the Chinese border and NOT the islands.
We gained it from the ROC, now called Taiwan.
The music you heard was Edgar's Nimrod , stunning piece of music also played at outr remembrance service on Nov.11 every yr .😊
yes, that piece never fails to be affecting....Elgar you mean 😏
An interesting fact is that Hong Kong still drives on the left, whereas China drives on the right.
I was in HK in 1989, a full 8 years before the hand-over. Anyone & everyone who had the means immigrated to Canada/Australia. The British brought democracy, capitalism and human rights to HK - it is sad to see it sink into dictatorship.
We were also very emotional in Portugal when we handed Macau to China in 1999. It was a sad day as we knew the Chinese government wouldn't keep their promises.
The Chinese Government immediately decreed that children had to learn and be taught in Mandarin instead of Cantonese.
As a Hongkonger, I can add some informations you might miss.
Hong Kong is composed of three parts. Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and New Territories.
"Treaty of Nanking" cede Hong Kong Island. "Treaty of Peking" cede Kowloon.
"The Convention Between Great Britain and China Respecting an Extension of Hong Kong Territory" lease the New Territories for 99 years(It makes up 86% of Hong Kong).
All sign by Qing dynasty King, and the documents still preserve in Taiwai.
Yes, and sailing is the favourite sport!
There aren’t the 2 systems that were agreed in the handover negotiations between the U.K. and China anymore.
China has gone back on the majority of the agreement. Hong Kong is essentially a Chinese (communist) type of system.
I can remember watching this on TV at the time - it really was quite a big deal as, three years away from the new Millennium, the last really significant piece of the British Empire, whose population was around 5 million, was placed back into the care of China. With the subsequent loss of Jamaica, just 14 minor British Overseas Territories remain - of which only 10 have permanent populations, whose total is a little under 250, 000 people, and none are major manufacturers.
If someone tells you that your cousin who is a lovng part of your family is now no longer going to be your cousin or part of your family, then you will be sad. I cant speak for everyone in hong kong at the time, but we had friends from there. They didn't want to leave, they enjoyed being under the crown, as with Britain, the royal family brought in tourists, it produced jobs for people and they had the same rights and freedom of movement that every british citizen had, and at the time i remember oour family friends from Hong kong being scared that China would go back on its promises and just take over. Pretty much like how the majority of Pakistan wanted to remain, so did the majority of people in Hong Kong. Britain doesnt rule over any of the places still left in the british emoire with an iron fist, demanding this that and the other, saying that you cannot do this and that. Those placeshave the same rights as every person within Britain does, all the freedom that we have and has the protection of the King, his army and all his laws and the rights associated with that. of all the countries that have left, a good many still remain loyal, some peopoe in those countries even want to return.
But yeah,it was a sad day for a lot of people when Hong Kong was handed back.
I live in a former British Colony; those of us who are old enough to remember deeply wish we still were one!
It's so great that you dive deeper when you didn't know something. This shows real interest. Many dives to come.
Probably the best reaction I've seen you do, especially because you actually listened to the message of the video rather than stopping it every couple of seconds
Agreed.
The Houses of Parliament still openly debate what is going on in Hong Kong because the handover agreement is in place and the UK still has a responsibility to its British Nationals (Overseas) - the joint declaration was signed in 1984 in preparation for when the 99-year lease expired to set out the terms of the handover (e.g. China is not to interfere with Hong Kong's "one country, two systems" before the year 2047 at the earliest).
On the 20th March 2024 the Urgent Question "To ask the Foreign Secretary if he will make a statement on the security and human rights implications of Article 23 in Hong Kong." saw the FCDO Minister in the House of Commons chamber criticising the Hong Kong legislature and reiterating "The British Government declared in 2021 that China is in ongoing breach of the Sino-British joint declaration." The relatively short Urgent Question debate is probably available on Parliament Live TV if not on CZcams.
In 2020/21, Hong Kong introduced a national security law that saw the UK Government declaring China in breach of the joint declaration, with the UK responding by creating the Hong Kong British National (Overseas) visa, and a pathway for British citizenship. The House of Commons Library said at the time that of the 7.5 million residents of Hong Kong, an estimated 5.4 million could be eligible to move to the UK (i.e. up to 72% of Hong Kong's population could permanently move to the UK if they want to).
Yep, you did understood way more than what was said in the video.
Proof that lack of knowledge does not equal stupidity!
There were lots of goods made in Hong Kong in the shops when I was younger . It was a thriving part of the Commonwealth . The Island was leased for 100 years and had to be given up . Certainly everyone in the UK. and the Commonwealth was sad to see it happen and fearful for the people left behind .
Your confusion/bewilderment on this subject it totally understandable; as an American, why would you know the background to this event? Well done on seeking to find out.😊
Yes, I think the same... 🙂
Hong Kong island itself was a British colony for almost 160 years. The bulk of the colony was not on the island, however. This was the New Territories, which Britain leased from Imperial China for 99 yrs. The lease expired in 1997, so it was not logistically possible to keep the island after that. A treaty made by China to ensure Hong Kong remained a democracy until at least 2047 has been ignored by China, at least for the past ten years. Btw, I worked there for five yrs, met my Canadian wife there, and we had our first child while there. However, I have not been back since 2006.
Hong Kong was a British colony for 150 years, so it was free like UK. Handing it back to China meant it would be overseen by Communism, that’s why it was such a sad day. Even Aussies had tears in their eyes! We wept because it felt like our much loved cousins were being abandoned to their fate, and we didn’t want them to go. So many Hong Kong migrants have been in Australia for more than a century. They own food shops, restaurants, technology stores, and so much more. Now, instead of them being able to travel back home freely to visit family and friends, that’s still possible but nowhere near as freely as it once was. 150 years means the people of Hong Kong knew no other system of government.
Chris pattern is one of the nicest person I’ve ever met I used to look after him when he was chancellor of Newcastle university, I honestly wish I asked him more questions about his time now, I’ve read his autobiography and got him to sign it … I’ve a more deeper understanding….. when he used to do the graduations if he heard a Hong Kong name he would spend more time talking to them
He was loved by them
I was honestly too young to understand it all back then but now I do and I’m saddened
The UK tried ways to negotiate to keep Hong Kong however China would not be moved on the subject. They only agreed to keep Hong Kong a democracy for 50 years, which they've now broken.
There was really nothing Britain could do to sway China either as China had a much larger military, Hong Kong was on the other side of the world, and the UN agreed with China as part of its declaration on decolonisation. Britain really had no leg to stand on.
Nice reaction Ryan. It's interesting seeing your interest roused at every tangent you follow. Well done.
As an Australian that witnessed the handover ceremony I can state that all our worst fears are coming true.😥🤔😡🤬
I‘m not American nor British, yet I felt bad. China had probably even a worse reputation than it has today back then. I thought they were thrown under the bus.
Who was thrown under the bus?
@@archiebald4717Hong Kong.
@@martar.2085China did not keep the commitments outlined in The Basic Law. Nobody threw Hong Kong under the bus.
@@archiebald4717 the inhabitants of Hong Kong
The UK were obligated to hand back Hong Kong or their word wouldn't have meant anything. What the British government failed to do was to give the Hong Kong people Representative Democracy with a Parliament. Then we could have handed it back to the Hong Kong citizens to let them run it themselves.
“Hard to understand these emotions ?” I really wonder about Ryan sometimes.
I'm wondering if it's because Ryan was brought up on US history i.e. the American colonies "fighting for freedom from the oppressive British". In reality Hong Kong has lost its freedoms and democracy since the British left. Very sad.
The Hong Kong chinese were not sad to see the Brits leave (well, may be a bit), they were sad because they saw the Chinese arrive. Everybody was well aware what would happen in the following years. and that Bejing is not making compromises. On paper they promised that Hong Kong would remain a free city, but it was clear that the Communists would somehow take control through the back door. And you see how things are today. Its no coincidence that Taiwan under no circumstance wants to go the same way.
And yes, its the Charles who is king today. Only over 25 years younger then.
It was a sad day for some people that I knew and worked together with in the British Army. Quite a number of them had done a posting of a few years in Hong Kong, and they said it was great there. Except for the humid hot climate.
Live and learn!
Macau was a portugese colony till 1999, too
Education is a wonderful thing, isn't it? ...
Such a pity Americans don't experience it like the UK and the Rest of the World do.
You really believe American education (and the rest of the world for that matter) should fully cover all the intricacies of the British empire?
I wonder if British education fully covers all the intricacies of the French empire, the Portugese, the Spanish, the Dutch, ...
I also wonder what percentage of the Brits even know that South Georgia is a British Overseas Territory, let alone find it on a map.
@@AlexGys9 The American 'education' system is the worst in the western world. Well known fact.
I'm half German [born there]/English [mostly English now] and I learned about ALL the European Empires/kingdoms and ancient one's too in history as well as some Asian.
You only have to look at some videos [and Ryan has viewed them too on here] to see that most city dwellers in America don't even know how many states they have, or how to tell the time/do basic math/know their own constitution & government.
@@AlexGys9 Considering how big an impact the British empire has had on the entire world... yes, perhaps they should be learning about it.
Think you are being a little optimistic about the UK education system.
@nicolad8822
Probably as it is now, but not as it was in my own school days.
Without going into detail, we were taught about "The ages of Discovery".
This included the creation and development of the European Colonies and Empires around the world.
It included enough of the history, geography, economics, science and technology developments that led to and flowed from, these events to get a broad understanding... and some context ...
At least sufficient to get a flavour and taste ... and to know where to go for further information.
Even as I left full time education, at the age of 16, I was aware that I had been the beneficiary of an excellent education.
I had been taught how to think and how to learn!
This gave me the tools to continue my aqusition of knowledge and the ability to think through that knowledge and experience to this very day.
I'm still learning and even changing my mind on various issues as events unfold and more knowledge becomes available.
I'm doubtful if this is still the case.
Chris Pattern was aware of what was coming for the people of Hong Kong.
I was there that day!
Ryan, you are doing well, adding to your knowledge various historical events and situations of countries other than your own. As a New Zealander, we were taught only the basics of the Commonwealth countries and only a small amount about other countries. United States of America is a large country with a long, complex history of its own. I don't think anyone should be critical of your global knowledge as I doubt their knowledge of other countries besides their own would be any more comprehensive. I enjoyed your reaction, and you might have noticed that some people commenting have varying opinions on how long Britain leased Hong Kong. So they are not experts either. 😂😂😂❤
Yes, hear hear to this...and well pointed out 😏
Kia ora fellow kiwi 👋
Hongkong under the British, at least after WW II until 1997, was breathtakingly unique and beautiful. It all went downhill quickly as soon as China was in charge. Macau (not too far from Hongkong) had been given back to China by Portugal in 1999. Things went a little more smoothly there since because Macau is considered the Las Vegas of the East; it has casinos hundredfold, and therefore different interests came into play here. But the magic of Hongkong has vastly gone after 1997. It was maybe not always all easy going under the British (mainly imperialistic/colonial) system, but it's definitely a hardship now under the Chinese dictatorial system. Clearly a turn to the worse.
Guessing this is because you learnt that yesterday, expecting a video about the Tower of London tomorrow then!
They basically went from living a free life to having it taken from them and it gets worse each day. After a 99 year lease they had never lived like mainland China but China’s Military was building up on the border waiting for this to happen.
Are you too young to remember things like Tiananmen Square? If so look it up and see what promise they broke. It still haunts me as much as 9/11 does.
Most Brits wept? Fletcher's talking out of his arse. Most either couldn't care less or were frustrated at the submission of another part of the former Empire.
Ryan redeemed himself a little before the end of the video and I’m happy for him.
Hong Kong and its history is one of the most interesting pieces of modern British history, and very recent for that too! Sadly, it seems many people in the UK have forgotten 1997...
Edit: that Australian flag you saw, was the flag of British Hong Kong.
I was in Hong Kong, and then in China over the Christmas/New Year period of 1996/1997, and I remember in Beijing they had the count down in days to when HK would be handed back to China projected onto a number of buildings. The sadness was that although Chris Patten negotiated a treaty which would preserve democracy in HK once the Chinese took over, noone really believed the Chinese would honour it. And sadly, so it has come to pass with brutal crackdowns. I prefer to remember Honk Kong as the vibrant, happy and optimistic place it was then, rather than the demoralised and scared place it is now.
Imperial China lost a war to britain, and had to cede an island (Hong Kong) it soon grew to a bustling port and outpost in the british empire, and they needed to expand, so they leased for 99 years Kowloon on the mainland directly opposite the island, in 1997 that lease was up, and well China didn't feel like renewing it, and splitting the place wasn't really an option, so the UK negotiated a turn over, with China promising to keep the current democratic system for 50 years, followed by 50 years of transition, guess who lied through their teeth, and this is also a major part of why Taiwan is not at all interested in even talking with China about reunification.
Only five minutes in and I am welling up already.
I know two friends I know for decades, they grew up as young Chinese in Honkong, but all promises of Red China to leave Hongkong some indenpendence were crushed. They both, as many Honkong citizens, left. Both in my case to Taiwan, because the oppression of the Communist Party became unbearable. And I assume many Chinese Honkong citizens feared exactly that during that time.
Hong Kong was British for 100 years, I remember it being very sad. Many people from Hong Kong have now moved to Britain 🇬🇧 As the Chinese have removed so many of their freedoms now.
Very touching. Yeah well, I think most people weren't surprised that the Chinese government would further and further restrict the freedoms there. I think the people born before 1997 in Hong Kong were British overseas citizens.
Hong Kong is one of the world's leading international finance centers and has one of the world's most active and liquid securities markets. The financial services sector remains one of Hong Kong's most important economic pillars and accounts for 21.3 percent of the city's GDPAs one of the largest trading surplus partners with the United States, valued at $31 billion, Hong Kong maintains large imports of American aircraft and spacecraft. Electric machinery, pearls, gold, diamonds, works of art, meat, and fruit and nuts are also significant imports from Hong Kong. Peace out.
Hong Kong island was ceded to the British “in perpetuity”, but was small, and Britain later took out a 99 year lease on the ‘New Territories’. This lease was due to terminate in 1999 but the whole territory was one working unit; Britain recognised that it couldn’t just keep the island of Hong Kong without the Territories, so agree to give the whole area back to the Chinese under a “One Country, Two Systems” agreement where democracy would prevail in the former colony. The Chinese are currently undermining and removing that democratic ‘right’.
After the opium wars!
Fuelled by the British
I visited Zhong Kong whilst it was part of the British Empire, and it was a beautiful place. The Hong Kong people were supposed to govern but China muscled in. I feel for the natives of Hong Kong, they did not want China to govern and there are protests to this very day about China rule.
An American similarity would be Hawaï-I. The Queen of Hawaï-i wrote to Queen Victoria, requesting to be part of the a British Empire. I don’t think Victoria replied, but an American adventurer found some resource he wanted to exploit, so the American Navy invaded and put the royal family under house arrest for many years. There’s quite a sad tale to read if you visit the former royal palace in Hawaï-i
Ryan, you need to research the Opium Wars of the 1800s to understand how Hong Kong came under British Rule and then was handed back.
You’ll have to look up Singapore next 🤣🤣 Started as a trading base by Stamford Raffles in British Malaysia, it became a large Malaysian city after that country left the Empire. It had a high Chinese population, and much later split away from Malaysia to become its own state. (Sir) Stamford Raffles returned to Britain and started London Zoo. You can still get a Singapore Sling at Raffles hotel in Singapore.
The union flag is the flag of GB. More commonly known as the Union Jack but its only when it's flown at sea that the word jack is added
Yes, I learned that from QI, it's the Union Flag. Of course that must be true as the QI elves have never misinformed us about anything :)
That moment was the end of an empire
The Union Jack is the red white and blue flag you see being lowered, along with the Hong Kong British Colony flag. You thought it was the Australian flag because ours also has the Union Jack in the top left.🇦🇺
❤
There was meant to be a 50 (maybe 70?) year deal, that China agreed on, where they wouldn’t encroach on Hong Kong and it’s people. But they U turned on pretty swiftly and started to push into HK after only 5-10 years or so in my recollection of it.
The mask slipped. "Is that charles the third", you know he's the third. You know its charles.
China made certain promised and signed a treaty which they have not honoured. Every HongKongese ( which is what the mainlanders call them) would have preferred to stay British - in those days they never considered themselves as Chinese and some don't today.
😅free before the hand back 😢😢
The Brits had a 99 year lease on Hong Kong and in 1997 the lease came to an end and the ownership went back to the original owners. At least that's how I remember it.
Not working out so great for Hong Kong now is it....
If you think about it, Hong Kong was much more wealthy than China and they had avoided all of the violence and oppression of the Chinese communist movement.
Chris Patten became Governor of Hong Kong following his defeat in the 1992 General Election, after securing a fourth consecutive term for the Conservative Party, Patten being he Chairman of the Conservative Party. However when he returned to the United Kingdom, after the handover, Patten was a national hero! Still widely respected across party lines.
HongKong is a good examble to the world what happens when one trusts China. Very sad for the people of HongKong who have now lost their democracy and who once belonged to the free world.Today they are in the claws of the CCP and at their mercy.
What I find REALLY interesting Ryan, is that YOU were born a speaker of English and you are unaware of English history. There is no such language as American , yet to speak English as your natural tongue without knowing anything ABOUT The English ( British) quite remarkable.
The Hong Kong National Anthem which they all grew up knowing is now illegal in HK, you can be arrested for playing it, Absolute madness!.
Lots of Hong Kong people fled to Canada in 1997.
Yes, they wept. Imagine a free and open society being handed over to a dictatorial regime. They knew what was coming, despite China’s assurances that nothing would change until at least until 2047. Even if China had waited until 2047, which they didn’t, that would be bad enough. I love Hong Kong, I had friends there and visited a number of times (I have also traveled through China - people and land are great, government terrible), I was there just days before the handover, I wanted to stay but couldn’t. Everyone I spoke to was very worried, some wanted to leave.
Something ridiculous that happened: my friend told me that the day/night before the handover all the postboxes in Hong Kong were repainted. British postboxes are red, China’s are green. What a weird priority, you are about to have a territory handed over to you and the most important thing you can find to fix is the colour of the postboxes? 😂😂😂
The destiny has been more than shaken. One Country Two Systems has been cast asunder - it was inevitable. The truth is people would rather be governed less well by themselves than by another people. We didn't weep btw, but it was the very end of Empire, that for good and a lot of ill made us who we are: a post imperial power.
Always wanted to make it to Hong Kong before the lease was up but sadly I never made it. The British people felt sadness for the people of Hong Kong because we knew that there lives would never be the same again 😢
The promise was ignored by China
All our colonies had British Governors FFS!
The Chinese signed a treaty but broke it!
During the First Opium War, China cedes the island of Hong Kong to the British with the signing of the Chuenpi Convention, an agreement seeking an end to the first Anglo-Chinese conflict. In 1839, Britain invaded China to crush opposition to its interference in the country's economic and political affairs. Hong Kong became a British colony through two wars: the First and Second Opium Wars. The First Opium War broke out in 1839. It is called the ‘Opium War’ because of one of its major causes: the British were smuggling opium from their Indian colonies into Chinese ports against the wishes of the Chinese government This was to help pay for the large amounts of Chinese tea that they were importing - by the early 1800s, tea was a popular drink with the British public. Britain also wanted more control over their trade with China, as they could only trade with certain officials called Hong merchants. Peace out.
We had to hand Hong Kong back, because it was on a long lease, that had expired. The Hong Kong flag was a defaced blue ensign flag. Many ex colonies like Australia and New Zealand retained theirs. Why shouldn't we be upset, its like a member of the family leaving.
The UK did not have to give it all back we could have kept Hong Kong Island and Kowloon but the New Territories were only under lease and as they constituted most of the colony there was no real way of holding onto the rest of it and lets not forget China may have made it very hard for the remaining colony if we had kept it . Highland Cathedral is my favorite piece of music with pipes .
All the fresh water came from the leased territories for example and most of the population lived there in the hills. It would have been totally untenable.
Ryan, technically the British didn't need to give back the actual city. That one was given in perpetuity. But the territory surrounding it (without which the city just isn't sustainable) was on a 99 year lease that ran out. The main issue here is of course, that with the illegitimate government controling mainland China having nukes and a shitload of soldiers, giving it back to the legitimate Chinese government (that would be the Republic of China, seated in Taiwan) was not an option.
Anyhow, given that without the territory surrounding the city, Hong Kong City wasn't sustainable, the city too was handed to the illegitimate government called the People's Republic of China
It was a sad day for democracy when this took place.
Are you unaware of the events in Hong Kong of the last several years Ryan?
As a Welshman, and feeling the history of persecution by the English, I remember thinking that it was back where it belongs, however there is always fear of the unknown. We had people from Hong Kong at college with us in London, the police in Hong Kong looked like ours, they had red letterboxes like we did, essentially it was like Britain but abroad, like Gibraltar still is today. When you were a kid in seventies Britain, every toy seemed to be made in Hong Kong. It was a cultural joke, but those industries made Hong Kong into a very rich place. It still seems to thrive.
Persecution?🙄
@@nicolad8822 when countries conquer others it doesnt happen cosily over a cup of tea, lots of torturing, murder and bloodshed happens. The English Kings built tons of castles to keep theWelsh out of their own towns, but we are on our way back.
All Ryan needs to do is look up Hong Kong on the net. All these things Americans claim not to know are actually very simple. Hong Kong was leased from China for 100 years. When it was up we gave it back. Simples !
In 1494, Spain and Portugal split the world between them with the Tratado de Tordesillas. This was just after the first voyage of Cristoforo Colombo and it explains why only Brasil speaks Portuguese of all South America or why in Filipinas they speak Spanish or Macao was Portuguese. And the trait explains also why UK and France built their empires with the aid of pirates. I think it was the most important document for the history of the entire world.
Except they weren't pirates because who gives a man with a funny hat the right to split the entire world in half?
You don't now what the Union Jack looks like?
Ryan was referring to the Hong Kong version of the flag, with the lion and dragon inside the white disk. So many colonial (and some post-colonial) flags were based on the union jack, it's hardly surprising that he confused it (initially) with the Australian flag.
I think Ryan wasn't familiar with the term: 'Union flag'. Americans would just call it the British flag. As would most people outside the UK.
You didn't know Hong Kong was a British colony?
Unbelievable
Can you name the Countries that are the colonies referred to in this list?
Overseas Territories & Dependencies
🇫🇷 France 17
🇬🇧 United Kingdom 17
🇺🇸 United States 14
🇦🇺 Australia 6
🇳🇱 Netherlands 6
🇳🇴 Norway 4
🇳🇿 New Zealand 3
🇩🇰 Denmark 2
🇵🇹 Portugal 2
Now don't cheat and Google them ! :)
The UK Parliament have recently enacted a law allowing any citizen of Hong Kong to claim British citizenship if they were born before the handover of power to China. Though they are unable to bring out with them some items. This has been gladly taken up by those persecuted by the Chinese authorities for their religious faiths.
They were British Citizens!
What you have to remember is that we owned Hong Kong. It was given to us by China after one of the Brit Chinese wars. What we did not own were the "new territories" in mainland China. Hong Kong cannot exist without the new territories
We should all always remember that the Chinese flag only has one large star. For China, everything that doesn't belong to this star is just a means to an end.
It you want to know why the people of Hong Kong weren't happy about China taking control have a look at China's human rights record,remember the Tianaman Square protest s which were broken up , ending by sending in Tanks to quell the riots ,China made promises to let things continue much same in Hong Kong after they took over ,they went back on their word ,few believed them but were powless to do anything about it ❤.
This is when Chinese stopped riding bicycles realised that there is some benefits to capitalism and opened themselves up to more trading.