Violent Hong Kong Protests of 2019 was a Mistake
By: Tamsen Ikard
Tags: Geopolitics, Chinese Communist Party, Hong Kong, Hong Kong Protests 2019, China

Violent Hong Kong Protests of 2019 was a Mistake

Hong Kong is slowly changing as China slowly takes out the opposition movement in slow and steady change policies. This process began when China passed the national security law for Hong Kong, which according to many, has caused the death of Hong Kong as a western, free, open society. Some officials from Beijing called it the second handover of Hong Kong. Hong Kong’s first handover to China came with fireworks, lion dances and there was some hope that this former British colony would be able to live its life as it did for decades.

Just 23 years later, Hong Kong’s second handover has brought fear and anxiety to Hong Kongers and led to many fearful citizens deleting their Twitter accounts, political parties disbanding, and some activists and ordinary people planning to flee abroad.

This has led to a soul searching among many activists if the massive and violent protests of 2019 was the correct path for the activists. Many are now wondering if they made a mistake by pursuing this path which did not lead to more freedoms for Hong Kong but now slowly transforming it into a very repressive system.

Why Hong Kong Protest was a Miscalculation

Hong Kong Protest was a mistake and miscalculation. It was mistake because it was so violent; it was also a mistake because the core impetus behind the protest was not liberalism but nativism. Hong Kong Protesters did not just ask for democracy. They promoted a separate Hong Kong identity. They promoted a solid separation of Hong Kong from the rest of China. Although they masked this idea of separation by calling for autonomy. But ultimately it was a call for separation based on a different identity.

The protest was based on a serious miscalculation on several fronts. The first front was underestimating the power of the Chinese state and Chinese national identity. Hong Kongers knew that asking for a separate Hong Kong identity would be a serious challenge to the Chinese sense of nationhood which has deep sense of humiliation for being weak in 19th century which led to the loss of Hong Kong to the British.

The second miscalculation was thinking that the CCP would back down after seeing such a comprehensive and violent protest and prioritize the economic benefits of Hong Kong. This was a serious miscalculation about the priorities of the Chinese state.

The third miscalculation was overestimating the power and the willingness of the west to confront China heavily for Hong Kong. This was probably the biggest reason why Hong Kong protesters showed such aggressive confidence. They were convinced that Euro/American alliance countries will put heavy sanctions on China for Hong Kong and that fear of sanctions will force China to back down.

Cap. Chinese national emblem attacked by Hong Protesters

Hong Kong Protesters underestimated the CCP leaders

If you look at the Hong Kong Protest from a realist perspective, doing a violent protest in China that was not only about democracy but was also strongly separatist in nature, was a serious mistake. This is the same China that is ruled by the CCP, that had no problem killing young protesters during the 1889 Tiananmen square Protests and completely ignored western condemnations and trade sanctions to do it. This is the CCP that did not just violently put down separatist tendencies in Tibet and Xinjiang, they are now striving to uproot the root cause of any separatism by engineering a systematic assimilation and death of any separate identity for Tibetans and Uyghurs. The CCP has shown time and time again that they are ruthless, determined and totally not cowed by western pressure when it comes to combating threats against national unity and party control.

But Hong Kong Protesters ignored all that with a very weird sense underestimation of the CCP leadership. There was frequent discussion in the social media about how CCP leadership is extremely corrupt and selfish and Hong Kong somehow represents their conduit to launder ill-gotten money. The protesters had strong belief that CCP officials were so selfish that they will be afraid of “ruining” Hong Kong and losing their ill-gotten money somehow.

There is this weird combination of incompatible logic among the most anti-China Hong Kongers. They will promote how CCP is hell-bent on world domination and is the Nazi-Germany reincarnate, but at the same time, they will downplay economic and military strengths of China. Reading comments on Social Media by hard-core activists would give one the impression that China is just one-step from complete collapse, and that CCP leaders are weak, unpopular and ready flee to the west at any moment.

Hong Kong Protesters alienated the only supporters who could matter

Hong Kong Protesters could have gained a lot of support among mainland Chinese liberals and pro-democracy voices. In fact, during the first few days of the protests, there were small gestures of support from those groups of mainlanders. However, this support evaporated as protests turned increasingly violent and anti-China with a separatist ideology.

During the escalation of the protests, the protesters increasingly targeted mainland companies, banks, and even small shops and restaurants. They later moved to attack Hong Kong to Guangzhou high speed rail link, which symbolically represents a link between the mainland and Hong Kong, again showing their hatred for any connection with mainland China. In essence, the protest was less about democracy and more about how to sever Hong Kong from mainland China.

The protesters later moved on to attack anyone speaking mandarin. There was a rumor going around about suspected CCP spies, and thus anyone speaking mandarin became a suspected spy and was beaten and critically injured.

Many Hong Kong Protesters denied having a separatist Hong Kong identity as their goal for the protests. But even if the so-called five demands did not include a demand for independence, the actions of the protesters were separatist in nature by trying to attack any kind of connection between Hong Kong and the mainland. These actions alienated the public in the mainland and destroyed the initial sympathies they might have had.

Another aspect of the alienation was the demands of foreign intervention by Hong Kong protesters. They put major emphasis on rallying support from the western countries by various means such as lobbying western leaders and lawmakers, flying flags of the US and UK during the protests, and even singing the american national anthem. This was deeply insulting to the Chinese who have had to endure humiliations, atrocities, and defeats at the hand of the western powers. To see a part of China that was under the subjugation of the UK to have these kinds of displays of affection for the west was viewed by mainstream Chinese people as a sign of servility and colonial mentality. In a way, this confirmed the stereotype of Hong Kongers as western worshipers and traitors.

All these actions combined, destroyed any chance of pro-democracy solidarity between Hong Kong protesters and the mainland liberals. In fact, Hong Kongers created the opposite effect of showing the fallacy of pro-democracy voices by portraying them as western-worshipping traitors who want to destroy prosperity and even divide the country into pieces. Nationalism and patriotism increased in the mainland and CCP was seen as the savior of China from foreign attempts at destroying the country.

The vast population of China with 1.4 billion people is the biggest strength of the Chinese Communist Party. This vast population provides the basis of China’s massive economy and market. It also provides the source of military, technological progress, and industrial might. As long as CCP has support from this vast population, no amount of western sanctions will be effective at putting pressure on CCP. Thus, if Hong Kong ever wants to gain more freedoms or more democratic governance, support from the public on the mainland is a must. But Hong Kongers destroyed this support by hating on mainlanders and trying to create a separate Hong Kong identity.

Conclusion

Many Hong Kongers were unhappy with their current situation of ever-closer integration with China. This is what ultimately fueled the massive protests. But trying to create distance with the mainland ultimately proved to be fatal for Hong Kong’s survival as a separate entity from the mainland. The CCP and the Chinese public no longer have any kind of goodwill for Hong Kongers. Many in the CCP and the public only view them as separatist traitors who must be neutralized and re-educated. This mistrust will force CCP to come up with policies to completely stamp out any kind of scope for anti-China protests and advocacy in Hong Kong. The entire Hong Kong society will have to be changed to achieve this goal and the tragic fall of Hong Kong freedoms will continue.

The Hong Kong protesters must think about how they miscalculated so badly and lost the very support of the mainlanders that they needed the most. They must ponder how they can regain that sympathy and support. That is the only thing that might stay CCP’s crackdown.