Communist-instigated violence still erupts spasmodically in Hongkong. However, as compared with the last seven months of 1967, all is quiet. The Communists made a bold bid to compel the British to knuckle under and relinquish control of the crown colony. They inflicted great suffering on the 4 million people of Hongkong. Many persons lost their lives. Hundreds were injured. The economy was damaged and the economic effects will be felt for a long time to come. Yet the Communists failed in all their major objectives. They may try again - but for the moment they seem to have decided that they have little to gain and much to lose.
What is the background of the Hongkong riots? What happened - and what are the implications for the future? This article is an attempt to answer those questions. These six points can be considered basic:
1. More than 90 per cent of the 4 million people of Hongkong are anti-Communist.
2. In any struggle against Communism, only force can be effective. Temporization, compromise and concessions will give the Communists opportunity to expand the scope of their attacks and to commit new atrocities.
3. The riots were a part of Mao Tse-tung's plot to take over Hongkong. The Mao regime could not commit its armed forces to this task, however, and tried to make up for the lack of military action by creating conditions of civil chaos.
4. It is the policy of the Maoists to "let politics take command". They were prepared to sacrifice any economic profits that might accrue through continued British control of Hongkong.
5. Communism's defeat in Hongkong was a serious one that presages the downfall of Maoism on the Chinese mainland.
6. Hongkong authorities refused to negotiate with the colony's Communists. They always have been prepared to let well enough alone, but only if the Reds refrain from disturbing law and order. If violence should be renewed, the authorities are prepared to respond with arrests, to shut down Communist establishments and to deport ringleaders.
The beginning came on May 6, when the Communists took advantage of a wage dispute between management and the workers of an imitation flower factory. At first, the Hongkong government sought to temporize. The disturbances were carefully planned and were carried out step by step. On May 11, the scope of the disturbances was greatly expanded. Communist students, labor union members and employees of Red organizations joined in attacking riot police with stones, bottles, clubs and lengths of pipe.
Communists established the "Anti-Persecution Struggle Committee" in mid-May to unify their command system and coordinate enlargement of the rioting. More than 200 student leaders and representatives of Communist organizations made up the committee membership. However, the announced committee membership did not include the hard-core Communists who were actually directing the violence. Behind-the-scenes leaders included Liang Wei-lin, the director, and Chi Feng, the deputy director, of the "New China News Agency" bureau in Hongkong. There has been repeated speculation that one or more higher-ranking Communists stood behind the NCNA functionaries. The nominal committee chairman, Yang Kuang, was only a puppet. Also carrying out orders from higher up were such tools as Fei Yi-min, the director of the newspaper Ta Kung Pao; Kao Chuo-hsiung, chairman of the Federation of Chinese Chambers of Commerce; and Wang Kuan-cheng, vice chairman of the federation.
Chinese Communist agents had been resident in Hongkong for a long time. Their orders came from the South-Central Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party. The overt commander of these forces was Tao Chu, head of the South Sub-bureau. Originally, the Hongkong Communist leaders belonged to the faction of Liu Shao-chi. Although the "great proletarian cultural revolution" had been under way on the Chinese mainland from August of 1966, no purges were attempted in Hongkong. Mao did not dare to move for several reasons. The Hongkong situation and Communist activities were wholly different from those of the mainland. Mao was afraid of an intra-Communist struggle in Hongkong. As for the Hongkong "powerholders", they feared a purge and were prepared to seek Mao's favor. They had seen their counterparts in Macao wrest control from the Portuguese and were confident they could do likewise in Hongkong.
Hongkong Communists were almost incredibly optimistic. About 3.9 million of the 4 million people of the colony are Chinese. The Reds thought they could easily play on the pro-Chinese feelings of these 3.9 million people and compel the British to surrender. After that they would get rid of any anti-Communist Chinese who might make trouble. Indulging themselves in this hallucination, they told Peiping they would have no trouble taking over and that they required only moral support. Mao and most of those around him have little experience with the outside world. With the outcome of the Macao riots in mind, they believed the representations of the Hongkong Communists and gave the green light for the wave of anti-British violence.
Communists of both Hongkong and Peiping were to be rudely disillusioned by the unfolding of actual events. As it turned out, fewer than 10 per cent of Hongkong Chinese residents were in any way moved or persuaded by the propaganda slogans. Once the violence erupted, the disapproval of most Hongkong Chinese quickly became evident. The British were surprised, too. They had feared that a majority of Chinese might be hypnotized by the Communists into rising against vested authority. As a consequence, the government was lenient toward the Reds when the riots started. Then, as it became clear that the Chinese people were overwhelmingly on the side of the government and against the Communists, the authorities took an increasingly firm stand against violence. The fundamental reason for failure of the riots was the anti-Communism of the Chinese people.
The Communists did everything they possibly could to disturb peace and order. They undertook demonstrations, strikes and boycotts. However, the massive demonstrations that the Reds expected to destroy government stature and authority were brought to an end in only two days with the proclamation of an emergency act. After that the Communists were limited to small-scale hit-and-run demonstrations usually involving no more than 100 people. Big strikes were ordered to disrupt the supply of electricity, water and gas, and to shut down tram, bus and ferry transportation. Except for fairly serious interference with bus service and some inconvenience in ferry service, all these efforts failed. Power and water supply was little affected. The boycotts were supposed to disrupt food supply and marketing. However, foods were available in ample supply with only a small price rise. The loser was Red China, which gave up about US$20 million in foreign exchange.
Terror was a principal instrumentality of the Hongkong Reds. Nine Communist newspapers published threats and rumors designed to intimidate the people. The Communist papers said that Red Chinese warships were entering Hongkong harbor and that large forces were being massed along the border. No one believed these tall tales. So beginning in June, the Reds stepped up the reign of terror in the streets. Labor union headquarters and stores selling Chinese Communist goods were turned into arsenals and strong holds for rioters and street fighters. At first, the weapons were primitive - knives, swords, spears and acid. Police and civilians were attacked. Traffic was disrupted. Trams, buses and private cars were burned. Then came the bombing phase. Bombs were exploded in crowded places. Many people were killed and wounded, including a number of small children. On August 24, the terrorists burned to death an anti-Communist radio commentator and his brother. They named six other anti-Communists and said they would be assassinated. None of the six - of whom two were journalists - was intimidated. They continued to fight the Communists. The principal result of the terror was the slow but certain erosion of any goodwill that the Communists might once have enjoyed in colony.
Ideology was of no use to the Communists in starting strikes or rallying rioters. They quickly found that only money would buy violence. They spent nearly US$10 million a month in trying to tie up transportation and another US$10 a month to pay rioters. Of the US$60 million spent in May, June and July, US$20 million was contributed by the Peiping regime. In truth, Peiping was virtually compelled to give the money. Leftist businessmen had their arms twisted for "donations" totaling US$23 million. A considerable portion of the money went into the pockets of those who were handing it out rather than into the pockets of the rioters. At one time, Canton big-character posters of the "cultural revolution" demanded the liquidation of Hongkong Communist leaders for corruption.
As noted above, the government at first sought to temporize, hoping that the Communists would quiet down and that the riots would not be too serious. For a while, the government merely waited, intent upon discerning the degree of Communist strength. Finally the authorities began to crack down. They raided and searched Communist union headquarters and schools. They confiscated weapons and arrested leaders. Among those hauled in were Tang Ping-ta, a vice chairman of the Federation of Chinese Chambers of Commerce; Fu Chi, a movie actor, and his actress wife, Shih Hui; and Hu Ti-chou, the editor of a Communist newspaper. More than 1,700 were put in jail. Prison terms for those convicted ran up to eight years. The highest fine was HK$18,000. However, leniency was the lot of those who acted on impulse or were intimidated into participation in violent acts. Most of those arrested were released. Three of the Communist newspapers that were inciting to violence were shut down for six months.
With their movement failing, the Communists sought to get something started along the Hongkong-Kwangtung border. Rioters who had been specially trained in Macao were sent through the New Territories to the frontier. These mobsters and paid farmers and workers attacked Hongkong border police on August 5. They sought to seize police weapons and to embroil the Chinese Communist border force in the fighting. Hongkong police handled the incidents patiently and managed to contain this new violence. Subsequently, the British sent regular troops to the border. When the Communists tried again a few days later, the Reds got nowhere. After that the British set up a second line of barbed wire all along the border.
Chinese Communist garrisons along the frontier made no attempt to intervene. On some occasions, the Red troops acted to prevent reinforcement of the mobs. The Chinese Communists may well have been concerned about problems on their own side of the border. In August and September, there were persistent reports of refugees massing for a repetition of the 1962 April-May exodus to Hongkong. In September, some 50,000 "criminals sentenced to labor reform" were reported waiting near Shum Chun for an opportunity to break through border barriers. Artillery and machine-gun fire was heard from the Chinese Communist side of the border for three days beginning September 9. The Chinese Communist army was said to be getting rid of the escapees.
Aside from initial approval and the US$20 million, the Peiping authorities did little to assist the Hongkong rioters. It was made clear from the beginning that the destiny of the colony would be "shaped by the patriotic compatriots of Hongkong". Mao Tse-tung had his own troubles on the mainland. The biggest single action of support for the rioters came August 20, when Peiping gave the British government in London 48 hours to release Communist journalists and other leaders who had been detained in Hongkong. The ultimatum amounted to a threat of war in the event of non-compliance. The British declined to release the Communist troublemakers. Peiping mobs then were turned loose to loot, sack and burn the British embassy and to abuse the charge d'affaires and members of his staff. There was not even a feint of war. At no time during the Hongkong crisis did the Chinese Reds reinforce the garrisons (of two-division strength) along the Canton-Kowloon railroad. The Chinese Communists apparently never had any intention of intervening in Hongkong with armed forces. Possibly they could not have done so, considering the priority involvement of the "people's liberation army" in the "cultural revolution".
Before last May, many of the Chinese of Hongkong were indifferent to politics. They bought goods from Taiwan or from the mainland; what counted was the price and the quality or familiarity of the article. The Communist violence of 1967 turned many of the colony's Chinese into political and economic activists against Peiping. The violence that took the lives of children and the Lam Bun brothers outraged the Chinese people and they turned their backs on the Communists in every way possible, including the economic. Before the May incident, Red China was earning about HK$3.5 billion a year from trade with Hongkong. Food sales alone added up to some HK$7 million a day. Twenty-nine stores selling mainland goods were making about HK$3.5 million daily. Peiping's profits ran around HK$300 million a month. As the wave of terror mounted, customers disappeared from stores selling mainland goods. When these places of business became headquarters for rioters and arsenals of weapons, they were deserted except for Communists. Such stores were losing HK$13 million a month by fall. The economic loss to Red China was more than HK$500 million by mid-September.
Another HK$500 million was lost by Peiping in curtailed exports. Strikes in Hongkong delayed the shipment of mainland-made goods to Europe and other places for the Christmas trade. Many orders were canceled. New ones have not been forthcoming. Storage costs mounted.
Hongkong depositors withdrew about HK$300 million from their accounts in Chinese Communist banks. Overseas Chinese reduced remittances to mainland relatives from about HK$80 million a month to HK$30 million. Both the Hongkong violence and Red Guard oppression of mainlanders receiving remittances were involved in the cut. Communist banks were taxed to support strikes and boycotts. They were compelled to provide HK$100 million in the early months of the riots. From May to mid-September, the total Communist economic loss was approximately HK$1.5 billion.
The patience of Hongkong's Chinese population had worn paper-thin toward the end of last year. Dropping the mask of neutrality, people began to report the locations of Communist strongholds and the identities of terrorists. Quite clearly, the Chinese of the colony are on the side of law and order and opposed to Communism. Except for the Communist publications, all the newspapers of the colony denounced the riots. Public utility workers risked their lives to keep services operating. The Communist at tempts to destroy public transportation and close down business and industry with a general strike were complete failures. Industrial production was not much affected. Business losses were primarily those of the Communists. Tourism was off only slightly.
Before the riots, Hongkong Chinese were inclined to hold a more or less neutral image of the Communists. Some Chinese were strongly anti-Communist and some were Communists. But the great rank and file in the middle were neither particularly one nor the other. Communist goods sold well because they were familiar and cheap. Communist entertainment troupes drew big crowds because they presented Chinese rather than Communist productions. Most of the professed Communists lived bourgeois lives. The time of Hongkong's troubles provided a great awakening. The Chinese population of the colony learned what their mainland cousins already had found out from Red Guard brutality and atrocities.
The Chinese Communists did not kill, maim and intimidate many British or other foreigners. Their targets were their own kind - the Chinese of Hongkong. The victims and their relatives and those who watched will not soon forget what the Communists did and would do again if they had the opportunity. In the wake of the riots, Hongkong seems safer from Communism than ever before. Even the self-professed Communist sympathizers are no longer so enthusiastic. Many of those who took to the streets as demonstrators or rioters did not get paid for their services. Others who struck and then lost their jobs now have neither work nor the benefits the Communists promised. Hongkong learned of the worthlessness of Communist promises along with its awakening to the wanton inhumanity of the Communist determination to seize power by force and violence.