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special facilities.
But we cannot talk to any
countries (other, possibly, than America, Canada and Australia) in advance about this problem. The period of our withdrawal is likely to be measured in months and past experience (as evidenced by U.N. efforts on behalf of refugees) has shown that much longer than this will be necessary to negotiate permanent settlement opportunities. Temporary transit areas will therefore be necessary and we may find countries very reluctant to act as host to large
numbers of Chinese who have no guarantee of permanent residence elsewhere. Singapore, Taiwan, Philippines and our Pacific dependencies may be possibilities.
62. The second major problem will be the maintenance of internal security. Public knowledge that we were preparing to withdraw would have an immediate and profound effect on the internal security situation. Those fearful of the change of regime would be clamouring to get out; communists would get to work on a confused public and rally their sympathisers whose numbers would mushroom overnight among those (tho great majority) of the population who would see no alternative but to remain; they would be joined by criminal and hooligan
elements. The morale of the Police Force would dip sharply (if it did not disintegrate altogether); the Force is preponderantly Chinese and its members would understandably be looking over their shoulders. The task of maintaining public order might devolve entirely on the garrison and the
likelihood is that it will prove impossible to maintain control throughout the whole area of the Colony. This would undoubtedly be the case if the Chinese Government deliberately
set out to foment the situation.
63.
These two major problems present us with a conflict in time scales. We should need as much time as we could get to
discharge our responsibilities to people. But the difficulties we would face in circumstances of growing disorder and economic confusion indicate that the period of withdrawal should be as short as possible.
640 It is most unlikely (with the precedent of Shanghai before us) that China would stand by while we stripped Hong Kong of such people and assets as we wished to remove.
We
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/can