Peter
Rickets
Hong Kong Department
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
King Charles Street
London SW1
Dear Pater,
303 Richmond Road
Twickenham
Middlesex TW1 2NP
13 December: 553
Following our meeting with John Coles this morning, I enclose a
revised text of the second part of the penultimate chapter of my book.
As you will see, it starts from page 14.
I have done my best to meet the various points made at the
meeting. But I do not pretend that I have given you complete
satisfaction. To take one of the main contentions, namely that there
has been no change in policy over Hong Kong, I am afraid I cannot
accept that. We shall be taking unilateral action in Hong Kong on
Wednesday if the Governor is to be believed. That will be a major
departure. We say that we still wish to cooperate with China; but we
set terms for that cooperation that we know they will not accept. That
seems to me a contradiction. It is as if in 1983 we had insisted that
we must continue with British administration, but that we still
wanted to cooperate with China over the colony. We cannot have it both
ways. Even John, I I think, conceded that there has been a new
'approach'. I shall not quarrel about the exact word; but I think it
is clear that things have greatly changed on our side since 1991.
I make much of this question, since it crops up at a number of
points in the text.
Apart from that, you will see that I have avoided the reference
to 'progress' on page 14.
Further down that page, I have inserted 'I fear before
predicting the consequences of confrontation. On page 15, I have
added 'As I see it'. In the second paragraph on the page I have
inserted 'almost certainly' and 'It seems only too likely'. This is
to meet the complaint about ex cathedra prophecies and to underline
that these are my personal views. Though, as I said at our meeting, it