19.
without the most careful joint Anglo-Chinese preparations
beforehand.
228
As was proved in the event, the risks of "giving
a pretext" to Japan ( country which, in the unlikely event of
her thinking a pretext necessary, would most certainly invent
one) were infinitely less than the practical certainty of
quick defeat facing the handful of armed men who had to fight
Relations without prospect of reserves or reinforcements.
between H.K. and the ChungKing government were never happy:
they were shot through with suspicion, misunderstanding and
imagined slights.
Only three H.K. officials ever so much as
saw Chungking one of them for no more than a brief week-end.
-
What happened in H.K. can hardly have been duplicated
Making all possible allowance
in history since small mercenary armies defended the rich cities
of medieval Europe. Of the colony's total population, about
300000 were able-bodied men.
on the most generous seale for fifth columnists, expatriate
money-makers and jelly-fish who ooze quietly to the winning
side, there cannot have been less than 75000 Chinese able and
willing, with any encouragement from ChungKing, to bear arms and to fight, not particularly for the British Empire, but against
the hated monkey-men from Japan. And yet a Nipponese army, employing 20000 to 30000 men from its four divisions, reduced the place wholly in seventeen days. The Colony's two million
citizens were defended by something under 12000 troops,
including volunteers.
H.K.'s/
The vast reservoir of man-power within
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