Hongkong
Army Education Officer in Hong Kong Februan - July 1946.
by Major Duncan Smith
Hong Kong.
E
Fringing the South China coast are many
islands, steep, rocky and barren. On narrow coastal strips
a few fishermen live, growing a little rice in fertile corners
thes
and sailing in their junks and sampans on seas
beautiful as the Mediterranean.
as blue and
A hundred years ago Hong Kong was just such
an island, smaller than the Isle of Wight and serving as a
base for pirates. To-day magnificent roads wind their way up
the rocky sides of the of the Peak and mansions look down on
one of the three great harbours in the world, Across half-a-
mile of sea stands the City of Kowloon and behind it stretches
30 miles of jagged, indented peninsular ased to Britain until
1990.
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In 1939 Hong Kong with a million inhabitants
It dominated the was the greatest free port in the world.
trade of South China and to-day with Shanghai in chaos, it may
rise to even dizzier heights of prosperity if China is not laid
wholly prostrate by civil war and revolution.
The possibility of such a glittering prospect
may seem to many Britons to be an overwhelming argument for
leaving well alone and for reaping with relief some of the
last fruits of 19th century imperialism. But there are two
factors which cannot be ignored. The first is whether China
is prepared to leave so tempting a prize in British hands
without a crippling agitation for the return of Hong Kong. The
second is whether an unchecked search for wealth or trade is
in tune with the mood and conscience of Socialist Britain.
It must be said at once that there is no
immediate prospect of the return of Hong Kong to China. The
Chinese tr ders in the colony do not by and large wish to be
ruled by a Chinese administration which has rendered large
scale trading almost impossible in both Canton and Shanghai.
At pres nt they have, in some senses, the best of both worlds. They can go freely to and from China and yet live in a Colony
in which t ́e rule of law is linked with a stable currency.It may
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