SECRET
INWARD TELEGRAM
TO THE COMMONWEALTH OFFICE
(The Secretary of State)
FROM HONG KONG (Sir D. Trench)
Ro
(135)
RECEIVED IN ARCHIVES No. 631
2 SMAL
MAY
Cypher
Do
24 May, 1967.
R. 24
尊
1300Z.
st
10
9
FLASH SECRET No. 688.
Addressed to Commonwealth Office.
Peking No. 261.
Repeated
" POLAD Singapore No. 126. "Washington No. 137. (Please repeat
PRIORITY to all).
132
967
My telegram No. 680 (not repeated).
Following from Galsworthy.
Following is our analysis and appreciation.
In the present state of overspill from the Cultural Revolution and given the Chinese propensity at this time for irrationality, we cannot be sure what are China's intentions towards Hong Kong or how they will react to any given situation. With this reservation, as seen from here it does not look as though Peking intends at present to force us out of Hong Kong. Our assessment is rather that the local Communists felt that they must act here increasingly in accordance with the principles of the Cultural Revolution (one of the "sins" of the Hong Kong Government is that it had "limited" the effects of the Cultural Revolution in Hong Kong), and accordingly seized the incident at, inter alia, the artificial flower factory as a suitable opportunity for doing so. This seems to have been a mistaken initiative by the local Communists, representing their response to their understanding of current trends of thought in China, rather th an a policy deliberately directed from authoritative mainland sources. But once the local communists had committed themselves, Peking, on the basis of misleading reports of the local situation, felt not only that they must react in support, but also that they could exploit the situation in order at least to humiliate us to such an extent as to ensure that in future we would be much more quickly sensitive to Peking pressure (e.g. over U.S. warships), and if possible to force us to accept a Macao-type situation.
2.
This situation is therefore essentially political. Although it arose from a genuine labour dispute, it could as easily have arisen from any other incident involving the Authorities here. From the outset the original labour dispute was taken over and exploited by the Communist press and organisations. Although the management, belatedly, sought the assistance of the Commissioner of Labour in settling the dispute, the Communists rejected his efforts, maintaining as a matter of principle that the Government has no status or role to play in labour matters.
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