TNAG-1263-FCO40-1606-Parliamentary-contacts-on-the-future-of-Hong-Kong-1983 — Page 144

The key question in diplomacy, as in everyday life, is not

what you want, but how you are going to get it. Slapping

down on the negotiating table an "uncompromising" demand

for an extension of the present lease, and insisting on

"rigid adherence to the status quo" would liquidate both

empire and prosperity in short order. I doubt if anyone

wants that. To suggest, as Professor Skidelski and Mr

Patrikeef do tha

that it

It is possible or tactically advisable

to negotiate in this way shows no awareness of the simple

and

power relationships; no practical concern for the welfare

of the Colony, and no understanding of Chinese national

pride, the most powerful and volatile element in the whole

equation;

The prosperity of Hong Kong depends on a secure Sino-British

entente about its future. This will not be achieved by

adversarial negotiations.

of continuity available.

We must aim for the maximum degree

But in doing so, we must also

bear constantly in mind the old risk of responsibility

without power. If our desire to continue administering

the Colony so strong that we wish to perpetuate it even if

we have no real control over events? Look at the history

of China over the last fifteen years the upheavals,

the power struggles and the drastic reversals of policy,

and the West's inability to predict these sea changes.

Is

it necessarily in our interests, or those of the inhabitants,

Pussine

to seek blindly to perpetuate into an uncertain future the

arrangements which have worked in different circumstances

K

4.