Hong Kong Invasion Threats in 1967 and 1982

From a story in The Australian, dated June 25th 2007.

CHINA seriously considered invading Hong Kong in the middle of talks with Margaret Thatcher in 1982, a former top Chinese official has disclosed.

The Chinese were ready to resort to "requisition by force" if the negotiations had set off unrest in the colony, said Lu Ping, who later headed negotiations with Chris Patten, the last governor.

Baroness Thatcher said later that Deng Xiaoping, then China's leader, told her directly: "I could walk in and take the whole lot this afternoon."

...

 Lu, who had an espionage network in Hong Kong, was well informed about the divisions on the British side.

...

 To show that the Chinese were deadly serious long before that, Lu also revealed that a radical faction of the People's Liberation Army was poised to invade the British colony during pro-communist riots in 1967.

The invasion was called off only by a late-night order from Premier Zhou Enlai to the local army commander, Lu said.

Lu's remarks were made in an interview with Dragon TV, a Chinese broadcaster. His claims have been backed by Zhou Nan, another former senior Chinese official in Hong Kong, who says in a forthcoming memoir that Beijing considered "non-peaceful means" to achieve reunification.

The Lu disclosures mark the first time a senior Chinese figure has commented on the 1967 convulsions, when British authorities almost lost control of the colony to rioters inspired by Mao Tse-tung's Cultural Revolution.

See Martin Lee on Thatcher's Talks with Deng Xiaoping in 1982 and British Empire in China.