Why Hong Kong Teaches Us We Do Not Need A United States Empire

One of the main talking points from interventionists is that the United States must have a powerful empire in order to keep the world free.

Only America has the diplomatic reach, the financial resources, and the firepower to lead the free world against the autocrats, rogue states and terrorists that are trying to overwhelm it.

So, we quickly come to an inescapable conclusion: The United States is the World’s Policeman because there is no alternative.

Without America, people around the world would suffer from far more tyranny, enslavement, and genocide. The countries where American troops have remained long after combat ceased — Germany, Japan, and South Korea — have prospered economically and morally. Countries that America abandoned — such as Vietnam and Iraq — experienced mass murder and other horrors. The Left, however, views nearly all of America’s wars since 1945 as expressions of superpower imperialism.

However, if the recent success Hong Kong has had keeping China from taking them over has shown us anything, that’s far from the case. In fact, it seems those who truly want freedom and Democracy will get it no matter who they fight against, while the ones who don’t will have the United States army occupy them forever.

Why Hong Kong Should Need The United States; But Don’t

In 2019, China spent $177.5 Billion on there military. Compare that to Hong Kong, who spend less than $10 million on there military. As of writing, the United States does not have a single military base in Hong Kong, nor do they have any troops deployed in the country.

As such, Hong Kong should be out of luck. China should have taken them over six months ago. Yet, Hong Kong has somehow managed to defeat the Chinese empire through riots and protests.

Even with pure numbers China should have no issue. China has 1.386 Billion people while Hong Kong only has 7.392 Million. There are 187.5 citizens of China for every 1 citizen of Hong Kong.

We saw a similar thing with Russia tried to annex Crimea — a part of Ukraine — back in 2014. While according to Russia Crimea is still part of them, I tend to not trust what they say. Russia has a population of 144.5 million compared to Ukraine’s population of 44.83 million — which is not as big of a difference but still a large difference.

At the time, we were told that the United States had to get involved with Russia.

“That is not acceptable to an America that stands up for the rights of human beings. We are Georgians. And we are Ukrainians,” said the late Senator John McCain.

After much protest, Russia gave up on any attempts to deny the sovereignty of Ukraine. Even former Prime Minister of Russia Mikhail Kasyanov has said the annexation of Ukraine was a mistake. And any attempt to Russia has made to use what they consider to be there’s has backfired greatly.

So Why Isn’t China A Free Democracy Already?

One remaining question is that if the Chinese empire is so ineffective, why are they still an authoritarian superstate? These people do not understand how Mao Zedong came to power. He was not able to take over China until 1954, while he had been the Chairman of the Communist Party since 1943.

The revolution took place over the course of slightly more than 4 years. Before that, China had spent around 20 years fighting a civil war. To put it simply, Mao and the communists took over because the people of China liked him and supported Communism.

The same thing is true of President Xi. The communist party of China has controlled it throughout the entire boom they had starting in the 90s and continuing on for almost 30 years. Xi Jinping has a very high approval rating from the citizens of China — helped by the fact he’s banned all dissent but I digress.

The reason why Hong Kong is fighting so hard against China is because they don’t want China, the reason China isn’t fighting is because they like China.