By Paul D. Shinkman, Senior Writer, National Security May 29, 2020, at 6:00 a.m.

   WHEN PRESIDENT BILL Clinton was pushing for a trade deal with China in 2000, he referenced Hong Kong to address broad concerns about Beijing's civil rights abuses and territorial threats, specifically a letter he received from the founder of Hong Kong's Democratic Party and longtime human rights activist Martin Lee.

   Clinton read from Lee's letter in a speech at Johns Hopkins University that March: "'This agreement,' and I quote, 'represents the best long-term hope for China to become a member of good standing in the international community.'"

   The optimism has not proved justified in the 20 years since Congress approved that agreement.

   Early Thursday, China's rubber-stamp legislature approved in a nearly unanimous vote new rules for Hong Kong, expected to take effect in September. Along with broad controls over public dissent and extrajudicial punishment, they are also believed to allow Chinese security services to operate openly in Hong Kong for the first time amid ongoing pro-democracy demonstrations. The move comes less than a week after Beijing announced it planned to impose sweeping regulations on the former British colony that had been allowed to maintain unique economic ties with Western democracies.

   It's the strongest signal yet that China is testing the world's resolve, challenging the countries that expected it would take a good-faith step toward democracy when it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001 and began its path to becoming an integral part of global commerce. The Chinese Communist Party's latest crackdown on territory it considers its own and central to its legitimacy is perhaps the clearest message yet that Beijing believes its economic clout is stronger than any other country's willingness to fight back.

   "I call this the rape of Hong Kong," Lee, now 81, told Bloomberg News on Tuesday of what most consider Beijing's attack on the fragile "one country, two systems" agreement that governed the semi-autonomous city. "If the outside world says to them, 'You can't do that,' they would say, 'It's none of your business.'"

   China in recent years has regularly challenged the world order, forcefully asserting territorial claims despite international objections in the East and South China seas as well as in airspace that the U.S. insists is international. It's also threatened to withhold access to its markets from any country or business that criticizes its political or human rights record.
However, it's incursion into Hong Kong – and its disregard for foreign objections – is unprecedented.

   President Donald Trump on Thursday said his administration would be "making certain decisions" with regard to China that he would publicly discuss Friday. The U.S. took the bold and provocative step on Wednesday of asserting that Hong Kong is no longer autonomous from China, an assessment required by U.S. law that strips the city-state of its preferential trading status.

   The Chinese Communist Party relies heavily on the size and access of Hong Kong's markets, but it also considers its influence over the former British colony as central to its legitimacy. It sees that control as a way of repairing damage from what it considers the "century of humiliation," in which foreign powers exploited China and its territories, and as a way of showing that Beijing now is standing up to foreign adversaries.

   The effects of the new U.S. measure on China remain unclear as is the extent to which Trump can craft and find support for punitive sanctions against China amid a global pandemic, an international economic downturn and ongoing trade talks with Beijing that thus far have proceeded on a separate track from political disputes but could easily be dragged in.

   "The judgment was always that this would be a thermonuclear step with huge costs for the U.S.-China relationship," says Sheena Greitens, a non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution and professor at the University of Texas' Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs who specializes in China studies.

   The U.S. has previously considered imposing sanctions on Chinese banks to pressure Beijing to do more to contain North Korea, but those prospective tactics have always been scuttled by domestic concerns about the certain blowback from Beijing, Greitens says.

   "Opposing Beijing and standing with Hong Kong are part of an existential struggle for the United States."

   However, consensus seems to be shifting. The Senate introduced legislation last week that would take aim at similar Chinese targets.

   "The fact that the administration and legislative branch are willing to consider such a major step tells us that we're in a very, very different place with the U.S.-China relationship," Greitens says. "The U.S. is willing to accept a lot more risk now than it was before in order to confront the People's Republic of China."

   It's also not a certainty that U.S. action on its own would be enough to change China's behavior – a factor the Trump administration appears to be currently considering.
China's ambitions are global. It has spent years fortifying trade routes at sea and on land, and it has integrated itself into the global economy to ensure access to international markets.

   "In the absence of coordination with others in the international community, such sanctions would not have much impact," says Bonnie Glaser, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies' China Power Project. "China is integral to the world economy, and other countries won't work with the U.S. to 'isolate' it. But there is growing support for pulling supply chains out of China in areas that are crucial to national security. The pandemic has shown that medical supplies are among those areas, and many countries now want to reduce their vulnerability to excessive reliance on Chinese suppliers."

   Some of America's closest allies have already signaled they may not stand by the U.S. if it decides to pursue sanctions. A spokesperson for U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Thursday that the government is "deeply concerned" over China's moves against Hong Kong, but the country has also been forced to consider how support for sanctions would affect its contentious deal to allow Chinese tech giant Huawei to help build critical components of its 5G network. The European Union has also taken only halting steps toward rebuking China. And The Japan Times warned over the weekend that U.S. economic punishments aimed at Beijing could cause even more damage to Hong Kong – or the U.S. itself.

   Yet support for such measures has increased on Capitol Hill. Members of Congress that China specifically threatened with sanctions earlier this month believe the U.S. must take unprecedented measures.

   "After years of human rights admonishment and cheap rhetoric devoid of any meaningful penalties, [Chinese President Xi Jinping] has concluded that the West is all talk, no action," Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey says in an email to U.S. News. The top House Republican on the Congressional-Executive Commission on China has been an outspoken critic of Beijing's reported human rights abuses, domestic population control and use of torture against its own people, as well as the latest actions in Hong Kong.

   "For the sake of vulnerable people everywhere, the United States – even if we have to go it alone – must impose sanctions," says Smith, who also served as a delegate to the U.N. under Trump and former President Barack Obama.

   Sen. Marsha Blackburn, also among those China targeted earlier this month, says China has "undercut U.S. interests for decades."

   "If China also continues to flout respect for human rights, cover up its responsibility for the global COVID pandemic, threatens its neighbors and engages in unfair trade practices, then our policies should reflect punitive actions that include, if necessary, sanctions," the Tennessee Republican tells U.S. News.

   "Wondering what would happen to democracy under Chinese global hegemony? Look at Hong Kong for a glimpse into a dark future if China's global ambitions are realized," says Rep. Jim Banks, a Republican from Indiana. "Opposing Beijing and standing with Hong Kong are part of an existential struggle for the United States."

   But, perhaps most notably, as the U.S. and China appear set on a collision course over Hong Kong, an assessment from Pompeo on Wednesday provided a fitting bookend to those Lee used some 20 years ago to open what he and others hoped would be an era of greater international economic cooperation.

   "While the United States once hoped that free and prosperous Hong Kong would provide a model for authoritarian China," Pompeo said, "it is now clear that China is modeling Hong Kong after itself."