602 { China’s Quest
and how his political reform program constituted a violation of agreements.
Patten’s account is interesting:
One after another, Chinese officials—over the table or from the depths
of their white-antimascassared chairs—would accuse me of having bro-
ken the Joint Declaration and the Basic Law. “How have I done so?”
I would respond. “Show me where.” “You know you have done so,” they
would reply. “You must have done so, or else we wouldn’t have said it.”
“But where?” “It is not for us to say; you must know that you have erred.”
“Give me a single instance,” I would argue. “Well,” they would usually
claim somewhat lamely, “you have at least broken the spirit of the Joint
Declaration and the Basic Law.” “What do you mean by the ‘spirit’? Do
you just mean that you disagree with me? Why not then discuss what
I have done? Put forward your own proposals.” “We cannot put forward
our own proposals until you return to the spirit of the text. The circles
spun and looped; the arguments twisted and turned ....^56
When Qian met Patten during the latter’s October 1992 Beijing visit, the
Chinese foreign minister demanded that he publicly retract his political reform
program. Failure to do so would create a “great challenge to Sino-British co-
operation,” Qian said. This would cause China to “quit partnership” with
Britain and “start all over again.” Qian viewed these harsh words as a “sin-
cere warning” which was “not heard” by Patten and London. This failure to
heed China’s warning opened the way to “open confrontation.”^57 As during
the 1982–1983 Joint Declaration negotiations, Beijing was stipulating a pre-
condition for negotiations—public withdrawal of Patten’s election reform
plan, in this case—that prejudged the outcome of talks. By withdrawing
Patten’s already announced reform program, London would implicitly agree
to proceed with changes to Hong Kong’s political set-up only after securing
Beijing’s consent. But in 1992–1993, unlike in 1982–1983, London refused to
accept China’s precondition.
Qian warned Patten that unless he abandoned his electoral reform effort,
Beijing would simply ignore him and deal directly with London. Beijing fol-
lowed through on this threat. Subsequently Qian handled the matter with
Hurd or with the British ambassador in Beijing, Robin McLaren. Patten for
his remaining years in Hong Kong was subjected to a campaign of vitupera-
tion by pro-China newspapers, by prominent figures in Hong Kong business
circles, and by some British China hands, such as Cradock, who felt Patten’s
political reform program was simply unrealistic. Patten himself felt opinion
turning against him. But Britain did not change course.
Seventeen rounds of talks between Ambassador McLaren and Zheng
Junsheng (Xu Jiatun’s successor as head of Xinhua in Hong Kong) began in
Beijing in April and continued to late November 1993. Zhang tried to per-
suade McLaren that British moves in Hong Kong needed to converge with