Even taking the worst possible view of the Chinese government, they have strong economic reasons to have been preparing for a new SARS type epidemic over the past twenty years. They don't need the benefit of the doubt.

One could also easily argue that the CCP has very little to gain from ruining almost all of their customers financially.

So far, it also looks like mainland China was hit hard, while Taiwan got off easy. The CCP would most likely not strengthen a territory that they hope to eventually absorb.

And lastly, I would assume that with Trump, the CCP could just bribe their way into Washington.

So I see very little for them to be gained from starting this. And you yourself also conclude that India is benefiting more than China.

Why give a government with modern day concentration camps, an avoidable epidemic of prisoners with COVID-19, and military occupation of free countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, or more historically in Iraq (again), Somalia, Korea, Vietnam, the Philippines, Cuba, I feel like I’m just naming random countries at this point...the benefit of the doubt about anything?

Comments like this really derail an otherwise civil and interesting discussion.

Syria is a free country? Have you been there?

Because China didn't kill George Floyd in daylight?

C'mon Hong Kong belongs to China and always was. It was just leased to UK and this lease had ended in last century. China just wanted to reap benefits of Being Kong economy this is why they given them such a huge autonomy . They can change it anytime as this is their property. If someone would follow your logic Hawai is also US occupied country ...

So I'm not going to get into an argument, just make three basic points to reply here:

Hong Kong did not always belong to China, and was not leased to the UK - part of Hong Kong's area (the New Territories) was leased, but Kowloon and Hong Kong island were ceded in perpetuity.

China signed an international treaty with the UK regarding the handover of Hong Kong, a treaty which comes with certain rights and responsibilities. Sure, there's no real way to actually enforce such a treaty, but you can't really complain if other countries react to the breaking of a treaty with punitive measures, and don't trust the treaty-breaker not to break other treaties in future.

How about asking the people of Hong Kong what they want? There's about 7.5 million of us here, with a fairly unique history and culture, so maybe just being subsumed into another country wouldn't be the choice of the population?

Hawaii was taken from its native peoples and there is a very slow process underway to remediate that. [0]

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_recognit...