Sunflower students were cleared of all charges in their occupation of their nation’s legislature

three years ago, almost to the day.

Joined by leaders Lin and Chen, Joshua Wong from Hong Kong’s Umbrella movement urged

the release of a Taiwanese college instructor, Lee Ming-che, from China’s custody.

Lee is an advocate for human rights and is being held for matters of “national security”.

The best way to understand the Hong Kong Umbrella movement’s end game is regime change in

China.

Hong Kong has no military and pro-independence Hong Kongers don’t seem to be advocating

mandatory military draft enrollment for all Hong Kong males.

Taiwanese males not only have mandatory draft enrollment, but have a minimum compulsory

service time after finishing school.

Taiwan’s student movement interrupted secret government talks between the US adversary

China and the US ally Taiwan.

Taiwan purchases military equipment from the US, including Apache gunships and F-16 fighters,

though trade was the primary concern of the Taiwanese protest.

Both military and trade are China-related talking points from President Trump, especially

this week.

No such talking points related to the Hong Kong protests.

The Taiwanese movement was led by young men who would serve in their nation’s military,

disrupted the government’s legislature for three weeks, and resulted in change.

The Hong Kong protests were led by young men forbidden by their government from serving

in their military, occupied public streets for three months, and only led to international

attention.

The only way to gauge the Hong Kong protests as a success is if the goal was to stir international

attention in the media to raise sentiment against China—enough sentiment that China’s

government changes enough to grant Hong Kong independence.

That is quite a significant change, enough for China to consider the matter one of national

security.

So, then, viewing activism as a matter of “national security” in China makes sense.

Hong Kong’s status with China and human rights are topics Western media readers are

interested in.

By detaining people who live outside of China inside of China, activists such as Joshua

Wong are receiving all the ammunition they need, courtesy of China.

China truly is in a war against the Western newspapers.

That is probably why economics are Beijing’s primary tool against North Korea, while Donald

Trump seems to have a different strategy in mind.