Britain exchanges Weihaiwei for the New Territories; other concessions for greater Hong Kong?

[Ricardolindo]

I'm not talking about ethics, and please don't make assumptions like that. China viewed the British in HK as an unpleasant tenant and patiently waited for their lease to expire. They didn't need to redeem lost territory because it wasn't lost, it was leased. I guess for the island it's technically irridentism.

The premise of this scenario is the UK returning Weihaiwei to China in exchange for a permanent lease on the New Territories, though.

 

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

The premise of this scenario is the UK returning Weihaiwei to China in exchange for a permanent lease on the New Territories, though.

1909 is not a very good time for that - the Qing are not in a great place, so the last thing they need is exchanging a lease for a permanent cession. It would have had to be by force, which could topple the Qing, which I doubt the British want. Or maybe there's some way to sweeten the deal for the Qing. If it had happened, that would not be good news for British-Chinese relations - with the lease, China could just wait it out. If it was a permanent possession, there would be a strong temptation to seize it. Hong Kong never had the opprobrium attached to it that other colonial possessions had, so while there's no pressure from anyone (like the US) to give it up, it doesn't seem likely that anyone will have strong motivaton to get involved in this to support the British. I think the relatively relaxed situation in OTL is because it was just leased. Whoever wroke the Wikipedia article on WeihaiWei might be a little delisional to say this might have resulted in HK being British forever (it's a valid AH speculation, but doesn't belong in an eencyclopeida article). My inclination is that HK goes back to China sooner, but there are a lot of butterfies by doing this so I'm not sure, but I think this would be a bigger festering sore to the Chinese and would provide stronger motivation to take it, and after the withdrawal E. of Suez I don't think the will is there to try to hold onto it.