At that point Cradock could only beg for mercy. "Mr. Lu, twenty-five billion is as high as I can go! There is truly no possibility of any more [money]. I hope that you can understand."
In the privacy of his mind, Lu Ping tallied the sums. They had gone from five billion to twenty-five billion; added together to more than seventy billion the Hong Kong government would make from land sales in 1997, it would be a hundred billion Hong Kong dollars. Although it was not much, it would be enough to let the new government scrape by at the start. And the new airport plan Cradock had brought with him contained the British government's agreement to listen to the views of the Chinese side during the transitional period. In the end the two sides were able to come to a common understanding on the new airport, whose overall cost was brought down to 98.6 billion Hong Kong dollars.
When Cradock proposed that they immediately sign an agreement, Lu Ping put on the brakes: "Let's not be too hasty. For such an enormous agreement, the two of us can only create a draft version. For a formal agreement to come into effect will require the two countries' heads of government to sign in Beijing."
Upon hearing this, Cradock was furious. "Then the deal is off! We won't sign! Our prime minister cannot come to Beijing!"
"What are you doing, backtracking now?" Lu Ping said in a stern voice. "You said quite clearly that your prime minister could come to Beijing!"
Cradock slapped the table and leapt to his feet: "I did not!"
Lu Ping also brought his hand down on the table: "Mr. Cradock, would you like me to get the notes out to show you? Do you want to talk, or don't you? If you don't, then please just go back to England now!"
Lu Ping understood that, after June of 1989, Western countries had sealed China off, and that no Western head of state would come to China. China hoped to get British Prime Minister John Major to be the one to break the deadlock.
Cradock could only meekly raise the white flag. "My apologies, Mr. Lu. My attitude just now was not acceptable. Please take a seat, and we'll continue our discussion. Perhaps our two heads of state could go to a third-party European country…"
"And why would they go to a third-party country?" Lu Ping retorted abruptly. "This is between our two countries. It has absolutely nothing to do with any third country."
All Cradock could say was that he would give the prime minister a call. After a brief absence, he returned to the room to say that Major had agreed to come to Beijing to sign a formal agreement with Chinese Prime Minister Li Peng. But they demanded that the Chinese side break with tradition, and hold the formal welcoming ceremony for the British Prime Minister at Beijing's airport.
They again ran up against Lu Ping's rejection: "No, the welcoming ceremony must be done according to the customs of the Chinese government, and be held in Tiananmen Square!"
Cradock let his gaze come to rest on Lu Ping. For a long time he said nothing.
Late that night the two sides signed a draft agreement of the "Memorandum of Understanding Concerning the Construction of the New Airport in Hong Kong and Related Questions." As was the custom on such occasions, a bottle of champagne was opened, and the two sides toasted the success of the negotiations.
Cradock offered a sincere toast to Lu Ping: "You are a staunch defender of your country's interests."
Lu Ping returned the toast, also calling Cradock a staunch defender of his country's interests.
Each of them truly was a staunch defender of their counties' interests.
On September 3, 1991, British Prime Minister John Major arrived in Beijing to formally sign the MoU on Hong Kong's new airport, breaking the post-June 1989 moratorium on western heads of state visiting China.
Through three rounds of negotiations stretching over eight months, and dozens of bitter clashes, the two sides had finally been able to come to an acceptable agreement.
But to think that the British were upstanding gentlemen whose word was their bond, to think that an agreement signed by the two countries' heads of states would not be treated by the British as so much cheap paper, would be an especially grave error.
Half a year later, in March of 1992, the British presented China with their projected costs for the new airport, which had increased from the agreed-upon 98.6 billion Hong Kong dollars to 112.2 billion Hong Kong dollars. This increase of 13.6 billion also papered over "contingent liabilities" of 22.5 billion Hong Kong dollars! The plan proposed by the British was completely out of line with the principles laid down in the MoU signed by the two countries' heads of state.
China was unsparing in its criticism of the British. The two sides met twice in Beijing to discuss the issue, both with no result.
At this point, I have to stop and contemplate.
The British plots, coming one after the other, were all exposed and put to rest by China. Any reasonable person would expect the British government to face up to reality, and to accept the inevitability of Hong Kong's return to China, no matter how unwilling it might be to do so. And yet, time after time, they persisted in trampling on the agreements between the two sides.
