It's not like HK volunteered to become a subject of the Crown in the first place though: > In 1839, Britain invaded China to crush opposition to its interferen

It's not like HK volunteered to become a subject of the Crown in the first place though: > In 1839, Britain invaded China to crush opposition to its interference in the country’s economic and political affairs. One of Britain’s first acts of the war was to occupy Hong Kong, a sparsely inhabited island off the coast of southeast China. In 1841, China ceded the island to the British, and in 1842 the Treaty of Nanking was signed, formally ending the First Opium War. http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hong-kong-ceded-to-the-british http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hong-kong-ceded-t... If Canada invaded the US and forced rohde island to become a territory of Canada, I'd probably be bitter about it, even if it became safer to live there.