Link: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/10/trump-taiwan-sovereignty-china/688356/

Chinese President Xi Jinping does not often look like he’s having a good time. His resting face at public events exudes a mixture of boredom and annoyance, as though he has more interesting business elsewhere. His displays of good humor have qualified as news in Chinese state media. When a camera caught him laughing during a meeting last October with Donald Trump, the moment “stunned observers,” according to one news report. At their meeting in Beijing in May, the staging spoke as forcefully as Xi’s expressions. His appearance with Trump at a press conference inside Xi’s official residence featured two nearly identical armchairs, except that the one reserved for the U.S. president was lower and softer, making him look smaller and slouchier than his host. If Trump took offense, he didn’t show it.

https://archive.ph/UH5Vj

They saw what happened in Hong Kong, so no.

Same reason the ukrainines haven’t given in.

They both understand what will happen to them if they let the invaders in.

Thr article is about the internal and external pressures that are erasing all other options.

None of which changes the brutal reality of being an occupied population. Just ask the people in eastern Ukraine.

You can die defending, or you can die in the ethnic cleansing. Might as well fight.