Hong Kong

The Battle of Hong Kong took place from December 8, 1941 to Christmas day of the same year. The incident was located on Hong Kong Island and Kowloon.

Hong Kong, then a British Crown Colony, was invaded by Imperial Japan. The British accepted help from the Canadian government, which sent troops to bolster British presence.

The Japanese attacked with horrible brutality, even by that day's standards. It was reported that the Japanese soldiers attacked and pillaged British field hospitals, killing and torturing wounded soldiers and medical staff, an action that was considered immoral at the time and is forbidden by United Nations in wars today.

Knowing furthur resistance was futile, the British and Canadian forces formally surrendered on December 25, a day known as "Black Christmas" in Hong Kong.

This began the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. The Japanese terrorised the public, murdering and pillaging, for three years and eight months until British forces liberated Hong Kong in 1945 and resumed control of it as a colony.

Japanese General Takashi Sakai, who led the invasion of Hong Kong and subsequently governed it for a time, was tried as a war criminal and executed on September 30, 1946 in Nanking, China with an audience consisting mostly of Hong Kongers. It was said that the Hong Kong viewers cheered and "...practically destroyed his body after the execution before Chinese security were able to hold them back..."

A Hong Kong legend tells of the day "...when the Hiroshima bombings occured, [that] the entire populace of Hong Kong smiled and cheered...for the first time since Christmas day of 1941..."

For more information regarding the Battle of Hong Kong, click on the corresponding "Related Link" below.

For more information regarding accusations and the trial against Takashi Sakai, click on the corresponding "Related Link" below.

• === because they needed a bigger Empire to fight other countries ===

not entirely! Hong Kong has a great Naval base which was used during WW2

• yes but still no they did not need a bigger empire they already had a big enough empire. They were given Hong Kong after the first opium war between the British and china. This war was caused because the British were smuggling in opium a drug that is very addictive. the British pretty much tried to drug china. So china then challenged the British to war and china ended up losing the war. Since they lost the war they signed a treaty with Britain called the treaty of nanking. This gave the British Hong Kong.

China is the most populous country, however, in terms of area, it is the fourth largest country.
China has the largest population, India the second largest, and the USA the third largest.

Russian has the most land, Canada the second most, and the USA the third most.

The telephone country code for Hong Kong is +852. (Note that Hong Kong is part of the People's Republic of China, which uses +86, but Hong Kong has retained its separate telephone numbering system.) Telephone numbers in Hong Kong have 8 digits after the country code, with no area code or city code. Numbers beginning with 8 are for "forwarding services," which may forward a call to anywhere in the world.

(The plus sign means "insert your international access prefix here." From a GSM mobile phone, you can enter the number in full international format, starting with the plus sign. The most common prefix is 00, but North America (USA, Canada, etc.) uses 011, Japan uses 010, Australia uses 0011, and many other countries use different prefixes.)

Hong Kong uses telephone country code +852. Most numbers have 8 further digits. Landline numbers mostly begin with 2 or 3; mobile numbers mostly begin with 5, 6, or 9; pager numbers begin with 7; and forwarding services and VoIP begin with 8.

Thus, any number beginning with +852, with the next digit 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9, with 7 digits after that, is a potentially valid number in Hong Kong.

(The plus sign means "insert your international access prefix here." From a GSM mobile phone, you can enter the number in full international format, starting with the plus sign. The most common prefix is 00, but North America (USA, Canada, etc.) uses 011, Japan uses 010, Australia uses 0011, and many other countries use different prefixes.)