HÉROES: esta gente merece todo nuestro apoyo.

Doubts about the ardor of Hong Kong's residents for greater freedoms may have been settled Thursday on a stiflingly hot and muggy day as at least 400,000 people marched quietly from a sports park to central government offices, starting at 2:30 p.m. and continuing well past dark.

The stunning turnout on the first anniversary of Hong Kong's "people power" movement destroyed key assumptions held in official circles that last year's epochal march of 500,000 of was due only to frustration over the handling of the SARS epidemic and a bad economy. Thursday's turnout of grandmothers, young parents, punk-rockers, and stockbrokers was twice the size organizers had predicted. And it took place in spite of - or because of - China's campaign this spring to nullify the calls for voting rights expressed by prodemocracy factions. The march ensures that Hong Kong will continue to be a thorn for Beijing.

Moreover, while Hong Kong people are famously nonconfrontational, many marchers expressed firmly that they want direct elections in 2007, even though Chinese officials ruled against this in April.

La verdad es que, conociendo la ciudad en la época en la que Chris Patten era el gobernador británico -no he vuelto desde el traspaso de soberanía a China- me costó hacerme a la idea de que los ciudadanos de Hong Kong aceptaran plácidamente lo que no puede evitarse ver como el punto más negro de Margaret Thatcher.

ACTUALIZACIÓN: Menos mal que las cosas han cambiado:

HONG KONG - The United States is planning a massive show of force in the Pacific Ocean near China to register a point with Beijing.

In an exercise codenamed Operation Summer Pulse 04, it is expected to arrange for an unprecedented seven aircraft carrier strike groups (CSGs) to rendezvous in waters a safe distance away from the Chinese coastline - but still within striking distance - after mid-July.

This will be the first time in US naval history that it sends seven of its 12 CSGs to just one region.

According to a Department of Defence statement, Summer Pulse is to test out a new Fleet Response Plan (FRP) aimed at enhancing the American Navy's combat power and readiness in a time of crisis.

[...] Sources in Beijing say China's reading is that Summer Pulse is being mounted with it as the target audience, a suspicion reinforced by reports that Taiwanese forces are slated to join in the drill.

Clearly, given Beijing's repeated warning that it will use force, as a last resort and whatever the cost, to stop Taiwanese independence, the US feels it needs to send Beijing a message.

From past deployment patterns, the US usually despatches one CSG to a trouble spot as a reminder of its presence.

It did so several times in the past when tension was high in the Taiwan Strait.

It sends two to indicate serious concern, as was the case when China test-fired missiles over the strait in 1996.

In a combat situation, it deploys three to four, which was what it did in the Gulf War in the early 1990s and the recent Iraqi war.

But never before has it sent in peace time seven CSGs to the same theatre.

The implications for China are grave.