By 
The longest pro-democracy campaign on Chinese soil - 75 days -- is over.Seven thousand Hong Kong police officers Thursday (Dec. 11th) swiftly dismantled over 100 tents, barricades and banners on the city's three major neighborhoods.
Many of Hong Kong's 7.2 million residents breathed a sigh of relief. The protest movement that gained worldwide attention for almost three months had run out of steam.
Two hundred protesters were arrested Thursday. They did not try to stop the police from tearing down the tents, homemade shields, toiletries, food supplies, umbrellas and barricades. Wearing protective chest shields, police used chain saws, hammers, knives and box cutters to clear the areas.
At the height of the protests in early September, October and November, an estimated 100,000 students and other protesters were involved. By Thursday, however, that number had dwindled to less than 500.
Most of those arrested were carried out lying horizontally on the pavement, face up, as police frog-marched them to a waiting jail wagon. No serious injuries were reported.
Among those arrested were opposition Democratic Party founder Martin Lee, student leader Nathan Law, media tycoon Jimmy Lai and singer Denise Ho. The students vowed they would continue their peaceful movement throughout 2015.
Critics of the protesters speculate the students had lost their battle with Beijing largely because they had no noticeable leader, only a handful of spokespersons.
China made no official comment after the dismantling action ended Thursday. World opinion previously had speculated Beijing would crush the student movement early in its campaign, using its military with tanks and live ammunition.
That's what Beijing did in June 1989 at Tiananmen Square in the center of the city. Protesters at that time gathered by the thousands to mourn the death of Hu Yaobang, the Communist Party's General Secretary and a liberal reformer who was forcefully deposed by the Beijing regime.
But the Communists allowed the Hong Kong protests to continue when they suddenly ended by an unexpected twist. A local bus company last week sued the students in a local Hong Kong court, alleging they were destroying its daily business by blocking roads and highways the buses used to pick up passengers.
The court agreed and quickly issued an injunction barring the students from further protests. With that injunction in hand and the posting of written notices on downtown area street poles, the police wasted no time in giving the students an additional three days verbal notice to clear their areas or face immediate arrest.
Hong Kong small businesses and retailers had also complained to police that the students' continued protests were disrupting their normal flow of business, already causing an estimated million dollars in lost revenue from customers who were blocked by the barricades from coming to their stores and offices.
The students' protests began Sept. 28 after Beijing announced Communist leaders would select the next chief executive for Hong Kong in 2017 instead of allowing Hong Kong voters to name their own candidates.
The protesters maintain this was a deceptive move by China, especially after that country took back Hong Kong from Great Britain in 1997, ending a 100-year land lease the United Kingdom had enjoyed. The protesters argue China at that time had agreed to certain autonomy for Hong Kong that included free elections.
Under a "one country, two systems" formula, Hong Kong has some autonomy from the Communist Party-ruled mainland and a promise of eventual universal suffrage. Beijing has allowed a vote in the next election, in 2017, but insists on screening candidates first.
Hong Kong's current chief executive, Leung Chun-ying is a Beijing choice.
