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Under the U.S.-Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992, Washington treats Hong Kong as a separate region from mainland China even after the former British colony transferred to Chinese rule in 1997. That includes treating Hong Kong as a separate customs territory.

Therefore, Hong Kong exports to the U.S. are not subject to the tariffs that the Trump administration has imposed on goods from mainland China.

“I don’t think they would directly withdraw that relationship unless China went in with armed force either through the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) or through the People’s Armed Police,” Daly said at the Morgan Stanley Asia Pacific Summit.

The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act still has to be reconciled and signed into the law by the U.S. president — a process that could be “slow walked,” said Daly.

Regarding the PLA’s clean-up activity on the streets of Hong Kong last week, Daly said that was an “interim step” that Beijing was taking to get people used to seeing the PLA on the streets of Hong Kong “although seeing them in a relatively benign light of young men and women clearing bricks.”

“This is also signalling to the people of China to see the People’s Liberation Army out there as virtuous, as constructive as opposed to the chaos and the protesters in Hong Kong itself,” said Daly.

Aside from the political signalling within China, it would also be an “interim step to further involvement of either the People’s Armed Police or PLA,” said Daly.

Both Beijing and Hong Kong are “scrambling” over what to do about the situation in the city, said Ben Bland, director at Australian think tank Lowy Institute.

“No one really expected we would see this level of defiance, of violence, but also of unity from the supporters of democracy in Hong Kong,” he said. “I think it has caught the Hong Kong government off-guard. It has caught Beijing off-guard. It has caught the rest of the world off-guard.”

But expect more Beijing oversight in Hong Kong, said Bland.

“The one thing that we can expect and which they have indicated is that they are going to be squeezing Hong Kong harder on so many fronts more prosecutions, more assertive action from the police, and in fact more direct control over Hong Kong from the authorities in Beijing,” Bland said.

On Tuesday, Beijing said Hong Kong courts have no power to rule on the constitutionality of legislation under the city’s Basic Law.

That came just a day after the special administrative region’s High Court ruled that a ban on the wearing of face masks during public demonstrations was unconstitutional.

“I think they want a Hong Kong that’s loyal and quiet and does what it’s told and as to how they get there that depends on how Hong Kongers react and so far they’ve really been digging their heels in,” Bland said.