Alarmed by continuing protests, China has a new strategy for Hong Kong. It’s predictably authoritarian and entirely idiotic.

As reported by the Wall Street Journal, the plan centers on three tenets: more patriotic education, more surveillance of Hongkongers, and more control over the city’s political system. Each of those steps is in overt breach of the Sino-British declaration, and Beijing’s treaty commitment to respect Hong Kong’s political freedom until at least 2047. Beyond that observation, however, this strategy is just absurd.