There is no need for such provocative and ugly looking scenes.
What HK police need are some of the more interesting anti-riot gear we have been seeing at Chinese police exhibits for years.
These protests seems like the perfect use for the sonic and microwave crowd dispersion kit Chinese manufacturers have been advertising.
Set the microwaves emitters to shoot a foot and a half above the ground, and put a sign saying ‘get on the ground if you want the pain to stop’ and then arrest the lot.
HK police should also get some of those laser rifles from the Chinese. If a protest shoots lasers at the eyes of policemen, they can get a taste of their own medicine right back at them.
Shotgun taser rounds should also be deployed en mass; and they can also use drone crop dusters to spray the ID dyes used in bank note ink bombs so that even if some protestors get away, they would be easy to spot and arrest later.
If mainland PAP do get involved, it won’t be another Tiananmen like western commentators are all but explicitly hoping for; but rather they would come in with crowd control non-lethal weapons, like the ones mentioned above and much more; but more importantly, they would come in with sufficiently numbers to corner and nab every single protestor.
If the PAP does come in, I would expect the extradition bill to get rammed through and made law, and all the arrested protestors will get sent straight to mainland prisons; where I am sure their fellow inmates will make them feel extremely welcome.
Back in 89, China had no effective non-lethal crowd control and dispersal equipment and tactics, today I would say Chinese mainland police are one of, if not the best equipped and trained forces in the world to effectively deal with massed protests in non-lethal means.
Ironically, in this day and age, a Tiananmen style event is far more likely in America, where the police is equipped and trained like an occupational army rather than law enforcement.
But as always, the western MSM only reports on dated stereotypes and semi-racist political slogans instead of up to date facts.