What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

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Hendryk
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What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#1

Post by Hendryk » 02 Mar 2016, 14:38

In OTL, after the founding of the Republic of China, the country quickly devolved into warlordism and civil war. But what if a stable neo-imperial regime had taken over in 1912, preserving national unity and continuing the industrial and military modernization of China?

Such is the basis for the alternate history book With Iron and Fire.

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#2

Post by Futurist » 06 Apr 2016, 22:34

Hendryk wrote:In OTL, after the founding of the Republic of China, the country quickly devolved into warlordism and civil war. But what if a stable neo-imperial regime had taken over in 1912, preserving national unity and continuing the industrial and military modernization of China?

Such is the basis for the alternate history book With Iron and Fire.

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Couldn't another good way to accomplish this be to have Cixi refuse to poison the Guangxu Emperor shortly before her own death in late 1908?


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Hendryk
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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#3

Post by Hendryk » 27 Jun 2016, 17:53

Futurist wrote: Couldn't another good way to accomplish this be to have Cixi refuse to poison the Guangxu Emperor shortly before her own death in late 1908?
That might have been another possibility, but by then the Qing Dynasty was moribund. In my personal assessment the last chance to save it was 1898; after that it was on borrowed time. So instead I allowed it to collapse on schedule, and introduced the POD shortly afterwards to allow for a clean break.

One change that may be of interest to the members of this board is that with China's committed alignment with the Entente, the Sino-German cooperation of the 1920s and 1930s is preempted, and instead Germany and Japan send each other feelers much earlier. One result is that Germany sends the Raven Legion, an analog to the Condor Legion, to fight alongside Japan on the Chinese theater...

Incidentally, I am now working on the second volume of the TL. Here is an interview where I go into some detail about the genesis of the TL.

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#4

Post by thaddeus_c » 29 Jun 2016, 13:06

Hendryk wrote:One change that may be of interest to the members of this board is that with China's committed alignment with the Entente, the Sino-German cooperation of the 1920s and 1930s is preempted, and instead Germany and Japan send each other feelers much earlier. One result is that Germany sends the Raven Legion, an analog to the Condor Legion, to fight alongside Japan on the Chinese theater...
that is interesting, of course very possible, but Germany never had a satisfactory economic relationship with Japan, in fact the opposite (with German concessions wiped out along with other Western countries during invasion? IIRC) and it wasn't the case after 1933 that Germany didn't want better relations but Japan was the wary party? (prior to German military success.)

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#5

Post by Hendryk » 30 Jun 2016, 16:08

thaddeus_c wrote:that is interesting, of course very possible, but Germany never had a satisfactory economic relationship with Japan, in fact the opposite (with German concessions wiped out along with other Western countries during invasion? IIRC) and it wasn't the case after 1933 that Germany didn't want better relations but Japan was the wary party? (prior to German military success.)
About the concessions, Germany lost the Jiaozhou/Kiautschou Leased Territory to Japan in 1914 and its enclaves in Tianjin and Hankou to China in 1917 (in WIAF all German concessions on Chinese territory are reclaimed by China in 1914). But I quite agree with your broader point that German-Japanese cooperation wasn't as close as it could have been. The book has a chapter ("The Sun and the Mirror", a reference not to British tabloids but to Shinto mythology :milwink: ) about Japan and how the changes in China cause butterflies in its politics and economy. For starters, with Vickers focused on the Chinese market, Siemens doesn't face competition for procurements to the Imperial Japanese Navy; there is no Siemens Scandal in 1914.

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#6

Post by thaddeus_c » 01 Jul 2016, 13:55

Hendryk wrote:
thaddeus_c wrote:that is interesting, of course very possible, but Germany never had a satisfactory economic relationship with Japan, in fact the opposite (with German concessions wiped out along with other Western countries during invasion? IIRC) and it wasn't the case after 1933 that Germany didn't want better relations but Japan was the wary party? (prior to German military success.)
About the concessions, Germany lost the Jiaozhou/Kiautschou Leased Territory to Japan in 1914 and its enclaves in Tianjin and Hankou to China in 1917 (in WIAF all German concessions on Chinese territory are reclaimed by China in 1914). But I quite agree with your broader point that German-Japanese cooperation wasn't as close as it could have been. The book has a chapter ("The Sun and the Mirror", a reference not to British tabloids but to Shinto mythology :milwink: ) about Japan and how the changes in China cause butterflies in its politics and economy. For starters, with Vickers focused on the Chinese market, Siemens doesn't face competition for procurements to the Imperial Japanese Navy; there is no Siemens Scandal in 1914.
was not referring to WWI loss of colonies by Germany but rather the loss of German business interests after 1937 invasion of China proper.

while closer German-Japanese cooperation is very interesting, and one would think logical, there was never any real effort made towards that and there is also geographic problem, made worse by USSR hostile to both.

if China is resurgent, Japan and USSR would have more reason to work together (Soviets always wanted divided weak China in my understanding.)

what could could happen, that somewhat tracks historical events, is that USSR supplies both German and Japan and allows easy transit for them to fight China and Allies.

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#7

Post by Futurist » 02 Jul 2016, 09:10

Hendryk wrote:
Futurist wrote: Couldn't another good way to accomplish this be to have Cixi refuse to poison the Guangxu Emperor shortly before her own death in late 1908?
That might have been another possibility, but by then the Qing Dynasty was moribund. In my personal assessment the last chance to save it was 1898; after that it was on borrowed time.
What about having Cixi die sometime before 1898, though?

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#8

Post by Cantankerous » 24 Jan 2024, 00:11

In a speech given in 1939, Chiang Kai-shek blamed the collapse of the Qing Dynasty on the fact that the Qing Dynasty itself was founded by a non-Han Chinese group, the Manchus. Had China under Chiang become a regional power again in the 1930s, it might have seized control of Hong Kong and Macao because the Chinese today know that the British unjustly seized Hong Kong in the 1839-1842 Opium Wars because they angered Chinese viceroy Lin Zexu by illegally exporting opium from India to China despite the fact that Chinese law made opium imports taboo. Chiang might have somewhat distracted the Japanese a bit from military aggression in mainland China by taking back Taiwan.

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Re: What if China had become a regional power again in the 1930s?

#9

Post by Terry Duncan » 26 Jan 2024, 08:30

Thread necromancy, topic locked.

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