Industrial Sung China

I remember hearing someone on the old board mention that the Sung Dynasty of China was close to an industrial revolution, before the Mongols came along. Any way we could get an actual IR going in China at that time? If so, what're the consequences? If the Mongols still manage to conquer the Sung (who were the most difficult state to conquer for the Mongols), you could see the general dissimination of the technology across the entire Eurasian landmass...

Well, lets let the Subg conquer the Chin 50 years earlier (someone else make up the details) then we have a strong 10 million men Chinese infantary (cannon fodder) reserve to stop the horde. Let the revolution begin!

Interesting idea about the Mongols disseminating Chinese industrial gizmos across their entire empire (and, via trade, I imagine they'd get to the Mamelukes, Byzantines, etc fast). However, the Mongols would have to hit the Sung in the earliest stages of the actual industrialization process--otherwise, with artillery, pneumatic machine-guns, etc from a more-advanced industrial base, the Mongols will likely get exterminated.

Matt Quinn said:

Interesting idea about the Mongols disseminating Chinese industrial gizmos across their entire empire (and, via trade, I imagine they'd get to the Mamelukes, Byzantines, etc fast). However, the Mongols would have to hit the Sung in the earliest stages of the actual industrialization process--otherwise, with artillery, pneumatic machine-guns, etc from a more-advanced industrial base, the Mongols will likely get exterminated.

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Unless the Mongols manage to get their hands on such technology themselves. We could have the Sung invent some technology and have it disseminate to the northern kingdoms, which were weaker and could be more easily conquered by the mongols. Now much of the Sung technological edge is lost...

Peter said:

Well, lets let the Subq conquer the Chin 50 years earlier (someone else make up the details) then we have a strong 10 million men Chinese infantary (cannon fodder) reserve to stop the horde. Let the revolution begin!

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Sorry, I of course meant Sung, not Subq.

It was probably me who mentioned it. I didn't say they were necessarily "close to an industrial revolution" - but they did have extensive coal mining and metal smelting operations, and in a couple of centuries they might have got a railway going or something, who knows. But the Mongols swept through this region and destroyed its economy. So even once the overall economy of China recovered under the Ming dynasty, they no longer had a well developed coal-mining region. This put in place a big barrier to developing steam power.