Holy moley,
@LeinadB93 lives! Welcome back
Awesome list of Dominion leaders there, looking forward to hopefully reading their entries when they're ready.
Damn, beat me to it! Good to see you back Lei
Thanks
It's good to be back. Unfortunately the return to the new school term has been a lot more hectic than usual! So this is the first free chance I've had to contribute again to this series.
But here's
China for you all to enjoy
The
Federal Republic of China, also known as the
United Republic of China, the
Fourth Chinese Republic, or simply the
Chinese Republic, is a sovereign state located in East Asia, bounded by the Yellow Sea and East China Sea to the east, and the world’s second-largest county, and the largest republic, by population. The fourth-largest country by area, with a combined area of 4.4 million square kilometres, China shares land borders with the Empire of Manchuria to the northeast, the Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics to the north and northwest, the State of Tibet to the the west, and the Union of Burma, the Kingdom of Laos, and the Socialist Republic of Tonkin to the south. China also claims numerous islands and maritime territories in the South China Sea, which are currently disputed between China, Sulu, Cochinchina, Sarawak, Malaya and Brunei. China also shares borders with the People’s Republic of Hainan, and the city-states of Hong Kong, Macau and Kouang-Tchéou-Wan along the country's southern coast.
Chinese civilisation emerged as early as the 21st century BCE with the semi-legendary Xia dynasty, with the Yellow River and Yangtze River valleys commonly held to be the cradle of Chinese civilisation. For millennia, China's political system was based on hereditary monarchies, or dynasties, and the country has expanded, fractured, and re-unified numerous times. The earliest known written records of Chinese history date from 1250 BCE, during the Shang dynasty who ruled in the Yellow River valley. In the 3rd century BCE, the Qin unified core China after conquering the various warring states and established the first Chinese empire, as well as constructing the first sections of the Great Wall. The short lived dynasty was supplanted by the Han dynasty, which ruled from 206 BC until 220 AD, following a widespread civil war. The Han established the first Chinese bureaucratic systems, and expanded the empire's territory considerably, with campaigns reaching as far as Central Asia, Mongolia and Yunnan. The Han period also saw the establishment of the Silk Road between the Han territories and Mesopotamia, and China gradually became the largest economy of the ancient world, whilst Chinese culture and technology experienced unprecedented advancement.
For nearly 21 centuries, Chinese history has alternated between periods of unity and peace, and periods of war and failed statehood, with numerous dynasties rising and falling prior to the 17th century CE when the Manchu Qing dynasty overthrew the Ming dynasty in 1644. The Qing multi-cultural empire lasted for almost three centuries, and was the fourth largest empire in history, but reached its peak in the late 18th century under the Qianlong Emperor, before beginning to decline in prosperity and imperial control. Following the Opium Wars, foreign powers imposed "unequal treaties", and the creation of extraterritorial treaty ports under foreign control such as Hong Kong and Macau. The 1861 Tongzhi Restoration began a decade long process of restoring practical imperial rule to China under the Tongzhi Emperor, whilst restoring practical abilities and consolidating the political system under the Emperor. The Restoration initiated a period of fiscal and administrative reform, and an extensive period of modernisation and industrialisation throughout China. The stalemate in the War of Jiawu against Japan over influence in Korea further strengthened China's domestic situation with the rise to prominence of revolutionaries in opposition to the foreign powers. The death of the Guangxu Emperor in 1908 alienated the hardline Manchu court from reformers and Han Chinese elite by obstructing continued reform.
In 1912, the Qing dynasty was overthrown in the Xinhai Revolution which established the First Chinese Republic whilst the reigning Xuantong Emperor went into exile in Manchuria, establishing the Empire of Manchuria, and Tibet, Mongolia, Taiwan and Tuva broke away from central control. Between 1912 and 1927, China was again wracked by internal instability as various warlords vied for control of the fractured nation, a period known as the Second Chinese Republic. The economic and political turmoil gave rise to the fascist and militarist Kuomintang who seized power over the entire country in 1927, with the establishment of the Third Chinese Republic, officially known as the
National Republic of China, but more commonly known as
Kuomintang China, following the Northern Expedition led by Chiang Kai-shek. Close relations with Nazi Germany, led to China's membership in the Axis alliance and after several large-scale military successes during the Chinese Wars of Expansion, China had annexed much of the territory lost after the fall of the Qing, namely Tibet, Manchuria, Taiwan, Mongolia and Tuva. The outbreak of the the Second World War in 1939 allowed China to occupy French Indochina, Korea and parts of the Russian Far East and Japan. However the most disastrous blow to the Allies came in 1942, when Chinese forces overran the Allied defences in the Philippines, Burma, Northeast India and Malaya effectively handing the entire Indochinese peninsula to Axis control At the height of its power in 1942, the National Republic of China ruled over a land area spanning 15,700,000 square kilometres (6,063,000 sq mi), making it one of the largest empires in history.
Fortunately the progress of Chinese forces was stalled at Singapore where a British Commonwealth force prevented the fall of the city, enabling parts of the British and the Dutch East Indies to avoid occupation. The Siege of Singapore lasted from 1942 to 1945 and prevented the planned invasions of Sumatra, Java and the Lesser Sunda Islands, as well as blunting the Chinese advanced across the rest of Southeast Asia, ultimately sparing Australia from invasion, although Chinese troops took Borneo, Sulawesi and much of New Guinea. Throughout the conflict China gained notoriety for its war crimes against the peoples of the countries it conquered, most notoriously on the Burma Railway where more than 100,000 civilians and prisoners of war were killed, and in Manchuria where China attempted to exterminate the Manchu people. Despite suffering many defeats and faced with the invasion and firebombing of the mainland, China refused to surrender until the atomic bombings of Shanghai and Tianjin in January 1946, which killed Chiang Kai-shek and the majority of the Chinese government. China would surrender on 2 February 1946, and the country was subjected to an occupation under five zones governed by each of the principal Allied Powers.
Increasing tensions between the Chinese democrats and communists, each backed by opposing sides in the nascent Cold War, would continue to escalate in the immediate post-war years despite an ill-defined and tenuous truce. Clashes between the two opposing forces began in March 1946, shortly after the Chinese surrender, and would escalate to open, if undeclared war, following the signing of the new Chinese Constitution on 2 October 1947. The subsequent civil war would engulf much of China and East Asia in a devastating conflict between democrats and communists that only ended in 1952 with the signing of the Paris Peace Accords and the relocation of Chinese and Korean communists to Soviet-annexed territories, the recognition of numerous border and territory changes, and resulted in nearly 10 million civilian and military casualties across the region. However, the “
Hainan Question” over the
de facto independence of the Communist government on the island Hainan remains an unresolved issue into the 21st century. China's new constitution came into effect on 27 July 1953, with the entering into force of the Treaty of Kyoto, which ended the Allied occupation and officially dissolved Kuomintang China and established the Federal Republic under a semi-presidential system.
Economic growth throughout the late 20th century has led to China's economy being one of the world's fastest-growing with high annual growth rates, and the country is currently the world's second-largest economy by nominal GDP and purchasing power parity (PPP). China conducted it's first nuclear test in 1972, a year after it gained a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, and has been one of the two non-NPT recognised nuclear powers ever since. Despite historically close relations with the United Empire, and cordial ones with Japan and India, since the end of the Cold War the country has re-positioned itself as a close ally to Moscow as part of the Sino-Soviet Alliance and the Collective Security Treaty Organisation. Today China is a nuclear weapon state and a recognised great power within Asia, with the world's largest army and second-largest defence budget China is recognised as a potential future superpower.
