Here is something different, based on an online novella that was removed last year. If you read one of my turns in
Trapped In Time: A Brave New World, you know which one I'm speaking of.
In the novella, China historically practiced cannibalism (specifically, the consumption of selected 17-year-old girls) as part of their culinary culture, a relic passed down from Qin Shihuang.
The author painted a rosy picture of PRC-era China, but realistically? Disregarding butterflies, once colonialism kicked in, Qing-era China is on a path of no return. I'm killing butterflies by allowing an alt-WW1 and WW2 to exist, but that's it.
This is what I came up with so far:
Free City of Dairen (
大連自由市, Japanese occupation, Soviet free port post-WW2)
Commonwealth of Weihaiwei (
威海衛聯邦, former British protectorate)
Republic of Kiautschou (
膠洲共和國, former German concession, neo-Nazi reactionary due to a stab in the back betrayal by West Germany in the 1960s)
Kingnan Free State (
荊南自由邦, fully democratic state, wedged between Communist north and Nationalist south)
Bouxchuengh People's Republic (
佈僮人民共和國, Guangxi without the more developed parts. Nationalist and hates Han Chinese for giving a bad name to China)
NANCHANG PACT MEMBERS BELOW (
南昌協約, everyone dislikes each other, but they hate the Russians and Americans more. Part of the Non-Aligned Movement)
International Republic of Zånhae (
上海國際共和國, alt-Shanghai International Settlement that expanded to all territories that use the Lake Taihu Wu language)
Chinese Union State (
中華合眾國, nominally democratic but otherwise Fascist. Hates everyone for the partition of China)
Republic of Formosa (
福爾摩沙共和國, Taiwan, but more hostile. Also controls Xiamen/Amoy)
Commonwealth of Canton (
廣府聯邦, flawed Parliamentary Democracy, combination of former British Colony (Pearl River Delta) and British Protectorate (northern Guangdong and Nanning Panhandle))
Cantonese State of Heongsan (
香山廣府國, former Portuguese Colony that evolved from Macau; Heongsan is the old name of Zhongshan)
Socialist Republic of Kwangchowwan (
廣州灣社會主義共和國, former French Colony, and went Communist like the rest of Indochina. For some reason the French hacked Móng Cái off Vietnam and attached it to Kwangchowwan.)
And yes, the PRC would exist, but it would be a developing backwater state that is seeking to suppress its past.