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Sweet Wormwood
Sweet Wormwood: Shun China (1942-1945)
The Sino-Japanese War (or as some might call it, the Second War of the East China Sea), had formally ended with the formal surrender of General Okamura Bakin and the remnants of the Japanese High Command on May 14, 1942, but this didn’t mean that resistance to the Chinese had ended as fanatical units continued to fight on for most of 1942 and 1943, devolving into banditry as time passed on and the Chinese marched into Northern Japan. However, while the Nagaist insurgency was a nuisance to the Chinese and the new Republic of Japan which had been established, it was the least of the worries of Imperial General Headquarters, which discussed the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War on October 2, 1942 in a secret HQ. What Imperial General Headquarters largely discussed on that fateful day were the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War and also how to deal with the threat of the Unified Indian State. The major lessons of the Sino-Japanese War were a major point of discussion amongst the factions in the Chinese General Staff. Even against the weakened Japanese Army, the Chinese landings were haphazard affairs with the Chinese forces largely without fire support and landing on small boats and the Chinese high command knew that such landings would be bloodbaths against a well-prepared Indian beach defense. In order to rectify this, the Chinese High Command decided that specialized landing craft would be designed to ferry infantry and vehicles directly to the beaches to provide speedy transportation of military equipment towards the beaches. In addition, High Command decided, based on the lessons of the landings on Japan, that the landing forces needed greater naval and air support as well, which required more coordination between the three branches of the Chinese military. With this, a new Chinese naval strategy took shape where amphibious landings would play a larger role in military thought.
In addition to this, the Chinese High Command discussed the menace of the Unified Indian State, which many Chinese thinkers had viewed as the biggest threat to China’s power and the biggest obstacle to China gaining what they saw as they saw as China’s rightful place as the master of Asia. Indian interferance in China’s sphere of influence in Southeast Asia had been a nuisance to the Shun Dynasty with Aceh and Burma falling to Unitarianism and with the Indians taking French Indochina and Malaya during their attack on France. However, the threat of Nagai’s Japan had led to China being unable to do anything about the Indian threat. Now, with the Japanese threat gone, the Shun Dynasty was now able to confront the Indian menace directly. China’s military discussed methods of containing the Indian menace and while some factions in Imperial General Headquarters called for a pre-emptive strike against the Unified Indian State, arguing that the UIS’ over-extended nature with them being tied up in the Middle East would make them easy pickings for a Chinese invasion, Marshal Sun Xinyi, the “Old Man of the Army” called for a more cautious approach, building up China’s military strength until the time is ripe for a Chinese attack while covertly supporting nationalist rebels in Indochina and Malaya. This was the course of action decided by Imperial General Headquarters, to build up the Chinese military and wait for the right time to strike. While General Meng Guanting, who was one of the main proponents for a strike against India, was initially disappointed by this decision, he eventually accepted said decision.
General Meng Guanting, main proponent of a pre-emptive Chinese attack on India
After this meeting, the Chinese armed forces set about a program of strengthening the Chinese military and applying the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War. Imperial General Headquarters during this time also introduced modifications to Sun Xinyi’s doctrine, which now had more emphasis on initiative by junior officers, who were now trained to function at two levels of command above their station in the army. This also had a practical effect as it meant that, with the cutdowns in size of the Chinese army brought about by the end of the Sino-Japanese War leading to demobilization of the army, the professional soldiers that the Chinese army had after the war would be ready to lead Chinese troops into battle in case of a war with the Unified Indian State. Also, the Chinese military during this time conducted exercises on remote Pacific islands that Lusang nominally possessed on how to iron out problems with the new methods the Chinese military was developing with it’s amphibious landing doctrine, developed from the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War and Operation Shenfang.
Chinese soldiers practicing amphibious warfare in a military exercise
In terms of military equipment, the Shun military took from the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War, where the shortcomings of Opustil suspension were laid bare during the Japanese campaign and the Overlord landship’s torsion bar suspension, despite the landship’s flaws, was deemed by General Zhang Gan, who was the head of the Chinese Landship Corps. The Chinese army in early 1943 tested out the Fast Overlord, a modification of the Overlord landship which combined the armor of the Overlord with the speed of the Battlemaster and the Improved Battlemaster, which was an improvement on the basic Battlemaster design which featured a larger turret with a three-man crew, radios for all landships, and torsion bar suspension. After a few months of testing, the “Improved Battlemaster” won out and mass production on the Improved Battlemaster began in earnest on September 1943. The Improved Battlemaster would be the workhorse of the Chinese army for the rest of the 1940s and into the early 1950s. The Fast Overlord would be used as the basis for a new series of heavy landships, the Emperor.
The Improved Battlemaster, which would be the Chinese army’s main landship for a long time.
The Chinese navy also developed new weaponry during this time. The lessons of the Japanese War had revealed that the carriers of the Chinese navy needed fast escorts to provide AA support and prevent them from being ambushed and sunk. The Chinese navy decided to provide this by building 5 battlecruisers using elongated versions of the hull of the 6 Liu Bei-class carriers. Said battlecruisers were the Fujian-class and were amongst the fastest capital ships on the planet when they were built in 1944. In addition, the Chinese navy had all Magentas built pre-1925 scrapped during this time as well except for the Shaanxi-class, which were modernized as a stopgap until the Fujian-class and the Guangdong-class, which would be the largest Magentas of all time, were ready for service. If all went according to the navy’s plans, the Chinese navy, by the time that Plan X would be completed in 1950, would have 15 aircraft carriers (the 6 Liu Bei-class carriers, the 4 Li Zicheng-class carriers, 2 Kublai Khan-class carriers, and the 3 Zhou Yu-class carriers) and 14 Magentas (the 5 Fujian-class, 3 Guangdong-class, 2 Shaanxi-class, and 4 Liaoning-class, all of which, with the exception of the 2 Shaanxi-class Magentas, would have 18.1 inch guns), making Shun China one of the main naval powers in the world, able to face down the Unified Indian State’s naval forces in battle. In this, the Chinese navy also didn’t neglect it’s submarine force with the Chinese navy, under Admiral Jia Ping, designing the world’s biggest submarine, the S-300, an “underwater aircraft carrier”able to circumnavigate the world non-stop and launch 3 seaplanes. Under Plan X, the Chinese navy would build 15 of these “submarine carriers”. Plan X’s goal was to turn the Shun Empire into a naval force to be reckoned with and a titan on the high seas.
A drawing of the Liaoning-class Magenta.
An image of the S-300 submarine carriers
On the domestic front, the Shun Empire wasn’t exactly silent as the first post-war elections in China saw the Progressive Union Party consolidate it’s role as the “natural party of government” as it won 322 seats in the Legislative Yuan with Yang Long entering his third and final term as Chancellor of China. Future historians would consider Yang Long to be one of China’s greatest leaders with his daughter Yang Xiao Long becoming a prominent politician in the late 20th century as well. During Yang Long’s third term, internal development became a major concern for the Chinese government with large-scale infrastructure projects to open up Xiboliya to development, with Xiboliya’s natural resources deemed vital for China to attain self-sufficiency. Also, during this time, the Chinese military cooperated with Douhang for soybean oil-based fuels to be used by the Chinese military in a measure to make China self-sufficient in terms of fuel. In addition, Yang Long’s government passed a measure to give Xiboliya and Mongolia representation in the Legislative Yuan, enlarging the Legislative Yuan to 700 seats. In terms of foreign policy, the government of Yang Long pursued a stance of forming friendly relations with both Germania and France during this period but avoiding any hostilities with the Unitarians out of a desire to build up China’s strength for the inevitable clash. However, the Chinese Jinyiwei started covertly backing nationalist rebel groups in Indian-occupied Cambodia and Malaya with arms and money smuggled via Dai Viet and Ayutthaya. By 1945, Shun China was now stronger than ever and after dealing with the threat of the Union of Japan, the Chinese, in case of a war with India, would be able to deal with the Indians with all their strength.
The Sino-Japanese War (or as some might call it, the Second War of the East China Sea), had formally ended with the formal surrender of General Okamura Bakin and the remnants of the Japanese High Command on May 14, 1942, but this didn’t mean that resistance to the Chinese had ended as fanatical units continued to fight on for most of 1942 and 1943, devolving into banditry as time passed on and the Chinese marched into Northern Japan. However, while the Nagaist insurgency was a nuisance to the Chinese and the new Republic of Japan which had been established, it was the least of the worries of Imperial General Headquarters, which discussed the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War on October 2, 1942 in a secret HQ. What Imperial General Headquarters largely discussed on that fateful day were the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War and also how to deal with the threat of the Unified Indian State. The major lessons of the Sino-Japanese War were a major point of discussion amongst the factions in the Chinese General Staff. Even against the weakened Japanese Army, the Chinese landings were haphazard affairs with the Chinese forces largely without fire support and landing on small boats and the Chinese high command knew that such landings would be bloodbaths against a well-prepared Indian beach defense. In order to rectify this, the Chinese High Command decided that specialized landing craft would be designed to ferry infantry and vehicles directly to the beaches to provide speedy transportation of military equipment towards the beaches. In addition, High Command decided, based on the lessons of the landings on Japan, that the landing forces needed greater naval and air support as well, which required more coordination between the three branches of the Chinese military. With this, a new Chinese naval strategy took shape where amphibious landings would play a larger role in military thought.
In addition to this, the Chinese High Command discussed the menace of the Unified Indian State, which many Chinese thinkers had viewed as the biggest threat to China’s power and the biggest obstacle to China gaining what they saw as they saw as China’s rightful place as the master of Asia. Indian interferance in China’s sphere of influence in Southeast Asia had been a nuisance to the Shun Dynasty with Aceh and Burma falling to Unitarianism and with the Indians taking French Indochina and Malaya during their attack on France. However, the threat of Nagai’s Japan had led to China being unable to do anything about the Indian threat. Now, with the Japanese threat gone, the Shun Dynasty was now able to confront the Indian menace directly. China’s military discussed methods of containing the Indian menace and while some factions in Imperial General Headquarters called for a pre-emptive strike against the Unified Indian State, arguing that the UIS’ over-extended nature with them being tied up in the Middle East would make them easy pickings for a Chinese invasion, Marshal Sun Xinyi, the “Old Man of the Army” called for a more cautious approach, building up China’s military strength until the time is ripe for a Chinese attack while covertly supporting nationalist rebels in Indochina and Malaya. This was the course of action decided by Imperial General Headquarters, to build up the Chinese military and wait for the right time to strike. While General Meng Guanting, who was one of the main proponents for a strike against India, was initially disappointed by this decision, he eventually accepted said decision.
General Meng Guanting, main proponent of a pre-emptive Chinese attack on India
After this meeting, the Chinese armed forces set about a program of strengthening the Chinese military and applying the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War. Imperial General Headquarters during this time also introduced modifications to Sun Xinyi’s doctrine, which now had more emphasis on initiative by junior officers, who were now trained to function at two levels of command above their station in the army. This also had a practical effect as it meant that, with the cutdowns in size of the Chinese army brought about by the end of the Sino-Japanese War leading to demobilization of the army, the professional soldiers that the Chinese army had after the war would be ready to lead Chinese troops into battle in case of a war with the Unified Indian State. Also, the Chinese military during this time conducted exercises on remote Pacific islands that Lusang nominally possessed on how to iron out problems with the new methods the Chinese military was developing with it’s amphibious landing doctrine, developed from the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War and Operation Shenfang.
Chinese soldiers practicing amphibious warfare in a military exercise
In terms of military equipment, the Shun military took from the lessons of the Sino-Japanese War, where the shortcomings of Opustil suspension were laid bare during the Japanese campaign and the Overlord landship’s torsion bar suspension, despite the landship’s flaws, was deemed by General Zhang Gan, who was the head of the Chinese Landship Corps. The Chinese army in early 1943 tested out the Fast Overlord, a modification of the Overlord landship which combined the armor of the Overlord with the speed of the Battlemaster and the Improved Battlemaster, which was an improvement on the basic Battlemaster design which featured a larger turret with a three-man crew, radios for all landships, and torsion bar suspension. After a few months of testing, the “Improved Battlemaster” won out and mass production on the Improved Battlemaster began in earnest on September 1943. The Improved Battlemaster would be the workhorse of the Chinese army for the rest of the 1940s and into the early 1950s. The Fast Overlord would be used as the basis for a new series of heavy landships, the Emperor.
The Improved Battlemaster, which would be the Chinese army’s main landship for a long time.
The Chinese navy also developed new weaponry during this time. The lessons of the Japanese War had revealed that the carriers of the Chinese navy needed fast escorts to provide AA support and prevent them from being ambushed and sunk. The Chinese navy decided to provide this by building 5 battlecruisers using elongated versions of the hull of the 6 Liu Bei-class carriers. Said battlecruisers were the Fujian-class and were amongst the fastest capital ships on the planet when they were built in 1944. In addition, the Chinese navy had all Magentas built pre-1925 scrapped during this time as well except for the Shaanxi-class, which were modernized as a stopgap until the Fujian-class and the Guangdong-class, which would be the largest Magentas of all time, were ready for service. If all went according to the navy’s plans, the Chinese navy, by the time that Plan X would be completed in 1950, would have 15 aircraft carriers (the 6 Liu Bei-class carriers, the 4 Li Zicheng-class carriers, 2 Kublai Khan-class carriers, and the 3 Zhou Yu-class carriers) and 14 Magentas (the 5 Fujian-class, 3 Guangdong-class, 2 Shaanxi-class, and 4 Liaoning-class, all of which, with the exception of the 2 Shaanxi-class Magentas, would have 18.1 inch guns), making Shun China one of the main naval powers in the world, able to face down the Unified Indian State’s naval forces in battle. In this, the Chinese navy also didn’t neglect it’s submarine force with the Chinese navy, under Admiral Jia Ping, designing the world’s biggest submarine, the S-300, an “underwater aircraft carrier”able to circumnavigate the world non-stop and launch 3 seaplanes. Under Plan X, the Chinese navy would build 15 of these “submarine carriers”. Plan X’s goal was to turn the Shun Empire into a naval force to be reckoned with and a titan on the high seas.
A drawing of the Liaoning-class Magenta.
An image of the S-300 submarine carriers
On the domestic front, the Shun Empire wasn’t exactly silent as the first post-war elections in China saw the Progressive Union Party consolidate it’s role as the “natural party of government” as it won 322 seats in the Legislative Yuan with Yang Long entering his third and final term as Chancellor of China. Future historians would consider Yang Long to be one of China’s greatest leaders with his daughter Yang Xiao Long becoming a prominent politician in the late 20th century as well. During Yang Long’s third term, internal development became a major concern for the Chinese government with large-scale infrastructure projects to open up Xiboliya to development, with Xiboliya’s natural resources deemed vital for China to attain self-sufficiency. Also, during this time, the Chinese military cooperated with Douhang for soybean oil-based fuels to be used by the Chinese military in a measure to make China self-sufficient in terms of fuel. In addition, Yang Long’s government passed a measure to give Xiboliya and Mongolia representation in the Legislative Yuan, enlarging the Legislative Yuan to 700 seats. In terms of foreign policy, the government of Yang Long pursued a stance of forming friendly relations with both Germania and France during this period but avoiding any hostilities with the Unitarians out of a desire to build up China’s strength for the inevitable clash. However, the Chinese Jinyiwei started covertly backing nationalist rebel groups in Indian-occupied Cambodia and Malaya with arms and money smuggled via Dai Viet and Ayutthaya. By 1945, Shun China was now stronger than ever and after dealing with the threat of the Union of Japan, the Chinese, in case of a war with India, would be able to deal with the Indians with all their strength.
- Whiteshore
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