China/Vietnamese wins the Tonkin Campaign

What if China, and the Vietnamese, was able to beat the French, and stop them from making Northern Vietnam a French colony.
 

raharris1973

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How would you propose they do that?

I'm asking seriously, not to dismiss the idea.

How did the other European powers of the time perceive the situation?

One idea for adding more cards to the Sino-Vietnamese deck -- Siam declares war on France simultaneously. Siam still had suzerainty over Laos at this time, and this could make more French outposts vulnerable in northern Vietnam , while giving the Vietnamese and Black Flag Chinese more room for maneuver. Possibly Siam's moves could include supporting an invasion/uprising of Cambodia by a royal brother or other relative of the French-puppet King.

It's tough to combine against an imperialist exploiter like France in the 19th century, because they generally pick the fight with you when they feel like it and the non-European countries are just trying to keep their heads down, hence the imperialists can sequence their wars one at a time for their convenience. But what if?

Another way to possibly have a Sino-Siamese coalition fight France is if the imperial government refrains from intervening over Tonkin in 1884 (as Li Hongzhang advised I think), but when the French go to war with Siam over Laos in 1893, China comes in on the Siamese side.

Another alternative might be if the deal proposed by some of the French to partition Tonkin into French and Chinese spheres of influence is accepted by the Chinese side and enforced on the French side.
 
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How would you propose they do that?

Well considering that the OTL result of the campaign brought down the Ferry government (via the 'Tonkin Affair'), we can probably assume that French public opinion was not particularly enamored of either colonialism or intervention in Tonkin, and so a French battlefield defeat could conceivably lead to an Adwa-like situation where, even though French power was far from exhausted, it nevertheless concedes a loss.

Chinese-Annamese leadership performed quite well on land, but poorly on sea and it was the latter that allowed the French to establish an economic blockade on China and pressure the Qing into defeat. Greater investment into Chinese naval thought rather than naval equipment during the 1860s (a problem recurrent throughout the 19thC) could have paid dividends at this point, though the Chinese still need their land victories to force a favourable peace.

Also we can't discount the possibility of the French making stupid moves, like attacking the Nanyang Fleet in Shanghai which would have probably drawn immediate Western condemnation.

I don't think Siam declaring war on France would help since that would just turn the whole affair into a 'war for national honor' or something similar.
 
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I think the best way to compete is to avoid the war all together, have the agreement to partition Vietnam into separate sphere of influences between the Chinese and the French would be a great start.
 
I think the best way to compete is to avoid the war all together, have the agreement to partition Vietnam into separate sphere of influences between the Chinese and the French would be a great start.

That's about as likely as asking the modern US to partition Mexico, Saudi Arabia or Japan into separate sphere of influences.
 
That's about as likely as asking the modern US to partition Mexico, Saudi Arabia or Japan into separate sphere of influences.

I believe the French foreign minister Frédéric Bourée met with Li Hongzhang to divide Vietnam into French and Chinese spheres of influence, read acquiesce to Cochin China and Annam being French and Tonkin remaining sinicized.

Throne and Mandarins: China's Search for a Policy during the Sino-French Controversy (Stanford, 1984)

Now back to the OP's question perhaps have the Chinese twin ironclads Dingyuan and Zhenyuan released earlier and that in itself would have given food for thought for the French. Although for both ships to play a role in the Sino - French conflict would also rely on the Beiyang fleet being deployed in support of the Nanyang Fleet.
 

raharris1973

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Well considering that the OTL result of the campaign brought down the Ferry government (via the 'Tonkin Affair'), we can probably assume that French public opinion was not particularly enamored of either colonialism or intervention in Tonkin, and so a French battlefield defeat could conceivably lead to an Adwa-like situation where, even though French power was far from exhausted, it nevertheless concedes a loss.

I would be highly interested to see a plausible TL based on this. I do see the French willing to come back for more rounds than the Italians did in Abyssinia (because of political weakness of the Italian government and the country's economic weakness). And the Italians eventually came back to Abyssinia too, in the 1930s.

Also we can't discount the possibility of the French making stupid moves, like attacking the Nanyang Fleet in Shanghai which would have probably drawn immediate Western condemnation.

If not including France at this time, what does the west include, Britain and America? Or is your thought that this would lead all the European (Britain, France, Russia and American powers (and maybe Japan too) to condemn France and pressure it to conclude the war hastily?

I don't think Siam declaring war on France would help since that would just turn the whole affair into a 'war for national honor' or something similar.

How does this jibe with the above? Your thinking is that France will respond to a local medium-sized defeat with retreat, but being fought by a regional coalition would just make Paris escalate?

Regarding potential compromises to avert the war in the first place, I believe what Bouree and Li Hongzhang were discussing was not a north-south division of Vietnam, anywhere along the lines of the 17th parallel, but rather a north-south division of Tonkin, the northernmost portion of Vietnam, probably leaving Haiphong and Hanoi in French hands with only the back country north of the Red river delta as a Chinese dominated buffer. Not that such a deal could not have changed Vietnamese (and Chinese...and French) history in interesting ways.
 
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What if China, and the Vietnamese, was able to beat the French, and stop them from making Northern Vietnam a French colony.

This is a chicken or egg scenario. If China at certain pod becomes in ATl capable/ modernize of defeating any European power, the French wouldn't even attempt to invade northern Vietnam knowing China can interfere.

But if the pod is the start of otl Tonkin war. This should be ASB due to China's lack of modernization and bureaucratic corruption.
 
perhaps have the Chinese twin ironclads Dingyuan and Zhenyuan released earlier and that in itself would have given food for thought for the French. Although for both ships to play a role in the Sino - French conflict would also rely on the Beiyang fleet being deployed in support of the Nanyang Fleet.

Nope, the Qing empire in the late 19th century was not one unified country. The Beiyang Fleet would never have risked their own precious ships to salvage the Nanyang fleet. Li Hongzhang would be very happy seeing his opponent Zuo Zhongtang humiliated by the French.

Back to the OP, no, there was no way.

The war started as local ethnic Chinese warlord "The Black Flag Army" clashed with the French, and the Qing was only an unwilling bystander dragged into the conflict. There was no way to win a war if the will was not there, full stop.
 
Wow, I'm writing a novel set in 1884 at the moment (but with more airships and bionic arms so... not completely OTL but trying to stick to OTL still) so I want to see more of this!

If Siam or Laos tries to fight with the Tonkin against France, I think there's someone a bit on the west who would be veeeeery happy. From my feel, if Laos and Siam were to divert forces to Tonkin, wouldn't that weaken them against the Brits?



What could be plausible would be that the French DO conquer it but can't hold it. A big factor for the Tonkin was that Gambetta and Lyautey made extensive use of the tâche d'huile doctrine, the oil stain. Basically, you hold a bit, wipe out all potential resistance and work with the locals, then move a bit farther, wipe out the resistance and work with the locals, repeat at will.

Now, if the French have their usual doctrine of combat, move as far as possible and hold the land after, it might be a problem as logistic in the jungle against partisans can be a bit... muddled (unless you got airships! airships everywhere! ahum, sorry 'bout that.).
So they conquer it, as in, have forts at the frontiers but don't really hold the land. Then the fighting becomes so tough that they have to go away. If you can't hold the land enough to exploit the coal and the rubber trees, both things that take a bit of time and investment, what's the point?

What do you think?
 

raharris1973

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If Siam or Laos tries to fight with the Tonkin against France, I think there's someone a bit on the west who would be veeeeery happy. From my feel, if Laos and Siam were to divert forces to Tonkin, wouldn't that weaken them against the Brits?

Why yes, it would. Of course France came after Siam anyway in 1893, precisely over Laos.

But I'm not sure what Britain really wanted from Siam in the late 19th century. Perhaps just trading rights, or perhaps territory like the Kra Isthmus to connect Burma and Malaya by land.

So they conquer it, as in, have forts at the frontiers but don't really hold the land. Then the fighting becomes so tough that they have to go away. If you can't hold the land enough to exploit the coal and the rubber trees, both things that take a bit of time and investment, what's the point?

The interesting thing about this idea is that it's the opposite of the Italian experience in Abyssinia, there, a big battlefield defeat was needed to justify the Italians quit. Slow bleed guerrilla warfare does not seem to have done as much to drive imperialists away in the 19th century, in part probably because local political actors had less political discipline and patience than professional guerrillas in the later 20th century.
 
The interesting thing about this idea is that it's the opposite of the Italian experience in Abyssinia, there, a big battlefield defeat was needed to justify the Italians quit. Slow bleed guerrilla warfare does not seem to have done as much to drive imperialists away in the 19th century, in part probably because local political actors had less political discipline and patience than professional guerrillas in the later 20th century.

Yes, that would be unlikely. The French would probably double down and burn everything to the ground. More arable land, yay.

Two things to consider: Indochine is far away from the mainland and colonisation wasn't that supported in France, especially compared to Algeria or Africa. And if the rebellion is supported by the Chinese, and the black flags which were pretty much an organised army, it changes the game.

That said, if there is a rebellion pushed up by chinese paramilitary forces, I'd think the Brits and French would come together for Opium Wars round 3.
 

raharris1973

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In 1885, I'm not sure the British are going to exert themselves doing France any favors-

from the english wiki-

There was considerable sympathy for China in Europe, and the Chinese were able to hire a number of British, German and American army and navy officers as advisers.

also -

In February 1885, under diplomatic pressure from China, Britain invoked the provisions of the 1870 Foreign Enlistment Act and closed Hong Kong and other ports in the Far East to French warships.
 
What if China, and the Vietnamese, was able to beat the French, and stop them from making Northern Vietnam a French colony.

Riviere, like Garnier 9 years earlier, had exceeded his orders. Considering European behaviour generally, and this earlier incident in particular, this was predictable. Have the Black Flag called in and waiting when Riviere makes his unprovoked and illegal attack and get handed his head before it all gets out of hand. He is then just a rogue officer who has gone off the reservation. Paris can disavow him with no or little loss of face.

I don't know that that will stymie the French forever; but an official attempt to take over might proceed in a fashion that deflects Chinese ire. The British took over Burma without upsetting Peking too much because they continued to fulfill Burma's tributary obligations for instance. If the French had done likewise a wider war could have been avoided.

Of course all you would get would be a Time Line In Ten Minutes because it is all over before anything really happens!:D
 
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