Despite being the world's 10th largest economy and second most populous country, the Republic of China of today has little tp show for this. The country is riddled with corruption and poverty, with the highest percentage of people living below $1/day in the G20.
China as definitely fallen behind it's much more econonically, militarilly, and politically powerful neighbor, the United Republic of India, with nearly 2 billion people in it's territory, as well as the world's largest economy, and essentially the puppet-master of an independent Tibet
Militarily, China has more active soldiers than any other country, but this proved inadequate as half a million Chinese soldiers were beaten by 300,000 Indian soldiers in the failed Chinese annexation of Tibet; their failure to reclaim the People's Republic of Mamchuria from joint Russo-Japanese forces, and their embarrassing performance in the Korean and Vietnam wars
People celebrated when they pushed the Communists to Manchuria, but realized that it came with much of China's surviving industry. The average Chinese seems unable to believe that for centuries, China was the center of the world.
What would a Communist victory under Mao in China look like today? Would they become one of the stereotypical totalitarian states like the Union of Arab Socialist Republics? Or would they prosper as Manchuria did? Would this China even be able to change its fate?