Different end to the warring states period?

On the other hand, if China fragments earlier under Korean pressure, Vietnam and all of Indochina can shake off their Chinese masters and get earlier independence...

I would really like to know when could Korea gain enough impetus (and manpower and so on) to fragment China... I mean, what could be the intention in the first place? And wasn't that kind of like a pinch of salt wanting to press against a large lake? Besides, I can't see besides a geological POD to grant Korea the ability to press against the whatever river valley civilization developed nearby.

And Chinese vassalage system was described by some as dispensing Chinese wealth to gain "glory" in the name only, at least in peaceful times, so the vassals might have at least tiny bits of "loyalty" developed.
 
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One point is that the normal list of “Warring States” (Qi, Chu, Yan, Han, Zhao, Wei and Qin) are all descendants of Zhou and spoke related languages. If any of these become sufficiently powerful, they have a good chance of creating (re-creating?) a unified state. The most plausible way to avoid this is to involve other states which have significantly different histories and languages in a balance of power. For example, had Ba and Shu unified into a single state holding Sichuan, it might well have been able to defeat the attack from Qin. Such a state would not have been able to unify China easily and would also have had an interest in ensuring that no other state succeeded. Eventually Goguryeo to the North and Vietnam to the South might have also had a common interest in preventing unification, although they would have been less effective as they would have interacted with only Yan and Chu respectively.
 
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In general if the Sanxingdui culture had managed to pull themselves together, they might develop a force to be reckoned with to Zhou. However this would require an even earlier POD that would seriously change the migration pattern and the geopolitical situation. Not only it would be hard to deal with it, its existence would anyway be hampered by a small population base to start with.

OTOH, Goguryeo did not exist in this time frame, it was still Old Joseon, which lack the cohesion, intention and power to interfere with states for the time-being I suppose? You might grant them a series of great leaders and prolonged peacetime, but I doubt if they would go so expansionist suddenly to put their hands into the states' pockets.

For Vietnam, I don't think Chu has much interaction with them IOTL. Văn Lang or Âu Lạc was simply too far south for any extended communication. The Red River valley was probably too far from the center of imperial power and geographically excluded, thus Vietnamese were never truly integrated but just heavily sinicized IOTL. Given their remoteness, I don't see why they would develop interests to impede their northern neighbour to unify. I think they would only care if their neighbours invade. Though you may wank them so they conquer the Pearl River valley, to give them some intentions and a larger population base to start with, but this might need some good justification.
 
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