I know this is difficult, not least due to its neighbours. But I am sure there is someway of dealing with them. How could we reverse the situation with Japan, where they are a potential playing ground for Korean interests? In what ways could we prevent China from crushing the growing Korean Empire too early? I would think that without a strong Japan and minimal Chinese pressure, Korea might expand into Manchuria, which wasn't really considered apart of China until comparatively recently, and Kyushu, but East Asian history has never been my speciality. Which is why I am asking the experts.
In such a situation Korea might be an ally of the Mongols and be in a position to make some Chinese gains. It's also possible that the northern Chinese might begin to consider themselves distinct from the rest and forge a separate sino-mongol identity. I don't know, there is a lot of mythology and nationalism bound up in the "inevitable Han unity" thing so I can't separate fact from fiction very easily at this stage.
The general point is to keep China from successfully unifying and repeated Mongol incursions might do the trick--supplemented by Korean land/siege type forces though of course, the Koreans had fits when the Japanese built castles during Hideyoshi's invasion, that war was won at sea.
Korea somehow manages to reunify China and establishes a Dynasty by claming the Mandate of Heaven. After that Japan should easily fall into the sphere of influence of the Korean-Chinese hybrid empire, especially if Japan is still feudalistic.
The crucial question is about ressources.
Where does Greater Korea get ressources for more power from?
I don't think a conquest nation is a good idea, given the neighbors.
Moreover, Mongol and Siberian areas do not really add much to
Korea's wealth. Mandchuria would be the only country Korea might
incorporate; but I think it is safer if Mandchuria is independent.
You needn't read importance from square kilometers.
Almost necessarily we need a week China, and a not-too-strong Japan.
MNPundit has already come up with ways how to accomplish that.
Now care for factors which keep China down (let it split into two to four
copeting states; late it be paralyzed politically and militarily).
At the same time, let the Chinese coastal cities still maintain some
moderate wealth, and let Korea (for whatever reason) urbanize quickly.
Then we have a small nation which dominates the larger region ecomomically
via sea trade, and also constitutes a considerable military power by comparison.
But it is restricted to the penisula, perhaps with a couple of trading posts
offshore.
Well they do have their own language and writing system... Plus their own versions of totalitarian communism, christian fundamentalism, not to mention cooking.
Korea is as much of a scaled down China as Belgium is a scaled down Germany or Italy. The only reason anyone would think this is if they are looking at an overly euro centric vision of the world, that would define all Asians or Africans as being identical.
It's interesting to see this . . . I didn't notice this before.
I think that Korea would definitely be able to expand into neighboring countries.
For one thing, Manchuria
was considered a separate part of Manchuria; in fact, three of the Korean kingdoms grew up around the area, and it was home to some other nomadic tribes, such as the Khitan and the Liao. Also, the Mongols did take control later, but they had a hard time controlling the people. However, if they had been more controlled and didn't overexpand themselves, they might have controlled northern China, and the two Chinas might have developed separately.
Yes Korea did have issues with Japan; they were invaded three times by the Japanese, and Korea repelled them with naval power under Yi Sun-shin. But that was only because an the king never listened to one of his advisors, who told him that certain numbers of troops needed to be maintained in each of the provinces.
Japan adopted the Mandate of Heaven for their own purposes, although it never maintained control over all of the islands until the 19th century, so I guess Korea could have used it to their advantage.
Resources are not a problem at all . . . Manchuria has plenty of them, and I don't thing that Korea would go haywire by invading Mongolia and Siberia and overextend themselves. Japan might be a possiblity, but as a group of islands, they don't possess resources. Manchuria shouldn't be independent; I think at most, they should be Korean vassals so that they can control them at will, and I don't think that it would be possible for China to industrialize until the Ming, after they had a close shave with Japan, possibly influencing them to adopt European methods.
Yes, they do have their own language and writing system, but so do the Manchus and the Mongols. They were pretty powerful in their day, and yet they failed to fully subjugate the people under them because they became so extensive. It also depends on what you mean by communism; remember, Korea is one of the few divided countries in the world, and of course they would have their own versions of all of these things. I mean, look at Christianity. It probably has the most number of sects in the world.
Korea is definitely not a scaled down version of China, believe me. The three most influential Asian countries, China, Japan, and Korea, all maintain some antagonism against each other somewhat, especially because Japan attempted to colonize the other two, and although they might be culturally similar, it's mostly because Korea and Japan adopted their neighbors' identities, not because they were subjugated like Belgium was. Also, the Chinese are genetically different from the Japanese and Koreans.
If you want concrete examples, take a look at my timeline.