The 8 nation alliance annex's china and it's results

It also took the British in India a couple of hundred years to achieve their end, and was taking over not one state but a myriad of smaller ones which is an order of magnitude more easier than taking over a unitary state. And even then they left a bunch of pseudo-independent princely states rather than outright annexing the whole thing.

"Method of conquest" has everything to do with it, because it determines the logic behind the conquest in the first place. Why would you go around annexing Chinese territory? What is the logic behind this and why is this more profitable than simply continuing OTL's policy of using a weak Chinese government to further western interests?
I think they *would* keep drawing more and more rights from a weak Chinese government. That's why they didn't try to conquer China in OTL, even though it was within their power to do so.

I was simply speaking to what would likely happen if they did attempt it, as per the OP.
 
I admit the method of conquest is different. But my point remains the same: the British in India never numbered more than a couple of hundred thousand, and they ruled over a population of hundreds of millions for years. Remember, 1900 was the high point of "New Imperialism". It doesn't matter how large or how populous China, India, or Africa are. The US, Japan, and the European powers have modern rifles, machine guns, artillery, and gunships. The China of 1901 is not the China of 1937. There is much, much less unifying nationalism, basically no industry, and very few arms. Holding down China is well within their means..

But the British Raj never even administered the whole of India, huge swathes of land remained under the control of the same people from before the British arrived, with only a few British government officials supervising the local rulers. The British relied on a massive Indian support structure without which a few public school boys with guns and their silly wives would be quickly massacred by hordes of natives and forgotten. This was possible because India, even under the so-called Empire of the Mughals was not a centralised nation but a collection of Kingdoms. Africa too, far from being directly run by some super British central authority, was mostly protectorates bound the to the Empire with treaties and threats. Taking over China, however, is taking over a centralised Imperial unitary state where instead of a mass of Princes eager to out-do each other, you actually have a existing bureaucracy that owned allegiance to the central government. There is no one to swear allegiance to you and supply you with the troops and policemen that will make the colony/protectorate/"Empire" functional, no one to sigh unfair treaties with so as to ensure peace and stability in the areas you know you can't really control with a few regiments of tommies, apart from that central government you've just removed.

Bear in mind that we couldn't conquer Afghanistan at the height of our Imperial power simply because we had no allies there and when we did we couldn't keep them. Trying to hold China will be a nightmare compared to that. Yes, a nightmare compared to the British Army freezing to death in the Afghan mountains as they retreat from a technologically inferior force of Muslim tribesmen.
 
But the British Raj never even administered the whole of India, huge swathes of land remained under the control of the same people from before the British arrived, with only a few British government officials supervising the local rulers. The British relied on a massive Indian support structure without which a few public school boys with guns and their silly wives would be quickly massacred by hordes of natives and forgotten. This was possible because India, even under the so-called Empire of the Mughals was not a centralised nation but a collection of Kingdoms. Africa too, far from being directly run by some super British central authority, was mostly protectorates bound the to the Empire with treaties and threats. Taking over China, however, is taking over a centralised Imperial unitary state where instead of a mass of Princes eager to out-do each other, you actually have a existing bureaucracy that owned allegiance to the central government. There is no one to swear allegiance to you and supply you with the troops and policemen that will make the colony/protectorate/"Empire" functional, no one to sigh unfair treaties with so as to ensure peace and stability in the areas you know you can't really control with a few regiments of tommies, apart from that central government you've just removed.

What are you basing this on? The Qing Empire certainly didn't act much like a single, uniform, unitary state. When the French attacked southern China, the various local officials asked for assistance from the central government and various Chinese local officials in the north. They received none; those people who were not under attack saw it as something that didn't concern them.

When Japan and "China" went to war in 1894, they attacked into Manchuria and northern China. The Beiyang (or Northern Fleet) was attacked and destroyed. The central government asked for the southern fleet (Nanyang) to come north and assist. They never did.

Each province had its own army, and it was extremely rare for any provincial governor to send them to help another. They were seen as the local power base, and no one wanted to risk them to help another. Beyond that, even if both sides wanted it, it was very difficult for armies from different parts of the nation to communicate, given the different languages and lack of literacy.

Even when the Chinese government started building a "national" army system after 1900, they created different armies in each language or ethnic region. There was a Cantonese army (which became CKS's power base). There was a separate army for Hui Muslims.

The sense of Chinese nationalism that becomes so strong later did not exist before May 4 1919. The other powers don't need to "divide and rule" in China. China in this period *is* divided.
 
I still think Truman was wrong not to nuke the hell out of China; pretty sure USSR would not have risked WW3 (their nuclear arsenal was much smaller than that of US and their delivery means against US soil would have been questionable at best)
Truman refusing to nuke China created the nuclear taboo and a leading reason the Cold War stayed cold.
 
Okay, clearly you're new to this. Let me explain the concept of the butterfly effect:

  • If in the 19th Century China is partitioned, then everything after that point will not happen.
  • No Russo-Japanese War, no WWI, no Balkan Wars, no WWII, no Cold War, no Mao, no Hitler, no Stalin, no Kiang Chai Shek, nothing.

That's saying too much. Events after the pod will be different, perhaps even unrecognizably different, but they need not never happen. (I'm pretty sure I got the grammar there. :) )
 
Mcdo: I'd say you're severely underestimating the ability of the Chinese to resist wholesale Western invasion. The French didn't do too well on the ground in the Sino-French war. They managed to fight an ill-equipped, poorly coordinated army made up mostly of Vietnamese and Zhuang tribesmen to a stalemate. The Japanese in the Sino-Japanese war did better because the bulk of the war was either naval or fought in Korea. The French were embarrassed enough that their government fell (see Tonkin Affair). This doesn't play like a nation willing to engage in long term occupation of largely unproductive territory filled with millions of hostile people who truly, deeply despise white people of all kinds.

As for the British, they couldn't conquer the Afghans and took a ton of casualties trying to defeat the Boers. At minimum, the Chinese would be more capable of resisting Western incursion than the Afghans. Don't you think Parliament is going to question just how much this little jaunt in China's going to cost the British taxpayer?

This also assumes that the Chinese populace is terminally stupid and would be unable to play the other powers off one another. Since all of the 8 Powers hate one another far more than they care about taking over China, it should be really easy to get the conquerors attacking one another. World War I starts early in this world

The only group getting anything out of this whole mess is probably the Russians, who can take Manchuria. Of course, they'll probably lose it during the inevitable Russo-Japanese War.
 
Well, to be fair, there will probably always be wars in the Balkans, no matter the TL.

Yes, but not the Balkan Wars.

I don't think that's strictly true. The Russo-Japanese war for control of Manchuria is still pretty likely.
The Balkan wars WILL happen, although maybe not as they did IOTL, although it's still possible for them to spark WW1, which could very well lead to the rise of Hitler...
As for Mao and Kai Shek, maybe, maybe not, it depends on any number of things.

Apparently the butterfly theory changes depending on who is saying what. :rolleyes: The events that proceed this POD (China being colonised) will change in any number of ways because of the POD. Even though the Franco-Prussian War still happened, whose to say there wouldn't be some kind of European reconciliation between then and *WWI? It's unlikely but it's possible. Also, WWI didn't have to happen - it could have been a series of isolated conflicts in Europe, for instance.

Actually, you're wrong. Just with the people. If this happens in 1901, Chiang Kai-Shek is already alive, and so are Stalin, Mao and Hitler. They will probably be butterflied into different people, but still.

Don't be so finicky. You knew exactly what I meant.
 
The only group getting anything out of this whole mess is probably the Russians, who can take Manchuria. Of course, they'll probably lose it during the inevitable Russo-Japanese War.

Why probably? The RJW was one of the few legitimately narrow victories of the period. If Russia has direct control of Manchuria an extra few years it might actually reduce the Japanese chances on land to unfeasibly low. The war on the Sea was also really helped by a few lucky moments for Japan, none of which are guaranteed to repeat again if you re-roll the dice.

Granted, there was no shortage of stupidity among the Russian government and high command, but Japan OTL nearly bled itself out of the war, and it could easily go worse with very little extra luck/preparation on Russia's part.
 
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Whilst the Russians did very well fighting defensively in that war, and inflicted very large casualties on the Japanese, it should probably be noted that the Japanese had far larger armies in the area at the time and had better logistics in the area. Whilst it wasn't a foregone conclusion that the Japanese won the Russo-Japanese War, they did have an advantage at sea, even if it wasn't decisive. IIRC, the Russians could only send 10,000 men East every month (the Trans-Siberian Railway wasn't built yet).

And so, in my opinion, it was almost guaranteed that Japan would lose the Russo-Japanese War in OTL. But in an this TL, it is quite possible that Stolypin's reforms could be more successful (or indeed, Witte's, depending on the PoD) which means more industry would be present in Russia, and the Trans-Siberian Railway would be more likely to be completed, as the inevitable Russo-Japanese War would be delayed. That makes it more likely for the War to be a Russian victory or a draw.
 
Eh, I'm not saying that Russia should win or draw, there's definitely timelines to that effect around (Not by a Mine, for example), only that there's no inevitability in this area at all. It can change pretty dramatically with smallish changes, so the potential author can swap around outcomes at will without straining credibility too much. Few wars can be talked about in the same way.

Of course the other possibility is that the Partition Of China might actually lead to a successful compromise in renegotiating of the concessions between Russia/Germany and Japan; if they are all three kept busy for a long enough time, the entire premise of the Inevitable Manchurian War may change.
 
The Japanese might come out as the overall winners, as their 'liberation of Asia' propaganda theme will have much more affect on Chinese living under European rule than on Chinese living under the Kuomintang.
 
The Japanese might come out as the overall winners, as their 'liberation of Asia' propaganda theme will have much more affect on Chinese living under European rule than on Chinese living under the Kuomintang.

Probably not, given how the Chinese in Macau and Hong Kong weren't enthusiastic about Japanese rule. In fact, it would be harder for Japan under this scenario, since they're one of the 8 Nation Alliance members who would have annexed China, and would be the recipient of more hate than the Nationalists, who would turn out differently.
 
That doesn't work, nor does creating artificial nationalities work. This is not the limited First Opium War or looting Beijing in the middle of the Taiping Rebellion. This is a full-scale attempt at wholesale conquest. The two are not the same and the difference is that unless we're talking massacres far larger than the largest Nazi atrocities this will be an inglorious clusterfuck for everyone involved.

Why artificial nationalities? Chinese are NOT a nation, but cluster of various "dialects" speakers, and these "dialects" are much more unintelligible to eachother than the European languages.

The mass ( how much 99%? ) of the population are totally illiterate. Example: the old "chinese" people in Taiwan, even now do not know Mandarin but Japanese.

The modern industrial power nations do miracles = industrial mass scale education.

I also suspect that such huge enterprise ( making rich the 8 powers on expense of cheap chinese labor + ( say ) african resources )... will consume all the vigour and will butterfly away the big wars of 20th century.

Result? ITTL modern day China ( mere geographic term ) and its population would be much more well off and perhaps numerous.
 
So like most European nations, then?

Yes. In fact there is no need for the 8 powers to go in. 4 enough:

1. Russia takes up the North: Uyguristan, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria. Easy to integrate / assimilate, cause the population is sparse. And non-chinese.

2. Britain the South-west : Greater Tibet ( perfectly fitting into the system of their Indian Empire ).

Britain and Russia can resolve their "Great Game" Central Asian issues putting "solid border" on the map inc. splitting Persia.

3. Japan the East ( except Shanghai which will remain international ), and trades Manchuria and Sahalin for this. There resides the majority of the Chinese population. In generation or two the Mandarin is dead language like Latin, .. or Shumerian.

4. France takes the South-Central provinces. Together with Germany. Condominium. The provinces of this land are named after the local minorities. The local languages are latinized alphabetically and start to be used as second official after French and German. France uses the local manpower to keep Indochina in its sphere.

World peace is achieved cause the Scramble for China gives the Imperialism enough food for digestion for the whole next century.
 
Why artificial nationalities? Chinese are NOT a nation, but cluster of various "dialects" speakers, and these "dialects" are much more unintelligible to eachother than the European languages.

Yes. In fact there is no need for the 8 powers to go in. 4 enough: World peace is achieved cause the Scramble for China gives the Imperialism enough food for digestion for the whole next century.

I'll explain more later, but both these comments are very, very wrong.
 
My personal opinion:

Russia gets the lion's share - East Turkestan and Mongolia (Inner and outer)
Britain gets Greater Tibet
France gets South China - Guangxi, Hainan and Guangdong
Manchuria is a toughie, but most likely, Russia and Japan fight for it.

As for the others, i'm not 100% sure, yet i'm relatively certain that not everybody will get anything. I'd be surprised if Italy got anything for example.
 
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