Russia might turn East Prussia into an independent buffer state, though.
The Russian Century - a TL
- Thread starter Onkel Willie
- Start date
Wouldn't East Prussia be bit useless buffer state since there would be still quiet long border line with Germany?
I would see Russia taking most of Polish speaking lands anyway. It is too possible that Russia will restore Polish auotnomy.
Well, it still pushes German presence farther from St Petersburg. In addition, losing some territory weakens Germany.
I think even though the ottoman still existed, i think it’s only a matter of time before it’s territory start breaking away or getting taken away by other power
If I were Russia, I'd create a puppet Kingdom of Poland after the war, either in a Personal Union or with a relative of the Tsar taking the throne. Or become a more decentralized federation or confederation, with different ethnic groups gaining autonomy while still being within the Russian Empire, which would work at least for the Slavic ethnic groups like the Ukrainians, Belarusians and Poles.
Chapter VIII: The Peace of Paris, 1916-1917.
Update time again!
Realizing continuing the war until total victory would be costly, the Entente powers accepted the request for an armistice from the Central Powers. They, however, rejected the condition of a status quo ante bellum peace proposed by Berlin and Vienna: the war had been too costly to just dismiss it as water under the bridge and walk away with nothing. The governments in London, Paris and St. Petersburg wanted to have something to show to their people for this hard earned victory. Negotiations would take place, involving a dozen delegations totalling hundreds of delegates that were assigned to thirty commissions and held more than one thousand sessions.
The Palace of Versailles was more than large enough to house them all, and therefore the peace conference dealing with Germany was held there, commencing in April 1916 and lasting for five months until September. The resulting Treaty of Versailles had a rather foggy preamble concerning war guilt. This resulted from an initial French attempt to assign all the blame for the war to German aggression, to which Germany protested by pointing out that it had acted in defence of its Austro-Hungarian ally. The question of war guilt remained an inconclusive one. The United States ambassador to Russia, David R. Francis, mediated on this issue on the instructions of President Woodrow Wilson, who hoped to emulate Roosevelt’s arbitration at the end of the Russo-Japanese War (this, however, was his sole meagre success).
The Treaty of Versailles dealt with peace between Germany and the Entente. Territorial changes took place, with France finally gaining its revanche by reannexing the contested region of Alsace-Lorraine lost in 1871 after 45 years of German rule. Vengeance had been the sole motif of the French anti-German foreign policy of the past decades and now France finally received gratification. This obsession characterized by revanchism had been assuaged, though could’ve been satisfied more thoroughly.
Russia and Britain were lenient for differing reasons. Russia considered annexing Posen, but believed keeping the Poles divided would keep their position weaker and were primarily interested in the Balkans anyway. They didn’t share France’s obsession for weakening Germany to the point it would never be able to constitute a military threat again for two reasons: firstly, they believed they could handle Germany if it ever got that far again; secondly, with Austria-Hungary gravely weakened, there were no more conflicting interests in the Balkans anymore. Britain in the meantime was primarily interested in containing Russia as it was clearly a rising power, which could again become a rival now that their common enemy had been defeated. A strong German buffer could help in that regard. The resulting peace would not be anywhere near as harsh as France had planned.
Meanwhile, German East Africa was still holding out and was used in a trade. Nearly 400.000 Allied soldiers, sailors, merchant marine crews, builders, bureaucrats and support personnel participated in the East Africa campaign. They were assisted in the field by 600.000 African bearers. The Allies employed nearly one million people in their fruitless pursuit of Lettow-Vorbeck and his small force. Lettow-Vorbeck was cut off and could entertain no hope of victory. His strategy was to keep as many British forces diverted to his pursuit for as long as possible and to make the British expend the largest amount of resources in men, shipping and supplies against him. He continued his highly effective guerrilla war effort even after Germany had formally requested an armistice, refusing to accept an occupation as long as the cession of German East Africa wasn’t definitive.
Germany lost most of its colonies. Cameroon was annexed by France, German Southwest Africa was annexed by South Africa, and Belgium claimed Ruanda-Urundi as part of the Belgian Congo while Japan annexed the German concession at Qingdao (China) and its Pacific possessions. In return for their formal cession of German East Africa – which was the time Lettow-Vorbeck said he’d stop fighting the British occupation – Germany could keep its one remaining colony: Togoland. The British were happy: they could now build their Cape-to-Cairo Railway.
Togoland would become a model colony, a prestige project showcasing the superiority of German colonialism. The port of Lomé would be further expanded for exports of Togoland’s main crop, cotton, and an indigenous textiles sector would be set up by new white settlers. Lomé would become the fourth largest port in the Bight of Benin. White settlers arrived based on the government’s encouragement with subsidies, increasing the white community to about 10% of the population. The infrastructure – already developed to the highest level in Africa with 1000 kilometres of roads, bridges and three main rail lines from Lomé totalling over 500 km – would be developed further with an additional 2.000 kilometres of roads and 1.000 kilometres of railroads built by the colonial office in the twenty years after the war. Across these roads and railroads cotton but also coffee, cocoa beans, peanuts, cassava, jasmine rice, maize and millet from large white-owned estates and plantations made their way to the domestic market. Phosphates were also mined and a white-owned artificial fertilizer industry arose while large deposits of limestone allowed for the production of cement. Under Lettow-Vorbeck as its new governor, its education system was also developed into a shining example. It had elementary, secondary and vocational schools equipped with “instructor qualifications, curricula, textbooks, teaching materials, all met standards unmatched anywhere in tropical Africa.” Compulsory education ensured 99% of the population would be literate by the 1930s. The drawback for this prestige project was that the colony cost the German government more than it earned.
Other stipulations included war reparations and military restrictions. Germany had to pay 10 billion gold marks in war reparations, most of which went to France and Belgium who seen by far the most devastation. Besides that Germany had to assist in their reconstruction with deliveries of coal, steel, pig iron, petroleum and cement fixed at 5% of Germany’s annual production until 1926.
As to military restrictions, France initially envisioned limiting the size of Germany’s standing army, forbidding it from having heavy artillery and creating a demilitarized zone in the Rhineland where no troops, fortifications or military installations of any kind would be allowed as well as an occupation of the Saarland. Germany made it clear this would mean continuation of hostilities and threatened to walk out. Behind the scenes they agreed to British demands for a major reduction of their navy if Britain wouldn’t back France’s drastic proposals. None of the French proposals made it as Germany’s army was still a viable threat, one that could still inflict serious damage if the war continued even if the conclusion was foregone: such a victory would’ve been much more costly, possibly extending the war by as much as a year to eighteen months. There was no public support for it either. The only serious military restriction imposed on Germany was that the tonnage of its capital ships, defined as battleships and battlecruisers, couldn’t exceed 1/3 of the Royal Navy’s tonnage. Forced to choose between handing the other ships over or scuttling them, the Germans chose the latter. Either way, Britain was satisfied that the German naval threat was gone.
After the Treaty of Versailles – subdivided into half a dozen chapters and two hundred articles – the Treaty of Trianon dealing with Austria-Hungary followed. One can only conclude Germany had been treated comparatively mildly, given that Austria-Hungary was virtually partitioned. Russia annexed Galicia and Northern Bukovina, regions predominantly inhabited by Poles and Ukrainians. Romania annexed the predominantly Romanian region of Southern Bukovina as well as Transylvania, a disputed region with a Romanian majority but also a major Hungarian minority that constituted 32% of the total population. Needless to say, this caused major resentment among the Hungarians, both inside and outside Hungary. Serbia annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia-Slavonia, Carniola, Lower Styria and Vojvodina and proclaimed the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later known as Yugoslavia). Italy got the Austrian Littoral, Dalmatia and South Tyrol.
Other territorial changes in the Balkans included the Italian annexation of Albania and the Ottoman annexation of Eastern Rumelia, which was followed by the expulsion of the Bulgarian population (today known as the “Bulgarian Genocide”, a classification the Turkish government still categorically denies to this day, probably the only reason why Turkey sometimes still is relevant in international news). The Ottomans received this prize because they’d declared war on the Central Powers late in the war.
What remained of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was now a landlocked rump state, having lost roughly 40% of its total territory, and it was about to break apart. The renewal of the 1867 Ausgleich that took place once every ten years turned into a renegotiation in 1917. This resulted from the fact that the Hungarian position was severely weakened due to territorial losses, whereas in the new equilibrium the Czech industry became even more important. Unsurprisingly, Czech elites lobbied for a reformed Ausgleich that’d change the country from a Dual Monarchy into a Triple Monarchy. Hungary wouldn’t accept sharing power with the Czechs, and a coalition of nationalist Hungarian parties decided to formally secede and they appointed Admiral Miklós Horthy as Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary (Budapest did still maintain an alliance with Germany). The remainder of the Habsburg realm continued as the Austro-Bohemian Empire. Franz Ferdinand, who succeeded Franz Joseph in 1916, retained the titles “Emperor of Austria” and “King of Bohemia.”
The dissolution of Austria-Hungary created a power vacuum in the Balkans that Russia gladly stepped into, but they weren’t the only ones and family ties complicated the situation. Italy also had an interest in the Balkans and their Queen-Consort Elena, the wife of King Victor Emmanuel III, was the sister-in-law of Tsar Nicholas II (Elena was the younger sister of the Tsarina). Italy, fortunately for Russia, had no interest in the Bosporus but more so in the western Balkans and agreed to guarantee Montenegrin independence despite Serbian wishes to incorporate it into their South Slav kingdom. Serbia was pissed off, but could hardly be surprised given that the rulers of Russia and Italy both had Montenegrin wives and Serbia couldn’t go against one, never mind both. As Serbia remained largely landlocked, Italy inherited the Austro-Hungarian navy.
In a secret agreement signed at San Remo, Russia recognized Greece as part of the Italian sphere of influence while Italy in return recognized the Russian claim on the Bosporus and agreed not to oppose a Russian move to gain it by force of arms. According to the same secret agreement, Montenegro was in the Italian sphere like Greece on the condition that it would never be annexed like Albania had been. Bulgaria would fall to Russia’s sphere of influence again once the Sublime Porte had been dealt with. Serbia and Romania were more or less expected to fall in line with Russia once this happened. Russia’s commitment to the aim of a warm water port on the Mediterranean remained unchanged and unwavering, which would cause tensions in the future.
Chapter VIII: The Peace of Paris, 1916-1917.
Realizing continuing the war until total victory would be costly, the Entente powers accepted the request for an armistice from the Central Powers. They, however, rejected the condition of a status quo ante bellum peace proposed by Berlin and Vienna: the war had been too costly to just dismiss it as water under the bridge and walk away with nothing. The governments in London, Paris and St. Petersburg wanted to have something to show to their people for this hard earned victory. Negotiations would take place, involving a dozen delegations totalling hundreds of delegates that were assigned to thirty commissions and held more than one thousand sessions.
The Palace of Versailles was more than large enough to house them all, and therefore the peace conference dealing with Germany was held there, commencing in April 1916 and lasting for five months until September. The resulting Treaty of Versailles had a rather foggy preamble concerning war guilt. This resulted from an initial French attempt to assign all the blame for the war to German aggression, to which Germany protested by pointing out that it had acted in defence of its Austro-Hungarian ally. The question of war guilt remained an inconclusive one. The United States ambassador to Russia, David R. Francis, mediated on this issue on the instructions of President Woodrow Wilson, who hoped to emulate Roosevelt’s arbitration at the end of the Russo-Japanese War (this, however, was his sole meagre success).
The Treaty of Versailles dealt with peace between Germany and the Entente. Territorial changes took place, with France finally gaining its revanche by reannexing the contested region of Alsace-Lorraine lost in 1871 after 45 years of German rule. Vengeance had been the sole motif of the French anti-German foreign policy of the past decades and now France finally received gratification. This obsession characterized by revanchism had been assuaged, though could’ve been satisfied more thoroughly.
Russia and Britain were lenient for differing reasons. Russia considered annexing Posen, but believed keeping the Poles divided would keep their position weaker and were primarily interested in the Balkans anyway. They didn’t share France’s obsession for weakening Germany to the point it would never be able to constitute a military threat again for two reasons: firstly, they believed they could handle Germany if it ever got that far again; secondly, with Austria-Hungary gravely weakened, there were no more conflicting interests in the Balkans anymore. Britain in the meantime was primarily interested in containing Russia as it was clearly a rising power, which could again become a rival now that their common enemy had been defeated. A strong German buffer could help in that regard. The resulting peace would not be anywhere near as harsh as France had planned.
Meanwhile, German East Africa was still holding out and was used in a trade. Nearly 400.000 Allied soldiers, sailors, merchant marine crews, builders, bureaucrats and support personnel participated in the East Africa campaign. They were assisted in the field by 600.000 African bearers. The Allies employed nearly one million people in their fruitless pursuit of Lettow-Vorbeck and his small force. Lettow-Vorbeck was cut off and could entertain no hope of victory. His strategy was to keep as many British forces diverted to his pursuit for as long as possible and to make the British expend the largest amount of resources in men, shipping and supplies against him. He continued his highly effective guerrilla war effort even after Germany had formally requested an armistice, refusing to accept an occupation as long as the cession of German East Africa wasn’t definitive.
Germany lost most of its colonies. Cameroon was annexed by France, German Southwest Africa was annexed by South Africa, and Belgium claimed Ruanda-Urundi as part of the Belgian Congo while Japan annexed the German concession at Qingdao (China) and its Pacific possessions. In return for their formal cession of German East Africa – which was the time Lettow-Vorbeck said he’d stop fighting the British occupation – Germany could keep its one remaining colony: Togoland. The British were happy: they could now build their Cape-to-Cairo Railway.
Togoland would become a model colony, a prestige project showcasing the superiority of German colonialism. The port of Lomé would be further expanded for exports of Togoland’s main crop, cotton, and an indigenous textiles sector would be set up by new white settlers. Lomé would become the fourth largest port in the Bight of Benin. White settlers arrived based on the government’s encouragement with subsidies, increasing the white community to about 10% of the population. The infrastructure – already developed to the highest level in Africa with 1000 kilometres of roads, bridges and three main rail lines from Lomé totalling over 500 km – would be developed further with an additional 2.000 kilometres of roads and 1.000 kilometres of railroads built by the colonial office in the twenty years after the war. Across these roads and railroads cotton but also coffee, cocoa beans, peanuts, cassava, jasmine rice, maize and millet from large white-owned estates and plantations made their way to the domestic market. Phosphates were also mined and a white-owned artificial fertilizer industry arose while large deposits of limestone allowed for the production of cement. Under Lettow-Vorbeck as its new governor, its education system was also developed into a shining example. It had elementary, secondary and vocational schools equipped with “instructor qualifications, curricula, textbooks, teaching materials, all met standards unmatched anywhere in tropical Africa.” Compulsory education ensured 99% of the population would be literate by the 1930s. The drawback for this prestige project was that the colony cost the German government more than it earned.
Other stipulations included war reparations and military restrictions. Germany had to pay 10 billion gold marks in war reparations, most of which went to France and Belgium who seen by far the most devastation. Besides that Germany had to assist in their reconstruction with deliveries of coal, steel, pig iron, petroleum and cement fixed at 5% of Germany’s annual production until 1926.
As to military restrictions, France initially envisioned limiting the size of Germany’s standing army, forbidding it from having heavy artillery and creating a demilitarized zone in the Rhineland where no troops, fortifications or military installations of any kind would be allowed as well as an occupation of the Saarland. Germany made it clear this would mean continuation of hostilities and threatened to walk out. Behind the scenes they agreed to British demands for a major reduction of their navy if Britain wouldn’t back France’s drastic proposals. None of the French proposals made it as Germany’s army was still a viable threat, one that could still inflict serious damage if the war continued even if the conclusion was foregone: such a victory would’ve been much more costly, possibly extending the war by as much as a year to eighteen months. There was no public support for it either. The only serious military restriction imposed on Germany was that the tonnage of its capital ships, defined as battleships and battlecruisers, couldn’t exceed 1/3 of the Royal Navy’s tonnage. Forced to choose between handing the other ships over or scuttling them, the Germans chose the latter. Either way, Britain was satisfied that the German naval threat was gone.
After the Treaty of Versailles – subdivided into half a dozen chapters and two hundred articles – the Treaty of Trianon dealing with Austria-Hungary followed. One can only conclude Germany had been treated comparatively mildly, given that Austria-Hungary was virtually partitioned. Russia annexed Galicia and Northern Bukovina, regions predominantly inhabited by Poles and Ukrainians. Romania annexed the predominantly Romanian region of Southern Bukovina as well as Transylvania, a disputed region with a Romanian majority but also a major Hungarian minority that constituted 32% of the total population. Needless to say, this caused major resentment among the Hungarians, both inside and outside Hungary. Serbia annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia-Slavonia, Carniola, Lower Styria and Vojvodina and proclaimed the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later known as Yugoslavia). Italy got the Austrian Littoral, Dalmatia and South Tyrol.
Other territorial changes in the Balkans included the Italian annexation of Albania and the Ottoman annexation of Eastern Rumelia, which was followed by the expulsion of the Bulgarian population (today known as the “Bulgarian Genocide”, a classification the Turkish government still categorically denies to this day, probably the only reason why Turkey sometimes still is relevant in international news). The Ottomans received this prize because they’d declared war on the Central Powers late in the war.
What remained of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was now a landlocked rump state, having lost roughly 40% of its total territory, and it was about to break apart. The renewal of the 1867 Ausgleich that took place once every ten years turned into a renegotiation in 1917. This resulted from the fact that the Hungarian position was severely weakened due to territorial losses, whereas in the new equilibrium the Czech industry became even more important. Unsurprisingly, Czech elites lobbied for a reformed Ausgleich that’d change the country from a Dual Monarchy into a Triple Monarchy. Hungary wouldn’t accept sharing power with the Czechs, and a coalition of nationalist Hungarian parties decided to formally secede and they appointed Admiral Miklós Horthy as Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary (Budapest did still maintain an alliance with Germany). The remainder of the Habsburg realm continued as the Austro-Bohemian Empire. Franz Ferdinand, who succeeded Franz Joseph in 1916, retained the titles “Emperor of Austria” and “King of Bohemia.”
The dissolution of Austria-Hungary created a power vacuum in the Balkans that Russia gladly stepped into, but they weren’t the only ones and family ties complicated the situation. Italy also had an interest in the Balkans and their Queen-Consort Elena, the wife of King Victor Emmanuel III, was the sister-in-law of Tsar Nicholas II (Elena was the younger sister of the Tsarina). Italy, fortunately for Russia, had no interest in the Bosporus but more so in the western Balkans and agreed to guarantee Montenegrin independence despite Serbian wishes to incorporate it into their South Slav kingdom. Serbia was pissed off, but could hardly be surprised given that the rulers of Russia and Italy both had Montenegrin wives and Serbia couldn’t go against one, never mind both. As Serbia remained largely landlocked, Italy inherited the Austro-Hungarian navy.
In a secret agreement signed at San Remo, Russia recognized Greece as part of the Italian sphere of influence while Italy in return recognized the Russian claim on the Bosporus and agreed not to oppose a Russian move to gain it by force of arms. According to the same secret agreement, Montenegro was in the Italian sphere like Greece on the condition that it would never be annexed like Albania had been. Bulgaria would fall to Russia’s sphere of influence again once the Sublime Porte had been dealt with. Serbia and Romania were more or less expected to fall in line with Russia once this happened. Russia’s commitment to the aim of a warm water port on the Mediterranean remained unchanged and unwavering, which would cause tensions in the future.
Well, since Britain hasn't backed French demands (of military limitations on Germany), I assume France won't support Britain in the (likely) Anglo-Russian War over Constantinople...
I don’t think Britain and France are going to be allies for that much longer.
Agree that Britain and France are not anymore in good terms. But in other hand France is not going to take actions against Germany alone. For that it is still too weak even if it is not so badly devastated as in OTL.
For the record, I don't think France and Britain will become enemies either, just go their separate ways (while maintaining their profitable trade).
Chapter IX: Scramble for China Pt.1, 1916-1917.
Update time!
Given that Germany was defeated and remained diplomatically isolated with the dissolution of its only significant ally, there was a distinct possibility the imperialist rivalries that had existed among the Entente powers until the late nineteenth century could resurface. For now, however, the Triple Entente remained in place. The German military was the strongest in Europe with the most professionally led officers corps and could still pose a threat to individual countries. French foreign policy emphasized the continued importance of the Triple Entente, pointing out that Germany could rise again if the three powers let themselves be played apart (which they believed the Germans would no doubt try). French foreign policy consisted of maintaining amicable relationships with Great Britain and Russia alike, and mediating differences between the two if necessary.
For now no such rivalry re-emerged between Britain and Russia, assuaging French fears, because Russian imperialist ambitions focused on the Orient: China had disintegrated in the wake of the 1911 Revolution. The revolution culminated a decade of agitation, revolts, and uprisings. Its success marked the collapse of the Chinese monarchy, the end of 2.132 years of imperial rule and 276 years of the Qing dynasty, and the beginning of China's early republican era. The hope that a republic could improve the situation of China and its downtrodden people was, however, soon dashed.
The Qing dynasty had struggled for a long time to reform the government and resist foreign aggression, but the program of reforms after 1900 was opposed by conservatives in the Qing court as too radical and by reformers as too slow. Several factions, including underground anti-Qing groups, revolutionaries in exile, reformers who wanted to save the monarchy by modernizing it, and activists across the country debated how or whether to overthrow the Manchus. The flash-point came on October 10th 1911, with the Wuchang Uprising, an armed rebellion among members of the New Army. Similar revolts then broke out spontaneously around the country, and revolutionaries in all provinces of the country renounced the Qing dynasty. On November 1st 1911, the Qing court appointed Yuan Shikai (leader of the powerful Beiyang Army) as Prime Minister, and he began negotiations with the revolutionaries. A National Assembly formally proclaimed the Republic of China on January 1st and the edict of abdication of the six-year old Emperor Puyi was promulgated on February 12th 1912.
Yuan Shikai, who enjoyed the loyalty of the New Army, quickly replaced Sun Yat-sen as President of China and head of state of the provisional government. Over the next few years, Yuan proceeded to abolish the national and provincial assemblies and declared himself as the Emperor of the Empire of China in late 1915. Yuan's imperial ambitions were fiercely opposed by his subordinates; faced with the prospect of rebellion, he abdicated in March 1916 and died of natural causes in June. Yuan's death in 1916 left a power vacuum; the republican government was all but shattered. This opened the way for the Warlord Era, during which much of China was ruled by shifting coalitions of competing provincial military leaders and the Beiyang Government.
The Romanovs had suffered in popularity during the Great War because of the hardships it had brought such as scarcity of food and fuel as well as inflation. The people were glad it was over. Whenever rumours surfaced that the peace talks might break down, leading to fears for a resumption of hostilities, there were waves of paralyzing strikes and protests. There were renewed demands for reform such as expansion of suffrage, more power for the Duma and reduction of the workweek from 48 hours to 40.
The first post-war legislative election in November 1916 produced a major victory for the SDP undern Julius Martov, which could now form a coalition with the Socialist-Revolutionary Party (SRP), the Polish Bloc and other ethnic minority parties and exclude the LDP now led by Pavel Milyukov. Though the social-democrats and the liberals had certain commonalities such as focusing on the expansion of suffrage, they’d always had a fundamentality different view of the role of the government in the economy. The Tsar was unpleased by this left-wing coalition as it included the anti-monarchist SRP.
In response Nicholas II disbanded the Duma in June as per his royal prerogative to do so at his personal discretion, but this unpopular move sparked more protests and in February 1917 new elections led to an even greater majority for the SDP-SRP bloc in the Duma. Clearly, the reuse of the old practice of disbanding a Duma in the way of the Tsar’s wishes and overruling the wishes of the voters – as had occurred regularly in the 1880s, 1890s and early 1900s – was no longer acceptable to the Russian people. The middle class and the working class were both much more politically aware now after 35 years of semi-constitutional monarchy and willing to fight for their rights.
Nicholas realized that dissolving the Duma again would lead to more protests and possibly revolution, so he reluctantly agreed to the next step: removal of the last vestiges of autocracy. Major reforms were enacted. The first-past-the-post electoral system was replaced by proportional representation for the Duma, meaning that a party winning x percentage of the vote would get the corresponding number of seats. Of the 196 members of the Imperial Council, 98 were appointed by the Tsar under the old system, but now all were elected. For the Imperial Council, as opposed to the Duma, the first-past-the-post system was maintained out of concerns that minorities and sparsely population regions would fall victim to the “tyranny of the majority.” The voting age was lowered from 21 to 18 and female suffrage was enacted too. The age for running for office, such as a seat in the Duma, was lowered from 25 to 18. For the Imperial Council 35 years of age was maintained as a restriction, ensuring the council’s mildly conservative nature and making it the sole brake on further reforms. The Tsar’s right to dismiss the Duma and issue new elections was removed from the constitution. Contrary to popular thought, Alexander II and Nicholas II were not liberal but quite conservative and had hoped to preserve much of their autocratic power by giving into demands for reform hitherto, but due to developments Tsar Nicholas II and his successors could henceforth only slow it down.
Meanwhile, a major trade union demand, a forty hour workweek, was also passed. As a major concession, the SRP moderated its demands for land reform and quietly dropped its abolitionist stance toward the monarchy. A major victory for the Polish Bloc was that restrictions imposed by Nicholas I and Alexander II were finally ended after nearly sixty years (this bloc was a diverse parliamentary group of left-wing and right-wing Polish parties, ranging from the socialist PPS to the nationalist ZLN). The Polish language could be publicly spoken again in word and in print without restrictions for the first time since 1863.
Crucially, foreign and defence policy remained privileges of the crown. Using his control over both foreign and defence policies, the Tsar decided an imperialist adventure ending with a quick victory could reinvigorate the monarchy’s and his own personal popularity. He was not about to make the same mistake again by picking on a country that could fight back, as had happened during the Russo-Japanese War. He had to wait for the right moment.
Chapter IX: Scramble for China Pt.1, 1916-1917.
Given that Germany was defeated and remained diplomatically isolated with the dissolution of its only significant ally, there was a distinct possibility the imperialist rivalries that had existed among the Entente powers until the late nineteenth century could resurface. For now, however, the Triple Entente remained in place. The German military was the strongest in Europe with the most professionally led officers corps and could still pose a threat to individual countries. French foreign policy emphasized the continued importance of the Triple Entente, pointing out that Germany could rise again if the three powers let themselves be played apart (which they believed the Germans would no doubt try). French foreign policy consisted of maintaining amicable relationships with Great Britain and Russia alike, and mediating differences between the two if necessary.
For now no such rivalry re-emerged between Britain and Russia, assuaging French fears, because Russian imperialist ambitions focused on the Orient: China had disintegrated in the wake of the 1911 Revolution. The revolution culminated a decade of agitation, revolts, and uprisings. Its success marked the collapse of the Chinese monarchy, the end of 2.132 years of imperial rule and 276 years of the Qing dynasty, and the beginning of China's early republican era. The hope that a republic could improve the situation of China and its downtrodden people was, however, soon dashed.
The Qing dynasty had struggled for a long time to reform the government and resist foreign aggression, but the program of reforms after 1900 was opposed by conservatives in the Qing court as too radical and by reformers as too slow. Several factions, including underground anti-Qing groups, revolutionaries in exile, reformers who wanted to save the monarchy by modernizing it, and activists across the country debated how or whether to overthrow the Manchus. The flash-point came on October 10th 1911, with the Wuchang Uprising, an armed rebellion among members of the New Army. Similar revolts then broke out spontaneously around the country, and revolutionaries in all provinces of the country renounced the Qing dynasty. On November 1st 1911, the Qing court appointed Yuan Shikai (leader of the powerful Beiyang Army) as Prime Minister, and he began negotiations with the revolutionaries. A National Assembly formally proclaimed the Republic of China on January 1st and the edict of abdication of the six-year old Emperor Puyi was promulgated on February 12th 1912.
Yuan Shikai, who enjoyed the loyalty of the New Army, quickly replaced Sun Yat-sen as President of China and head of state of the provisional government. Over the next few years, Yuan proceeded to abolish the national and provincial assemblies and declared himself as the Emperor of the Empire of China in late 1915. Yuan's imperial ambitions were fiercely opposed by his subordinates; faced with the prospect of rebellion, he abdicated in March 1916 and died of natural causes in June. Yuan's death in 1916 left a power vacuum; the republican government was all but shattered. This opened the way for the Warlord Era, during which much of China was ruled by shifting coalitions of competing provincial military leaders and the Beiyang Government.
The Romanovs had suffered in popularity during the Great War because of the hardships it had brought such as scarcity of food and fuel as well as inflation. The people were glad it was over. Whenever rumours surfaced that the peace talks might break down, leading to fears for a resumption of hostilities, there were waves of paralyzing strikes and protests. There were renewed demands for reform such as expansion of suffrage, more power for the Duma and reduction of the workweek from 48 hours to 40.
The first post-war legislative election in November 1916 produced a major victory for the SDP undern Julius Martov, which could now form a coalition with the Socialist-Revolutionary Party (SRP), the Polish Bloc and other ethnic minority parties and exclude the LDP now led by Pavel Milyukov. Though the social-democrats and the liberals had certain commonalities such as focusing on the expansion of suffrage, they’d always had a fundamentality different view of the role of the government in the economy. The Tsar was unpleased by this left-wing coalition as it included the anti-monarchist SRP.
In response Nicholas II disbanded the Duma in June as per his royal prerogative to do so at his personal discretion, but this unpopular move sparked more protests and in February 1917 new elections led to an even greater majority for the SDP-SRP bloc in the Duma. Clearly, the reuse of the old practice of disbanding a Duma in the way of the Tsar’s wishes and overruling the wishes of the voters – as had occurred regularly in the 1880s, 1890s and early 1900s – was no longer acceptable to the Russian people. The middle class and the working class were both much more politically aware now after 35 years of semi-constitutional monarchy and willing to fight for their rights.
Nicholas realized that dissolving the Duma again would lead to more protests and possibly revolution, so he reluctantly agreed to the next step: removal of the last vestiges of autocracy. Major reforms were enacted. The first-past-the-post electoral system was replaced by proportional representation for the Duma, meaning that a party winning x percentage of the vote would get the corresponding number of seats. Of the 196 members of the Imperial Council, 98 were appointed by the Tsar under the old system, but now all were elected. For the Imperial Council, as opposed to the Duma, the first-past-the-post system was maintained out of concerns that minorities and sparsely population regions would fall victim to the “tyranny of the majority.” The voting age was lowered from 21 to 18 and female suffrage was enacted too. The age for running for office, such as a seat in the Duma, was lowered from 25 to 18. For the Imperial Council 35 years of age was maintained as a restriction, ensuring the council’s mildly conservative nature and making it the sole brake on further reforms. The Tsar’s right to dismiss the Duma and issue new elections was removed from the constitution. Contrary to popular thought, Alexander II and Nicholas II were not liberal but quite conservative and had hoped to preserve much of their autocratic power by giving into demands for reform hitherto, but due to developments Tsar Nicholas II and his successors could henceforth only slow it down.
Meanwhile, a major trade union demand, a forty hour workweek, was also passed. As a major concession, the SRP moderated its demands for land reform and quietly dropped its abolitionist stance toward the monarchy. A major victory for the Polish Bloc was that restrictions imposed by Nicholas I and Alexander II were finally ended after nearly sixty years (this bloc was a diverse parliamentary group of left-wing and right-wing Polish parties, ranging from the socialist PPS to the nationalist ZLN). The Polish language could be publicly spoken again in word and in print without restrictions for the first time since 1863.
Crucially, foreign and defence policy remained privileges of the crown. Using his control over both foreign and defence policies, the Tsar decided an imperialist adventure ending with a quick victory could reinvigorate the monarchy’s and his own personal popularity. He was not about to make the same mistake again by picking on a country that could fight back, as had happened during the Russo-Japanese War. He had to wait for the right moment.
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El_Fodedor
Banned
Let me guess.
Xinjiang is going to be annexed. Mongolia is going to become a Russia puppet state while getting Outer Mongolia. Tibet is going to become a British protectorate. The French are going to get their area of influence in southern China while the British get the central basin close to Xangai. Maybe the Japanese get Shandong?
China is really fucked. But this definitely makes sense from a Russian perspective. China is the only other country which can hope to counterbalance Russian dominance in Eurasia in the long run, and as we know it, even supplant it completely. Even if the Chinese manage to reunite their Han-core (the belly part in the map), they are going to get permanently separated from their appendices, which serve as both natural resources playgrounds (minerals, water in the case of Tibet) and security buffers.
China can still become one of the world's biggest economies, maybe even the biggest if they try really hard, but they are going to have serious strategic weaknesses which will humble them in regard to Moscow.
But if you really want to fuck up China in the long run, then some kind of Guangdong state needs to be established. It would basically be China's Ukraine if they can last long enough to acquire its own identity permanently.
Xinjiang is going to be annexed. Mongolia is going to become a Russia puppet state while getting Outer Mongolia. Tibet is going to become a British protectorate. The French are going to get their area of influence in southern China while the British get the central basin close to Xangai. Maybe the Japanese get Shandong?
China is really fucked. But this definitely makes sense from a Russian perspective. China is the only other country which can hope to counterbalance Russian dominance in Eurasia in the long run, and as we know it, even supplant it completely. Even if the Chinese manage to reunite their Han-core (the belly part in the map), they are going to get permanently separated from their appendices, which serve as both natural resources playgrounds (minerals, water in the case of Tibet) and security buffers.
China can still become one of the world's biggest economies, maybe even the biggest if they try really hard, but they are going to have serious strategic weaknesses which will humble them in regard to Moscow.
But if you really want to fuck up China in the long run, then some kind of Guangdong state needs to be established. It would basically be China's Ukraine if they can last long enough to acquire its own identity permanently.
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That’s the thing with democracy you give people an inch and they’ll want a mile.
With Manchuria, guess the question is whether Russia directly annexes it or they do what Imperial Japan did and create a bogus "Manchu nation" under a puppet Qing Dynasty.
Maybe attach areas of Southern China with sizable minority populations (especially as there are enough Zhuang in Guangxi for the PRC to make it an "autonomous region" for said people and Yunnan and Guizhou are also areas with sizable populations of minorities) to said state as well?
I mean, despite enduring racism from the US, Malaya, Singapore, Australia..., overseas Cantonese, Hokkien, Fujianese never stopped identifying as Chinese. I don't think an independent Guangdong can form its own identity, especially when the effects of Opium War and the humiliation of that war was very strong in Guangdong.
I'd personally say that areas with sizable minority populations like Guangxi, Yunnan, and Guizhou are easier to spin off as "independent" puppet states. But yeah, if a shared experience of being under British imperialism could unite Bengalis, Punjabis, Marathis, and Tamils under a single "Indian" nation where none existed prior to the British Raj or Moluccans, Javanese, Makkasarese, and Acehnese, to name a few, all being under Dutch rule could create "Indonesians" out of them, being partitioned by multiple imperialist powers could weaken China's national identity.
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Chapter X: Scramble for China Pt.2, 1917-1920.
I thought I'd quickly conclude the developments in China for you guys following this, so here's the next update.
In July 1917 such a potential opportunity presented itself when Chinese General Zhang Xun launched a swift coup d’état to restore the Manchu monarchy by force of arms with support for the monarchy from certain groups such as ethnic Manchus and Mongols, believing the republican government discriminated against them. The Qing also enjoyed support among sections of the Han Chinese population as well, such as in north-eastern China. Many were disappointed about the Republican government’s inability to solve China’s problems. Finally, there were numerous reactionaries and disempowered ex-Qing officials who conspired to overthrow the Republic. As a result, pro-Qing restorationist groups, most notably the Royalist Party, remained an underrepresented, but powerful factor in Chinese politics during the 1910s. In the wake of the coup, several members of President Li Yuanhong’s government subsequently defected: former Qing war minister Wang Shizhen, civil affairs minister Zhu Jiabao, diplomat Xie Jieshi and Beiyang General Jiang Chaozong.
The restoration of the eleven-year old Puyi as Emperor of China was proclaimed on July 1st 1917 and Beijing’s capital police immediately submitted to this new government. President Li promptly fled and appointed Feng Zuozhang Acting President while Premier General Duan Qirui commanded military operations against Zhang Xun. Duan’s forces took control of the Beijing-Tianjin railway and stood poised to retake the capital as most of the Northern Army sided with the Republic against Zhang and the restoration.
The Conference of St. Petersburg would determine the division of China into spheres of influence and regulate trade (similar to how the Berlin Conference had formalized the Scramble for Africa). The matter had been set in motion by Russia’s decision to intervene in favour of the restoration of Puyi as Emperor of China, using its strength of over 150.000 troops in Manchuria to crush attempts by the Republican army to retake Beijing. Russian troop strength in Manchuria tripled to 450.000 men quickly, using the now complete Trans-Siberian Railway. The Japanese were alarmed because they believed this would be the beginning of a Russian invasion, moving troops to the Yalu River, which formed the border between Korea and China. Great Britain in turn was alarmed because Germany was trying to break its diplomatic isolation by supporting Russia, declaring it would go to war to assist the latter if need be. If this occurred, the provisions of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance would require Britain to go to war against Russia and Germany in Japan’s defence (the alliance agreement specified either signatory had to go to war if the other got involved in a war with two or more powers).
With the last major war still fresh in everyone’s memories, cooler heads prevailed and they responded to an American proposal for a conference. US President Charles Evans Hughes offered to mediate as he considered European plans for a more formal partition of China a threat to the US Open Door Policy: the United States diplomatic policy established in the late 19th century and the early 20th century that called for a system of equal trade and investment and to guarantee the territorial integrity of China. Fearing China “would be carved like a turkey at thanksgiving, as had already been done in Africa” US Secretary of State Hiram Johnson was sent to St. Petersburg by Hughes to defend the Open Door Policy. This would be Johnson’s baptism of fire and the result would be a mixed bag at best, which was most likely the reason why he wasn’t appointed Secretary of State again after Hughes’ re-election in 1920. Johnson had become Secretary of State in the first place because he’d helped Hughes win in California by a mere half percent of the vote, swinging its thirteen electoral votes to the Republican side in the 1916 Presidential Election. With 267 electoral votes to the 264 of Wilson, Hughes was the winner despite not winning the popular vote (this was the fourth time after 1824, 1876 and 1888 that this happened).
The St. Petersburg Conference was held at Peterhof Palace, the Russian equivalent to Versailles. The country it concerned, China, wasn’t even invited to attend. Meanwhile, Johnson’s diplomacy proved quite ineffective in the face of Russia’s refusal to give any guarantees of a gradual reduction its troop strength of nearly half a million men in Manchuria, which was amounted to a de facto military occupation. Johnson’s attempts to forge an Anglo-American-French-Japanese diplomatic coalition were unsuccessful. France didn’t want to oppose its Russian ally and all were more concerned with securing their sometimes mutually exclusive interests. The end result was the Scramble for China: diplomats divided this large and ancient nation, brought to its knees by aggressive European imperialism and its own internal problems, by drawing lines on a map. All of this was formalized by the signing of the 1918 Treaty of St. Petersburg with China, weak and divided as it was, being powerless to stop it. Russia was the big winner.
Russia formally annexed Xinjiang Province, also known as Chinese Turkestan, and split it in two: the north became the Dzungar Oblast and the South the Tarim Oblast. Russia also directly annexed Outer Mongolia, which became the Mongol Governorate. Manchuria had already been part of St. Petersburg’s sphere of influence, but this was now made official by the establishment of a formal protectorate over this entire region that was almost twice the size of France and had a population of about 15 million. Russia built roads, bridges, railroads, canals, ports, water works, and communications networks to modernize Manchuria, enabling the de facto colonial economic exploitation of the latter by the former. Most important was Manchuria’s potential for coal and steel production, but industrial centres produced more than just that: aircraft, automobiles, trucks, dyes, inks, electrical devices, fabrics, farm equipment, glass, mining equipment, locomotives, processed leather products, rubber products and so on. Control over Manchuria added an annual coal production of fifteen million tonnes to Russia’s own of 35 million tonnes; Manchurian steel production added half a million tonnes to Russia’s domestic production of 4.3 million tonnes.
Russia backed up the restoration of Qing rule, formally recognizing the Chinese Empire and interfering in the Warlord Era by favouring the Zhili clique over the other northern factions. The Zhili clique had been forced to share power with the Anhui clique, headed by Premier Duan Qirui, which was dominant in the Beiyang government. The Zhili clique, composed of military officers, felt discriminated by Duan in the area of appointments and promotions. Lacking strong bonds, they were more than willing to abandon and betray him. In the subsequent Zhili-Anhui War in 1919, multiple divisions loyal to the Zhili clique and trained as well as equipped by the Russians destroyed the forces of the Anhui clique and the other northern factions. Russia assisted with artillery support, aerial reconnaissance and a “volunteer” infantry division fighting on the front.
The Zhili clique controlled everything north of the Yellow River and its tributary the river Wei and could live with accepting the now fourteen-year old Emperor Puyi as a purely ceremonial figurehead (formally known as Qing Emperor by his era name Xuantong, which ironically meant “proclamation of unity”). General Cao Kun became the Prime Minister of the Chinese Empire and Zhang Xun, who’d launched the Qing restoration, was appointed Foreign Minister. The clique’s chief lieutenant and arguably the ablest strategist of China, Wu Peifu, was promoted to the rank of Marshal and became Minister of War.
Russia, Germany, France, Italy, Austria-Bohemia, Iran, Hungary and the Balkan powers (Yugoslavia, Romania, Greece, Bulgaria and Montenegro) quickly recognized Cao’s military dictatorship in the north as the official government of China and established formal diplomatic relations. Premier Cao’s regime now had international legitimacy and was the strongest of all the factions, but had to accept a hefty price in return for Russian assistance: through its protectorate over Manchuria, Russia had a decisive voice in finance, policing and government affairs of the restored Qing Dynasty. Like the Emperor, the generals in charge were all puppets who had to acquiesce to Russian domination; Qing controlled northern China became a satellite state.
The Republic of China persisted south of the Yellow River and still enjoyed the diplomatic recognition of the United States and Great Britain among others, but it too was a victim of Western imperialism. Tibet formally declared its independence from China, but merely exchanged Chinese for British rule: a British resident arrived in Lhasa and quickly concluded a treaty of protection, with the Dalai Lama, between the British Raj and Tibet. Troops of the British Indian Army arrived in Tibet, which was now one of the princely states and a buffer against Russian influence extending from Xinjiang in the north. Nepal and Bhutan were now effectively surrounded by British India and soon became vassal states and part of British India too. In eastern China, the provinces of Guangdong and Hunan became a British “area of interest” as a buffer to the crown colony of Hong Kong.
France concluded a treaty of protection with the Qing government in Beijing that gave it a protectorate over Guangxi, Yunnan and Guizhou, ignoring the government of the Republic of China in Nanjing. It acted as a buffer to French Indochina and was de facto part of it as the commanders of the French military presence there deferred to the Governor-General in Hanoi. France now possessed one third of all of China’s tin and manganese reserves and these were quickly under the control of French mining conglomerates. Crops that brought in good money such as tobacco and sugarcane also quickly fell to French control.
For Japan it made sense to establish a protectorate around their concession at Qingdao and so they did. Shandong Province was theirs after they reached an agreement with the British who had a naval base there called Port Edward, located at Weihaiwei. Britain gave up Weihaiwei, but easily enough obtained concessions for two new Royal Navy bases at Shanghai and Canton. Besides Shandong, Japanese also increased its control over Fujian, which was directly across the sea from their colony of Taiwan.
The Scramble for China was the depressing climax of the “Century of Humiliation.” This describes an era that had started with China’s defeat in the First Opium War in 1839, a period of intervention, subjugation and ultimately partition with the establishment of “protectorates” as a thin veil masking foreign colonial rule over large swathes of the country. By the time the process was completed around 1920, Russia had annexed 3.2 million square kilometres, an area six times the size of Germany. The revived Qing Empire north of the Yellow River was a vassal state to Russia. South of the Yellow River a bunch of Western protectorates were in fact colonies, which neither of the two Chinese governments had any real say over anymore whatsoever. The remaining Republican rump state de facto only controlled the Sichuan, Hubei, Jiangxi, Henan, Anhui and Jiangsu provinces. China had been carved like a turkey.
Chapter X: Scramble for China Pt.2, 1917-1920.
In July 1917 such a potential opportunity presented itself when Chinese General Zhang Xun launched a swift coup d’état to restore the Manchu monarchy by force of arms with support for the monarchy from certain groups such as ethnic Manchus and Mongols, believing the republican government discriminated against them. The Qing also enjoyed support among sections of the Han Chinese population as well, such as in north-eastern China. Many were disappointed about the Republican government’s inability to solve China’s problems. Finally, there were numerous reactionaries and disempowered ex-Qing officials who conspired to overthrow the Republic. As a result, pro-Qing restorationist groups, most notably the Royalist Party, remained an underrepresented, but powerful factor in Chinese politics during the 1910s. In the wake of the coup, several members of President Li Yuanhong’s government subsequently defected: former Qing war minister Wang Shizhen, civil affairs minister Zhu Jiabao, diplomat Xie Jieshi and Beiyang General Jiang Chaozong.
The restoration of the eleven-year old Puyi as Emperor of China was proclaimed on July 1st 1917 and Beijing’s capital police immediately submitted to this new government. President Li promptly fled and appointed Feng Zuozhang Acting President while Premier General Duan Qirui commanded military operations against Zhang Xun. Duan’s forces took control of the Beijing-Tianjin railway and stood poised to retake the capital as most of the Northern Army sided with the Republic against Zhang and the restoration.
The Conference of St. Petersburg would determine the division of China into spheres of influence and regulate trade (similar to how the Berlin Conference had formalized the Scramble for Africa). The matter had been set in motion by Russia’s decision to intervene in favour of the restoration of Puyi as Emperor of China, using its strength of over 150.000 troops in Manchuria to crush attempts by the Republican army to retake Beijing. Russian troop strength in Manchuria tripled to 450.000 men quickly, using the now complete Trans-Siberian Railway. The Japanese were alarmed because they believed this would be the beginning of a Russian invasion, moving troops to the Yalu River, which formed the border between Korea and China. Great Britain in turn was alarmed because Germany was trying to break its diplomatic isolation by supporting Russia, declaring it would go to war to assist the latter if need be. If this occurred, the provisions of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance would require Britain to go to war against Russia and Germany in Japan’s defence (the alliance agreement specified either signatory had to go to war if the other got involved in a war with two or more powers).
With the last major war still fresh in everyone’s memories, cooler heads prevailed and they responded to an American proposal for a conference. US President Charles Evans Hughes offered to mediate as he considered European plans for a more formal partition of China a threat to the US Open Door Policy: the United States diplomatic policy established in the late 19th century and the early 20th century that called for a system of equal trade and investment and to guarantee the territorial integrity of China. Fearing China “would be carved like a turkey at thanksgiving, as had already been done in Africa” US Secretary of State Hiram Johnson was sent to St. Petersburg by Hughes to defend the Open Door Policy. This would be Johnson’s baptism of fire and the result would be a mixed bag at best, which was most likely the reason why he wasn’t appointed Secretary of State again after Hughes’ re-election in 1920. Johnson had become Secretary of State in the first place because he’d helped Hughes win in California by a mere half percent of the vote, swinging its thirteen electoral votes to the Republican side in the 1916 Presidential Election. With 267 electoral votes to the 264 of Wilson, Hughes was the winner despite not winning the popular vote (this was the fourth time after 1824, 1876 and 1888 that this happened).
The St. Petersburg Conference was held at Peterhof Palace, the Russian equivalent to Versailles. The country it concerned, China, wasn’t even invited to attend. Meanwhile, Johnson’s diplomacy proved quite ineffective in the face of Russia’s refusal to give any guarantees of a gradual reduction its troop strength of nearly half a million men in Manchuria, which was amounted to a de facto military occupation. Johnson’s attempts to forge an Anglo-American-French-Japanese diplomatic coalition were unsuccessful. France didn’t want to oppose its Russian ally and all were more concerned with securing their sometimes mutually exclusive interests. The end result was the Scramble for China: diplomats divided this large and ancient nation, brought to its knees by aggressive European imperialism and its own internal problems, by drawing lines on a map. All of this was formalized by the signing of the 1918 Treaty of St. Petersburg with China, weak and divided as it was, being powerless to stop it. Russia was the big winner.
Russia formally annexed Xinjiang Province, also known as Chinese Turkestan, and split it in two: the north became the Dzungar Oblast and the South the Tarim Oblast. Russia also directly annexed Outer Mongolia, which became the Mongol Governorate. Manchuria had already been part of St. Petersburg’s sphere of influence, but this was now made official by the establishment of a formal protectorate over this entire region that was almost twice the size of France and had a population of about 15 million. Russia built roads, bridges, railroads, canals, ports, water works, and communications networks to modernize Manchuria, enabling the de facto colonial economic exploitation of the latter by the former. Most important was Manchuria’s potential for coal and steel production, but industrial centres produced more than just that: aircraft, automobiles, trucks, dyes, inks, electrical devices, fabrics, farm equipment, glass, mining equipment, locomotives, processed leather products, rubber products and so on. Control over Manchuria added an annual coal production of fifteen million tonnes to Russia’s own of 35 million tonnes; Manchurian steel production added half a million tonnes to Russia’s domestic production of 4.3 million tonnes.
Russia backed up the restoration of Qing rule, formally recognizing the Chinese Empire and interfering in the Warlord Era by favouring the Zhili clique over the other northern factions. The Zhili clique had been forced to share power with the Anhui clique, headed by Premier Duan Qirui, which was dominant in the Beiyang government. The Zhili clique, composed of military officers, felt discriminated by Duan in the area of appointments and promotions. Lacking strong bonds, they were more than willing to abandon and betray him. In the subsequent Zhili-Anhui War in 1919, multiple divisions loyal to the Zhili clique and trained as well as equipped by the Russians destroyed the forces of the Anhui clique and the other northern factions. Russia assisted with artillery support, aerial reconnaissance and a “volunteer” infantry division fighting on the front.
The Zhili clique controlled everything north of the Yellow River and its tributary the river Wei and could live with accepting the now fourteen-year old Emperor Puyi as a purely ceremonial figurehead (formally known as Qing Emperor by his era name Xuantong, which ironically meant “proclamation of unity”). General Cao Kun became the Prime Minister of the Chinese Empire and Zhang Xun, who’d launched the Qing restoration, was appointed Foreign Minister. The clique’s chief lieutenant and arguably the ablest strategist of China, Wu Peifu, was promoted to the rank of Marshal and became Minister of War.
Russia, Germany, France, Italy, Austria-Bohemia, Iran, Hungary and the Balkan powers (Yugoslavia, Romania, Greece, Bulgaria and Montenegro) quickly recognized Cao’s military dictatorship in the north as the official government of China and established formal diplomatic relations. Premier Cao’s regime now had international legitimacy and was the strongest of all the factions, but had to accept a hefty price in return for Russian assistance: through its protectorate over Manchuria, Russia had a decisive voice in finance, policing and government affairs of the restored Qing Dynasty. Like the Emperor, the generals in charge were all puppets who had to acquiesce to Russian domination; Qing controlled northern China became a satellite state.
The Republic of China persisted south of the Yellow River and still enjoyed the diplomatic recognition of the United States and Great Britain among others, but it too was a victim of Western imperialism. Tibet formally declared its independence from China, but merely exchanged Chinese for British rule: a British resident arrived in Lhasa and quickly concluded a treaty of protection, with the Dalai Lama, between the British Raj and Tibet. Troops of the British Indian Army arrived in Tibet, which was now one of the princely states and a buffer against Russian influence extending from Xinjiang in the north. Nepal and Bhutan were now effectively surrounded by British India and soon became vassal states and part of British India too. In eastern China, the provinces of Guangdong and Hunan became a British “area of interest” as a buffer to the crown colony of Hong Kong.
France concluded a treaty of protection with the Qing government in Beijing that gave it a protectorate over Guangxi, Yunnan and Guizhou, ignoring the government of the Republic of China in Nanjing. It acted as a buffer to French Indochina and was de facto part of it as the commanders of the French military presence there deferred to the Governor-General in Hanoi. France now possessed one third of all of China’s tin and manganese reserves and these were quickly under the control of French mining conglomerates. Crops that brought in good money such as tobacco and sugarcane also quickly fell to French control.
For Japan it made sense to establish a protectorate around their concession at Qingdao and so they did. Shandong Province was theirs after they reached an agreement with the British who had a naval base there called Port Edward, located at Weihaiwei. Britain gave up Weihaiwei, but easily enough obtained concessions for two new Royal Navy bases at Shanghai and Canton. Besides Shandong, Japanese also increased its control over Fujian, which was directly across the sea from their colony of Taiwan.
The Scramble for China was the depressing climax of the “Century of Humiliation.” This describes an era that had started with China’s defeat in the First Opium War in 1839, a period of intervention, subjugation and ultimately partition with the establishment of “protectorates” as a thin veil masking foreign colonial rule over large swathes of the country. By the time the process was completed around 1920, Russia had annexed 3.2 million square kilometres, an area six times the size of Germany. The revived Qing Empire north of the Yellow River was a vassal state to Russia. South of the Yellow River a bunch of Western protectorates were in fact colonies, which neither of the two Chinese governments had any real say over anymore whatsoever. The remaining Republican rump state de facto only controlled the Sichuan, Hubei, Jiangxi, Henan, Anhui and Jiangsu provinces. China had been carved like a turkey.
