Who would the Qing Dynasty have sided with in World War I and what will be the effects?

Who would the Qing Dynasty have sided with during World War I?

  • Entente

    Votes: 34 39.1%
  • Central Powers

    Votes: 20 23.0%
  • Neutral

    Votes: 33 37.9%

  • Total voters
    87
(I know the first half of this may seem irrelevant, but I think it's important to explain the history of China during the war for some context)

In our timeline, starting on August 6th 1914, the Republic of China proclaimed neutrality in World War I. However, there were several politicians (which included officials left over from the Qing era) who believed that involvement in the war could help boost Chinese prestige in the world. In January 1915, Japan used it's position as one of the Allies to not only keep troops in formerly German Qingdao, but also send 21 Demands to Yuan Shikai, which not only reinforced Japanese control over China, but in exchange, the Japanese would help Yuan Shikai become Emperor. Yuan accepted the demands, but the demands and Yuan's acceptance of them were met by a outraged Chinese public. In November 1915, the Second Chinese Empire was declared with Yuan as Emperor, but the Chinese public was outraged, leading to the National Protection War. The negative public reception also convinced the Japanese to change course and begin supporting the republicans. Yuan would abdicate in March 1916. His death created a large power vacuum, which led to his former generals becoming warlords of their own cliques.

Involvement of the war became a divisive issue among the cliques with the Anhui supporting involvement, but the Zhili wanted restraint. After a second failed restoration of the throne engineered by Zhang Xun which ended in Duan Qirui's Anhui Republican Army overthrowing Zhang, Duan effectively took over Beijing and declared war on the Central Powers on August 14th 1917.

In 1918, in response to the Bolshevik Revolution, Duan would sign the Sino-Japanese Agreement of Joint Defence Against Enemies with Japan, which enabled Japan to extend it's military presence in China, mainly Manchuria.

But let's say that none of this happened. The Qing Dynasty was able to survive the 1911 Xinhai Revolution with the child emperor still on the throne, wielding absolute authority. The Qing Dynasty is able to survive into August 1914, when World War I begins.

As I said before, when the Xinhai Revolution resulted in the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty, many of the officials who wanted China to pick a side in the war were leftovers from the Qing era. With that being said, who does the Qing Dynasty support? The Central Powers or the Entente? Or do they remain neutral to avoid further humiliation at the hands of the Europeans, but they're forced to contend with Japanese imperialism as the ROC was in our timeline? If they do choose a side of the war, what would be the effects of siding with either the victors or the losers?
 
Probably the same calculus applies. They lean towards the Entente as the Central Powers have far less ability to protect their possessions in China. They might even leap in early, throwing the Beiyang army at Qingdao if they thought that they could beat the Japanese to it. The Qing are not in any possession to fight the Entente, being literally surrounded on all sides.


They would use the war as a chance to quietly consolidate and resolve their internal struggle for leadership. One thing that's certain is that a surviving Qing will not be an absolute monarchy, at least in practice. Pu Yi would survive only on the sufferance of Yuan and other internal powerbrokers; they will rule China. The test will be if they can keep the provincial leaders on side.

If they join the Entente they might try and seize Central Powers investments as an easy source of 1: popular prestige, 2: economic relief and 3: pushback against the unequal treaties.
 
Probably the same calculus applies. They lean towards the Entente as the Central Powers have far less ability to protect their possessions in China. They might even leap in early, throwing the Beiyang army at Qingdao if they thought that they could beat the Japanese to it. The Qing are not in any possession to fight the Entente, being literally surrounded on all sides.


They would use the war as a chance to quietly consolidate and resolve their internal struggle for leadership. One thing that's certain is that a surviving Qing will not be an absolute monarchy, at least in practice. Pu Yi would survive only on the sufferance of Yuan and other internal powerbrokers; they will rule China. The test will be if they can keep the provincial leaders on side.

If they join the Entente they might try and seize Central Powers investments as an easy source of 1: popular prestige, 2: economic relief and 3: pushback against the unequal treaties.

If the Qing join the entente, what might happen at Versailles assuming the rest of the war goes like OTL? How would keeping a bunch of cities of your nominal ally's people gel with the whole 'self determination' thing? I know that IOTL they just ignored any African or Asian requests that they be given self determination, but it might be harder to ignore the point if it gets brought up by a sovereign nation.

On the main point, I think a big part of this question depends on how the Qing survive, and by extension, who is in charge.

If it's the Guangxu emperor not getting poisoned by Cixi, then I think there's a decent chance that China joins the Entente like SenatorChickpea. He definitely had no love lost for the Germans, and given that he based his reforms on the Meiji Restoration he probably wasn't too opposed to a friendship with Japan and Britain.

If it's Pu Yi as emperor, then it falls more to whoever is actually in charge. If the 1911 revolution doesn't happen, then that's likely Yikuang. Yikuang was friendly to foreigners, and he had a good head on his shoulders for diplomacy. He would probably side with the Entente or keep the Qing neutral (like actually neutral, not signing on to become a Japanese puppet neutral).

Of course, if Yuan Shikai takes the reigns of prime minister after crushing the 1911 revolt, then he might very well pull the same thing he did as president IOTL and try to get Japanese backing to overthrow Pu Yi and set up his own dynasty. Going from a monarchy to another monarchy might be more palatable to the Chinese populace than going from a republic to a monarchy, or things might play out like IOTL.
 
Versailles will be interesting, no doubt about it. I can't see China getting major concessions, because they're simply too weak to demand them and unlikely to have made enough of an impact on the war to convince their allies that they've paid for them in blood.
If they're fast enough to take Qingdao, then they might keep it on grounds of possession- though the Japanese will demand something else in its stead, either in the form of more Pacific mandates, some kind of racial equality clause or possibly even a tacit allied blessing to an attempt to hold part of the Russian Far East (assuming the civil war proceeds as per OTL.)

If they don't get concessions, then you see something along the lines of the May 1919 movement though perhaps manifested the KMT rather than the communists.
If the Qing manage to come back with some kind of symbolic victory, that will do a lot to secure their legitimacy.

Far more important though is whether they've managed to rebuild any kind of authority over wider China. 1911 was in some respects a recognition of the growing gap between Beijing's de jure and de facto control of regional China. Provincial elites were pretty independent.
If the war has given the Qing a chance to show China that they're wielding actual authority, ideally with a victory over a Western power, then this will help them immensely; but I don't think the government survives unless it widens its base of elite support, and depending on who's in charge that may not happen. Yuan certainly wasn't known for playing nice with others.
 
Because the Manchus were deeply unpopular, and by the twentieth century had conspicuously failed to catch the wave of nationalism sweeping China? Pu Yi was a young 'foreign' Monarch of no great charisma or talent.

Hence why I stressed how any surviving Qing dynasty will have to work very hard to shore up its legitimacy- because even in the event the regime lasts, the actual dynasty is so weak- toxic, in fact- that the powers behind the scene might well decide to remove them anyway.
 

raharris1973

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For some reason, I think the Dowager Empress or a spiritual successor of hers could be more prone to siding with the Germans and Central Powers to get revenge against the other foreigners.

I think if the Qing dynasty perhaps hobbled along without facing the Boxer rebellion and then the smackdown by the world powers might have some more fight left in it and might see the Central Powers as a tool to weaken its most dangerous colonizers. The Boxer Suppression both took alot of the fight (against foreigners) out of China and harmed Qing dynasty legitimacy internally.
 
Joining the CP would seem to be the biggest risk but also have the potential for the biggest gain. They could potentially get Germany and AH to renounce unequal treaties in exchange for their help once the war has gone to attrition and the CPs know they can’t win cleanly, while victorious CPs can also force Russia, France, and Italy to renounce unequal treaties and they can claim that they will force Britain and Japan to as well (which obviously won’t happen) when they win. They can also try to get territory from Britain, France, Russia, and Japan in basically every direction. They would also be siding with their fellow monarchs, and be able to spite more foreigners.

I would imagine that China’s Army will be in no position to fight all across its border. How many troops could they hope to tie down in Burma, Indochina, Manchuria, and their gigantic border with Russia? Mostly low quality colonial troops and Japan I would think. But given China’s terrible infrastructure, massive manpower reserves, and huge size, it might not be easy to actually take China with Germany/AH/OE taking everything the Allies had in the OTL besides Japan. Which also makes me wonder how it would effect the Allies economically if they had to finance a war against China from 1915-1917 without the US. Japan is no doubt stronger than China, but can the Allies actually finance this war without the US?
 
Yes, they can finance it.

China was completely dependent upon foreign capital- from New York, Berlin, Paris, St Petersburg and above all, London. Only one of those financial centres would even theoretically be prepared to extend loans in this situation, but that's irrelevant given that Berlin would be in no position to actually get China the money.
If they start at war against all their neighbors, the provincial leaders will simply ignore what amounts to a directive to destroy the nation- and their own personal fiefdoms.

The Qing fall right quick.
 
It would be interesting to see if CP China is more like Romania and quickly implodes, or becomes the Ottoman style pain that just clings on after years of taking a beating.
 
China was too fractured to do something, even if chose entente might amount to nothing, specially Tsingtao might still be japanese
 
Central Powers. This only works if the Qing is industrializing and the Kaiser sees them as a source for German Business. The Chinese need technology and where better to get it from than Germany. Furthermore, an industrializing China will worry Britain, France, and Russia the most
 
It would be interesting to see if CP China is more like Romania and quickly implodes, or becomes the Ottoman style pain that just clings on after years of taking a beating.

This would be a interesting TL tough, Qing China surviving years of war until just have nothing to put a fight. (Ottoman-like)

This sounds very plausible, like the ottomans, they are surrounded by all sides, but have a respectable manpower to deal with it. I think would be great an Atatürk-like person taking command in the post-war. Anzacs smelling blood in an Guangzhou Campaign? :p
 
Central Powers. This only works if the Qing is industrializing and the Kaiser sees them as a source for German Business. The Chinese need technology and where better to get it from than Germany. Furthermore, an industrializing China will worry Britain, France, and Russia the most
That might sound doable considering China's hostility to Japan and Japan being with the Entente, though the question is, will Qing China focus on the North against Russia and Japan? or in the South against the Western Allies?
 
Central Powers. This only works if the Qing is industrializing and the Kaiser sees them as a source for German Business. The Chinese need technology and where better to get it from than Germany. Furthermore, an industrializing China will worry Britain, France, and Russia the most

And die quickly as it is surrounded by enemies. The British , French and Russians pick some Chinese warlord to back, give him money and some weapons and a new government comes into being.
 
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