WI: China Joins USSR (Soviet Republic of China)

I personally think it's an interesting timeline but I'm still confused as to why a few of the commentors, including yourself, continue to mention Russian-Ethnocentrism as a hurddle to this ATL?

Stalin was a freakin' Georgian after all? Why would he give a rats butt (and in stalinist russia his opinion is the only one that mattered) about White Russian ethno-hegemony if he as per the OP had a chance to bring Chinese manpower in to the soviet sphere permanently.

I think it is less about Russian-Ethnocentrism and more about keeping the Chinese Happy, remember also that when I mean "Russian" I also count Ukrainians and Georgians (both of whom had the top job) in that since those who came from those parts and ran the USSR considered themselves as such*

However due to their shear numbers alone, the Chinese will dominate although there is nothing on paper stopping a Russian from leading it (they might need to have a very good understanding of Chinese culture)

*I am not using Soviet since it refers to everyone in the USSR (ITTL) including the Chinese
 
Stalin may have been Georgian, but at heart he was a Russian nationalist. He reversed Lenin's policy of each nation having it's own cultural practices in favor of a policy of promoting Russian culture and language. He even carried out ethnic cleansings against several minority communities.

He was even opposed to having a USSR in the first place and rather wanted the RSFSR covering the OTL USSR area instead. If it does happen then yes he would definitely want the Chinese to dominate. After his death however that will gradually change...
 
I personally think it's an interesting timeline but I'm still confused as to why a few of the commentors, including yourself, continue to mention Russian-Ethnocentrism as a hurddle to this ATL?

Stalin was a freakin' Georgian after all? Why would he give a rats butt (and in stalinist russia his opinion is the only one that mattered) about White Russian ethno-hegemony if he as per the OP had a chance to bring Chinese manpower in to the soviet sphere permanently.

Stalin was an ethnic Georgian. Culturally and politically he was completely Russian and did everything he could to increase Russian power.

Also, even if the leadership if the Communist Party was some sort of enlightened internationalist clique - which they weren't - they aren't going to last long when the military and other less "enlightened" Russians find that they've basically given away their nation to the Chinese. How many countries can you think of today which would like to be annexed by China and become a tiny minority?
 
What if it's a local Chinese Soviet Republic, joint on land with the USSR, and joins the USSR? More possible than not. In fact, think China was very lucky to have avoided such a situation IOTL.

You can have
1) a state occupying the Northeast (Manchuria) named Chinese Soviet Republic, or
2) a Chinese Soviet Republic comprising Northwest provinces like Gansu, Shaanxi, and Ningxia after Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia were already annexed by the Soviet Union.
or
3) both.
Or basically, just a Czarist Empire 2.0 in Asia (In addition with southern Xinjiang and a couple Northwestern provinces.)
541px-Russian_Empire_(orthographic_projection).svg.png
 
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While admittedly more feasible politically, as per the ATL I'm proposing, if the Bolsheviks were to be the driving force of the Chinese revolution instead of Mao, I highly doubt splitting up China, which the imperial powers had done through out the Qing Dynasty, would have left a good impression of the Chinese communists.

Maybe a Tibetan SSR may be feasible, but I think a united Chinese SSR was the only way the Bolesheviks could maintain the hearts and minds of the Chinese population and nomenklatura
 
While admittedly more feasible politically, as per the ATL I'm proposing, if the Bolsheviks were to be the driving force of the Chinese revolution instead of Mao, I highly doubt splitting up China, which the imperial powers had done through out the Qing Dynasty, would have left a good impression of the Chinese communists.

Maybe a Tibetan SSR may be feasible, but I think a united Chinese SSR was the only way the Bolesheviks could maintain the hearts and minds of the Chinese population and nomenklatura

A united one won't work. Once again it would be the largest SSR in population by a long shot. Thus, the Chinese would totally dominate the USSR, which the Russians are not going to let them do.
 
Stalin may have been Georgian, but at heart he was a Russian nationalist. He reversed Lenin's policy of each nation having it's own cultural practices in favor of a policy of promoting Russian culture and language. He even carried out ethnic cleansings against several minority communities.

Stalin was an ethnic Georgian. Culturally and politically he was completely Russian and did everything he could to increase Russian power.

Also, even if the leadership if the Communist Party was some sort of enlightened internationalist clique - which they weren't - they aren't going to last long when the military and other less "enlightened" Russians find that they've basically given away their nation to the Chinese. How many countries can you think of today which would like to be annexed by China and become a tiny minority?


Right, but if the goal is Worldwide revolution?...
 
A united one won't work. Once again it would be the largest SSR in population by a long shot. Thus, the Chinese would totally dominate the USSR, which the Russians are not going to let them do.

They would however lose that battle eventually and the USSR would be a Chinese led one.
 
Elaborate?

You need to break China up essentially. It's kinda like the equivalent of asking countries like the United States and France to fuse together. Both are allies and have some common beliefs in ideology, but they are two very different cultures with very different history, language etc that wouldn't want to take a back seat to one another.
 
Okay, so here's the thing. The Soviet Union was not originally intended to be merely the Russian Empire draped in red bunting. It was a union of allied socialist states intended to be a prototype world government. That goal was forgotten very quickly, but it's kind of the whole raison d'etre of the union treaty.

You only get a Chinese Soviet Socialist Republic in a TL where the Soviet Union had already greatly expanded beyond the borders of the Russian Empire. So, a successful German Revolution and other eastern European states that ratify the union treaty, making the Soviet Union more like the EU with teeth.
 
Okay, so here's the thing. The Soviet Union was not originally intended to be merely the Russian Empire draped in red bunting. It was a union of allied socialist states intended to be a prototype world government. That goal was forgotten very quickly, but it's kind of the whole raison d'etre of the union treaty.

You only get a Chinese Soviet Socialist Republic in a TL where the Soviet Union had already greatly expanded beyond the borders of the Russian Empire. So, a successful German Revolution and other eastern European states that ratify the union treaty, making the Soviet Union more like the EU with teeth.


Even in 1920, though, the idea of a soviet federation embracing , say, central Europe, was already being discounted by Stalin. To quote an old soc.history.what-if post of mine:

***

As Robert Service notes in his *Stalin: A Biography* (pp. 179-80) this
question was being debated in the summer of 1920--not only for Poland but
for Germany as well--by Lenin and Stalin:

"Stalin and Lenin also undertook preliminary planning for the kind of
Europe they expected to organise when socialist seizures of power took
place. Their grandiose visions take the breath away. Before the Second
Comintern Congress, Lenin urged the need for a general federation
including Germany, and he made clear that he wanted the economy of such a
federation to be 'administered from a single organ.' Stalin rejected this
as impractical:

'If you think you'd ever get Germany to enter a federation with the same
rights as Ukraine, you are mistaken. If you think that even Poland, which
has been constituted as a bourgeois state with all its attributes, would
enter the Union with the same rights as Ukraine you are mistaken.'

"Lenin was angry. The implications of Stalin's comment was that
considerations of national pride would impel Russia and Germany to remain
separate states for the foreseeable future. Lenin sent him a 'threatening
letter' which charged him with chauvinism. It was Lenin's objective to
set up a Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia. His vision of
'European socialist revolution' was unchanged since 1917. But Stalin held
his ground. The Politburo had to acknowledge the realities of nationhood
if the spread of socialism in Europe was to be a success.

"These discussions were hypothetical since the Red Army had not yet
reached Poland, far less set up a revolutionary government in Warsaw..."
 
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