WI: Chinese Muslim terrorists?

We got Uighur terrorists in Xinjiang... But is it possible for Chinese Muslims (Hui) to form terrorist organizations, probably with Taliban support, and form their own state, centered in Qinghai/Gansu/Ningxia/Xinjiang? (Much like the Xibei San Ma)
 
Pick from the Pack

Uighurs are sufficiently far enough away from metropolitan Chinese society that they don't feel near the heat that say, Falun Gong or other movements that the Chinese internal security forces figure might catch on in the Han population. AFAIK the Hui don't proselytize much and keep to themselves.
Other factors keep the PRC from antagonizing them, as they try to keep Pakistan onside as their buddy and try not to appear to actively anti-Muslim, just interested in maintaining domestic order by squishing all opponents.

Unlike the Stalinist repressions in Russia, the Maoists didn't go on quite the rampage against Chinese Buddhist and Taoist temples and religious figures that the Soviets did in the USSR. It didn't hurt that the Muslims never seriously opposed the Communists during the Civil War and many Hui fought in the PLA, so Muslim mosques and clergy were largely left alone. The Maoists preserved the structures as part of Chinese cultural heritage and felt that people would grow out of such superstitious stuff and pursued a live and let live relationship with clergy and religious groups that didn't oppose the regime AFTER the Cultural Revolution, where any deviation from Maoist doctrine was anathema.
Christian missionaries have historically been considered Trojan horses for European colonization in thought as well as Chinese territory, so that's why Christian missionaries get hassled as vigorously as they are in China.
I don't excuse it, that's just why it happens.

So as to the Hui being radicalized, you have to give them a serious bitch with the powers-that-be, a clear cadre of leadership making that bitch known in the ulemma and organizing domestically and abroad to oppose the regime. You could have a crazy Muslim cult spring up that ends up getting crushed like the Davidians in Waco or Aum Shirinkyo in Japan but I don't see a mass movement springing up.

One problem with that is that the Chinese whatever their political flavor historically do NOT tolerate anyone close agitating against their regime.
A separate Muslim enclave that tried actual defiance would be stomped so hard it'd make Tibet look like a day in the park, atrocities be damned and NOBODY in the area would feel froggy enough to oppose it. The Russians wouldn't. They've got enough issues with Muslims in the Near Abroad as it is, and might invade the local stan's to "restore order" as well. Pakistan's isolated enough as it is and needs the Chinese as a counterweight to India and wouldn't say boo.
The US might make some vague noises about it being a shame but I don't see us going to war over it, especially if the Chinese authorities frame the Hui activists as terrorists.

The Hui know this and don't want to test that theory. They're making money and getting by like everyone else in China. When everyone else in China gets hassled, then they might join the movement, but it won't be Muslim-only IMO. YMMV. Keep in mind, enough Uighur and Hui have traveled and seen what it's
like in Tazhikstan, Afghanistan, etc and figure they've got a much better deal in PRC, but hey, when you've convinced yourself anything short of living by sharia
is unacceptable, then you might see some activism.
 
Last edited:
The Hui are for the most part just Chinese people that happen to be Muslims. They're more Sinic than the Manchu, Mongols, Zhuang, Miao, Yi and many other Chinese minority groups. They're an unlikely candidate for rebellion.
 
Unlike the Stalinist repressions in Russia, the Maoists didn't go on quite the rampage against Chinese Buddhist and Taoist temples and religious figures that the Soviets did in the USSR.

The cultural loss in China was far more severe than in Russia.

Maoist rampages during the cultural revolution razed many Taoist and Buddhist sites (stupas, shrines etc) to their foundations. Also, religous art, scrolls and other artifacts were systematicaly collected and destroyed. Maoists even searched private homes for religous items (something rarely done in Stalinist Russia).

Unlike the Maoists, Stalinist Russia did not systematically destroy religous structures. Rather, the structures were usually kept intact and converted into communist meeting halls, lenin "libraries", prisons etc. Though some valuable religous artifacts were broken up and sold abroad to fund communist projects and some icons destroyed as "lessons" to the peasants, most religous items were not systematically destroyed. Instead, they were collected and tossed into store rooms, displayed as part of communist propaganda in museums of atheism etc.

It didn't hurt that the Muslims never seriously opposed the Communists during the Civil War and many Hui fought in the PLA,

Most of the Hui moslems were allied with the Nationalists, not the communists. The Communist Western Route Army (including the famous women's regiment) was destroyed and the survivors enslaved by the Hui muslim warlords of the Ma (Mandarin reference to Mohamad) clan. Ma regiments also attacked Mao's army as soon as it emerged from Tibetan areas during the Long March.

What may have redeemed Hui Muslims in communist eyes was that they were also violently opposed to seperatism. The same Ma clan that fought the red army, also fought and brutalized Tibetan and Turkic muslim seperatists.
 

Laurentia

Banned
A Taliban funded Chinese Muslim state in central China is about as likely as Colorado one day telling the United States fuck off and leaving the Union under the control of Osama Bin Laden's ghost.
 
We got Uighur terrorists in Xinjiang... But is it possible for Chinese Muslims (Hui) to form terrorist organizations, probably with Taliban support, and form their own state, centered in Qinghai/Gansu/Ningxia/Xinjiang? (Much like the Xibei San Ma)

These terrorists will be repressed on a scale and with a ferocity that will bring them down very quickly. The PLA and the various secret police forces will use methods similar to the NKVD of Staline at it worst.

In a country , where the Familial Planning is authorize to steal not autorized children from their parents, so what do you think they will do the terrorists, their families, or their friends ?
 
A Taliban funded Chinese Muslim state in central China is about as likely as Colorado one day telling the United States fuck off and leaving the Union under the control of Osama Bin Laden's ghost.

This. Now end the thread.
 
Han Chinese Muslims are quite well integrated. They may be the most successfully assimilated Muslims anywhere. There are a large number of ethnic Muslims in China who long abandoned the religion. It's said that Hu and Ma are both Islamic names, with the former meaning Hussein and the latter Mohammed. Hu Jintao, the leader of China and Ma Ying-joeu the leader of Taiwan likely both have Muslim ancestors.
 
Han Chinese Muslims are quite well integrated. They may be the most successfully assimilated Muslims anywhere. There are a large number of ethnic Muslims in China who long abandoned the religion. It's said that Hu and Ma are both Islamic names, with the former meaning Hussein and the latter Mohammed. Hu Jintao, the leader of China and Ma Ying-joeu the leader of Taiwan likely both have Muslim ancestors.

That's exactly right. Besides, it's pretty hard to practice religion in China anyway.
 
Historically China was religiously tolerant, combined with geographic distance probably assisted assimilation. The Jews assimilated completely. One of my friends is Chinese Jew by ancestory. Chinese Muslims are rather like American Jews. Some still practice their religion, but many do not and are indistinguishable from other Chinese other than the surname.

Sometimes you can't even tell by surname. The captain of China's new aircraft carrier is an ethnic Muslim, but his surname is Li. Like American Jews, many Chinese Muslims changed their names.
 
Last edited:
Top