WI: Chinese victory in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895)

What if Qing empress Cixi had decided to invest on the military rather than in reforming the imperial palace in 1891, giving the chinese navy more of a winning chance in the First Sino-Japanese War?
Could the chinese defeat the japanese? If so, then what are the consequences?
Would Korea remain a nominally-independent chinese vassal? Would this be better or worse for the korean population than OTL's japanese occupation?
With a lucky and prestigious victory, would Cixi decide to implement government reforms?
Will the Boxer War be butterflied away?
With a slightly stronger China, will Russia still decide to move into Manchuria as in OTL?
And what are the long-term consequences for China? I'd assume that a stabler late Qing regime leads to no Xinhai Revolution, thus no Yuan Shikai period, no Warlord Period, no Second Sino-Japanese War, no 1940's Civil War, and no Mao, thus, allowing China to get much more powerful, and earlier than OTL.
 
Cixi is too concerned with her own power instead of caring for the Empire.
Personally I don't think Manchus would ever make Chinese military stronger since that would destabilize their rule.

I think Korea would be better under China than Japan, but that makes me a traitor, oh well.
 
Given how the "Qing China failed in reforms" argument is completely based upon the Sino-Japanese War, a victory would really be a strong prestige-boosting event for the reformists within the court. This however, doesn't mean China becomes OTL Japan--Qing China has a host of her own problems she will have to deal with eventually. However, by silencing the Han nationalists with a victory, this most likely means a much stronger Imperial China that doesn't waste her time tearing herself apart from the Taiping Rebellion to the Cultural Revolution.
 
Cixi suddenly changing her priorities may give the Empire some advantage, but the problem in the Qing goes away beyond that.

That said, okay the Beiyang Fleet has ammunition, but unlike the IJN it lacks proper training and discipline, expect TTL Yalu River to not be a one-sided stomp, but the Chinese win through sheer firepower, one still the problem with the land war, where Li Hongzhang's Anhui (?) Army was defeated by the Japanese in Pyongyang, this shows another sign of Chinese weakness that needs to be remedied. Immediate consequences is: some unrest in Japan, the Meiji Restoration taxes the Japanese citizen heavily, in exchange people wanted some foreign success, so we probably have Japan slowing down its modernization/industrialization for time being. On the Chinese side, as I said the problems goes beyond that, the Manchus surely got a breathing space, but that is not enough.

To some extant you have some reforms showed success and if we get really optimistic we can get something like the New Policies 10 year earlier, but the rampant corruption that existed in the Qing are still there and most importantly, didn't I say that the Japanese were heavily taxed heavily and caused some unrest, well there was the same in China, heck it was the main cause of the Boxer's Rebellion, so even defeating Japan going full reform (like the Hundred Days) will probably end the Dynasty as well, so you need to take it easy, unlike Japan the Qing has the "small" problem of having a mostly foreign ruling class over 99% of native Chinese, the even bigger problem: to be somewhat successful the Manchus need to give power to the Han, which mind you they actually did in OTL (the New Armies, the Assemblies, sending students abroad), however they need to give the Han some reasons to why they shouldn't overthrown them like in Xinhai, defeating the Japanese shows that the regime isn't a joke like in OTL, but that wouldn't last long, which leads us to...

"With a slightly stronger China, will Russia still decide to move into Manchuria as in OTL?"
Yes they would, the Russians still have interests in Manchuria and Korea, and so far so long the Chinese haven't beaten an European power, here is the chance of the Qing to prove themselves and it could end up badly, unlike the Russo-Japanese war there are multiple fronts for the Chinese to fight and the Russians would have much less problem deploying armies in Xinjiang than in Manchuria (someone has good info on this?) and the Chinese have a rather short time (around 10 years) to learn from the mistakes from the war with Japan, as I said the land performance was as bad as the navy, and the only forces during the late Qing era that showed some competence were the Muslims which one their leaders (Ma Something, don't recall lol) was deeply xenophobic (he even refused to dress his soldiers in western fashion) so... the Qing needs a new competent force. Granted if you have a Russo-Japanese War-style performance from the Russians the Qing can win, albeit barely.

"Would Korea remain a nominally-independent chinese vassal? Would this be better or worse for the korean population than OTL's japanese occupation?"
Definitely better, though the status of Korea as a "vassal" was pretty much gone by then (Japan already opened Korea in the 60s), but the whole thing in Korea would be interesting, Queen Min probably don't get killed as the Japanese wouldn't de facto control Seoul and there is no Korean Empire in the short term, but we could have something like the Gwangmu Reform being kickstarted anyway, but I know shit about Korea there so I'll end here.

"And what are the long-term consequences for China?"
IMO? A lot can happen, the Qing may get stomped by the Russians, get a even worse deal than Shimonoseki (there is probably no Triple Intervention-esque help) and collapse anyway, even if they win and for the third time, modernization and reform is a painful process, particularly for a country so fragile like the 1894 Qing Empire, you could get something like the Boxers due to the radical and brutal transformations in Chinese society (albeit if the Qing isn't in a sad state like post-Shimonoseki the rebellion may not be as visceral as OTL), and above all there is no guarantee that Cixi would go in the path of modernization (though she could, in the aftermath of Boxers she probably was the dynasty's most successful reformer) she may very well not give a shit.

Hope I made some sense in all that rabble, my wall of text-making skills are awful.
 
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