WI: Empress Cixi dies in 1881 instead of Ci'an.

An idea I drew from a previous thread of mine.

So in 1881, right after installing her nephew as Emperor Guangxu, Empress Dowager Cixi got ill, what prevented her from participating in the earlier regency. However, what if she died there, instead of Empress Ci'an, the main wifr of Emperor Xianfeng that died in the same year from an aparent stroke (theories that Cixi killed her are considered false).

So, now it's question time! Is it possible for Prince Gong to get the regency? Details about Ci'an don't describe her as a political ambitious woman, preferring to restrict herself to family affairs, so he could get a shoot. With Cixi out of the window, who is more likely becoming the "face" of the conservative faction at the court? And the main one, assuming Gong does get a favorable place in the regency, how could it influence the War with France (The Qing did kinda well there... relative to the other wars, and the fact that the French had little enthusiasm for the whole deal)?

So, thoughs?
 
I'll answer relating to what I know: the Sino-French war.

This war will probably happen at some point. Even if IOTL it was the result of Henri Riviere's foolhardy expedition in Tonkin, the forces behind were very strong: Indochina was now a French sphere of influence and the Chinese influence will have to be shaken off at some point.

Given the understandable reluctance of the Vietnamese court to completely submit to French domination, they tried to find other ways to free their shackles. Historically that meant asking Big Brother if they could help.

If a war breaks out (likely given the jingoism of the time and the thirst for glory in the French officer corps), the Chinese are in a good position since they know the terrain and that it's simply a very defensible terrain with a lot of possibility for ambush (the paper bridge embush for example). Of course, if Ferry in the chamber isn't as convincing, the war could turn better for the Chinese but that's another question.

The French in this case also had to deal with men dropping like flies due to fever and with... interesting supply lines with a partisan/guerilla war at their back given the state of utter anarchy of the Tonkin region at this point. The fact they came to pacify it was used extensively in propaganda after.

Anyway, my point is that some kind of conflict is likely to break out and if it's of military nature, the Chinese WILL score some victories due to diseases, supply lines and better knowledge of the terrain.

There can be a PoD around what the French take of course. I always thought the Kwangtchéou concession was stupid. The French should have asked for Hainan, makes much more sense to get the whole bay
 
Yeah, I'm aware of it, the war was IMO a ticking bomb since the French got Conchichina.
Jus with Cochinchina it could have been contained but Garnier's expedition iin 1873 was the death knell of it.

Seriously though, a "Ferry has a heart attack" PoD would be very interesting
 
Jus with Cochinchina it could have been contained but Garnier's expedition iin 1873 was the death knell of it.

Seriously though, a "Ferry has a heart attack" PoD would be very interesting
Hmm, interesting. That said, the Sino-French War is just a detail in the WI, it's more focused on a Gong-lead Guangxu Regency. :p
 
So... anyone with a thoughts aside the Sino-French War? ;)
Well known nobody cares about those pesky natives in the background of any good story ;)

I have always wondered about Cixi. Was she a bad person or was she completely sheltered from reality?

The best computer cannot work without good data. That's actually very important in.determining any effect of her death
 
I have always wondered about Cixi. Was she a bad person or was she completely sheltered from reality?
Cixi was really just power hungry and protective of Manchu superiority. She didn't object to reform because it was reform, but that it threatened her superiority as a Manchu. Due to the fact that the later reforms often had Hans at their helm, Cixi would object to reform no matter what. And there's also the fact that, as usual for any higher up in the Chinese government, Cixi was amazingly corrupt.
 
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Cixi was really just power hungry and protective of Manchu superiority. She didn't object to reform because it was reform, but that it threatened her superiority as a Manchu. Due to the fact that the later reforms often had Hans at their helm, Cixi would object to reform no matter what. And there's also the fact that, as usual for any higher up in the Chinese government, Cixi was amazingly corrupt.
But did she know what was going on? Did she have any idea of the world shenlived in and the consequences of her action?
 
But did she know what was going on? Did she have any idea of the world shenlived in and the consequences of her action?
She did--at least in her earlier years. However, she was after all in a tough position, and one has to understand that her primary--and perhaps only goal was to maintain imperial rule. On one hand, she had to prevent the fall of the Qing to foreigners by supporting Prince Gong and his Han-dominated reformers; on the other hand, she had to protect the Manchu-ness of the dynasty and please the hardline Manchus who were extremely xenophobic and scared of progress.

My view is that to reform and modernize, it would be inevitable that the Manchus would lose their dominance, and thus Cixi viewed that as going too far especially when Kang Youwei--a Han became leader of the reformists.
 
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