If China gets Balkanized...

That's kind of a big pronouncement.

There would be competing orders, but not a singular dominant one. The only way China could ever collapse/balkanize is if the central order falls apart or factionalizes since the country is extremely centralized in terms of its administration.

Anything I've said on this thread only talks about what might happen AFTER said event were to occur. I'm not debating whether or not it will any time soon or whatever, but what occurs after the fact.

edited 3rd Nov '11 9:41:09 PM by FFShinra

Well in that case, if we look back in history, typically after a major collapse and the subsequent mass death and civil war that would occur, one power usually tends to dominate over all the others. One of the hundred or so ethnic/political groups is going to win and then reabsorb the rest of China. How long chaos lasts, I'm not sure, but it seems like these days, resolution of conflict happens faster. So a complete breakdown of China might only lead into 10-20 years of civil war (with who knows how many 100s of million dead).

From a modern perspective, unless China is awash with guns, it seems a safe bet that the strongest side will mop up the others handedly.

Which really means the cause of the breakdown and the way the breakdown occurs is important. I would tend think it is likely to end up like Turkey. Breakdown happens, the military holds all the cards, steps in, solidifies the borders (whatever they may be) and then reforms China. Then if they want to go after lost territories after that, they might do so.

Ten to twenty years isn't insignificant. Especially when active groups inside, as well as active powers outside, would rather see the western territories made independant. In essence, I'm suggesting that if China went under, the West and all close by powers would treat it like Yugoslavia was treated...the seceding constituent republics were immediately recognized as independant and immediately courted to give support to them and all the rest.

Yeah but unlike Yugoslavia, NATO can't dominate militarily in China.

Says who?

The Yugoslav Army was the third largest in all Europe at the time. The collapse of the state shattered that military. As such, if China too, is shattered, its fighting power will not be as strong as it would have been at its peak. There are also clandestine operations that should be taken into account a la Afghanistan, considering how relatively remote the breakaway regions would be.

Curios but wouldn't Taiwan, Mongolia, India, and other China neighbors try to make land grabs in the event of a Chinese collapse?

Taiwan would count its blessings and split off for good, I think. India could effectively grab Tibet, and the Russians would probably help Mongolia grab Inner Mongolia.

India would probably guarantee the independence of East Turkestan, to keep a buffer between themselves and an eventually reunited China.

India would only grab territory the Chinese took from them back in 1962, particularly both the Aksai Chin and Transkarakorm Tract (sold to the Chinese by Pakistan also in the 1960s) in Kashmir. Everything else is just a few kilometers square.

And they'd try to prop up Tibet, if only to ensure a puppet state. Central Asia with backing from Russia would back East Turkestan.

I doubt Russia would back Turkestan. They would back Mongolia is more like it. Backing Turkestan would be Russia backing a Chechnyan separatist ally.

If it helps insulate former Soviet Central Asia from Chinese influence, they would. It would also ingratiate them with the Muslim community at a shallower level.

More likely, they'd fear it would embolden the muslim separatist groups in their own country.

One of the main reasons China has such a good hold on Turkestan and Tibet today is that no one is actually willing to lend a real helping hand. Central Asian countries may have religious links to Uyghurs, but they have no solidarity with the larger ethnic group in the region, the Hui, who are by and large indistinguishable from the Han groups other than the fact they practice Islam. The Central Asian countries stand to lose ground to Uyghurs wishing to form Turkestan in the same way that that Kurds want to form Kurdistan and take land from multiple countries (such as Iraq, Turkey and Iran).

The realpolitik you are talking about is sorta ignoring why those regions don't get much direct external assistance to break off from China in the first place. Russia is friends with Mongolia, hence why half of Mongolia is separated from China right now. Nobody is friends with Uyghurs, and Turkey might like to give lip service but that's it. India would help Tibet, that makes sense but they can't exactly move troops across the Himalayan mountains. So at best they lend financial support but Tibet itself is a poor region. There's nothing there. I mean, we think Greece has zero economy, what does Tibet have?

So generally, one expects the split to either be along the Yellow River, between the central provinces and the minority groups are more likely to side with one group or another with whomever they think they'd get better rights under. I think that's the more likely scenario. As for Taiwan, historically it takes like a century before the central authority has the power to retake the island. Plus the area has really only fell under Chinese influence in the last two centuries.

Then again, right now, it's hard to picture the balkanisation because except for a few groups at the fringes, everyone is basically together in solidarity.

How North Korea would respond to a dividing China is the big concern for me.

Huh, that's a good point actually. If China fell apart, North Korea has no more cards to hold. So either they go down in a blaze or they dismantle peacefully. Considering how they are set up, it's more likely there'd be one last military push southward which would just mess up the region more in the short term.

TBH, I wouldn't be surprised if the US or the South initiated a first-strike attack on the North if China started to fall, just to make sure they didn't get caught by surprise by a desperate North. Without China to support them, there'd be no reason not to.

What would happen to the Spratly Islands? They're calimed by China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Philipines, and Brunei.

@breadloaf

Russians have backed Muslims before to their mutual benefit, so I don't see how they'd be fearful enough to not even bother an Enemy Mine action.

Central Asia and the Kurd region of northern Mesopotamia are different. In central asia, ALL the ethnic groups are intermingled, thanks to years of Russian and Soviet rule. As such, if the Uighurs became independant the Central Asian states wouldn't be against it just because some of them happen to be in their own country. That isn't to say there would be no problems, but its a common enough thing in the Turkestan region that they're not going to be dissuaded from Turkestani solidarity (something thats been growing over the years thanks to Kazakhstan as a way to dampen ethnic nationalism due to the aforementioned intermingling that would make that very dangerous), especially if the Russians want that buffer zone to protect their interests in the Near Abroad (and protection of the Near Abroad is far more important than incitement of Muslim seperatism, which can't really get any worse than it already is in Chechnya).

As for why no one helps these two regions, its because no one wants to fight a unified and stable PLA. In the event of a situation when that dissuading factor is removed, for possibly as long as two decades, the other major powers will protect their interests. With the Indians, they can fly in supplies, they can fly in aid, and they can be a bit more clandestine in their support, perhaps advocate placing Tibet under the UN's auspices to protect it from the horrors of the civil war/warlordism further east. Russia wouldn't work to directly get the Uighurs either, and indeed I originally said they would support Central Asian efforts for such an endeavor since they actually border the area.

Regardless of how China goes down, whenever that might be, India will go for Kashmir. At this point the only reason China holds it is for a physical connection with the Pakistanis, a priority that will go lower on the list should a collapse should happen.

Depends on how China goes down. They might try to make themselves a player between the factions, they may go into silent shock as they realize their sugar daddy is gone, they might make the excuse to sack Seoul...whatever happens I agree that its likely a preemptive strike by US/Korea would occur.

Vietnam is the one most in position to take it, if I recall. Might cause bickering with the other powers but it seemed it was always Vietnam and China that are the principle actors in that dispute. Could be wrong though.

Doubtful if the Spratly Islands would change hands at all because of China's fall. China has only risen recently and it's not like anybody was able to have a good hold on them before that.

What's interesting here is that these groups are all trying to form buffer states, it's likely to lead to the Taliban style situation. Kowtowing to China, or kowtowing to Russia/India isn't exactly a step up at all. They still don't have independence and those countries most certainly will not be pouring 100s of billion for infrastructure development. So I think it likely that efforts to try to back independence are likely to just backfire and cause massive regional war between the factions in China and the ones nearby.

So then a collapse in China will spread outward to cause conflict everywhere, not just a restart of the Korean war.

If you're both sufficiently remote and theoretically independent, the Russians are more likely to de facto ignore your existence than actively oppress you. (Main reason the Vietnamese went pro-Soviet instead of pro-Chinese, the Soviets could be relied on not to give a fuck about Vietnam after the proxy war was over. )

Don't know about the Indians, since they ain't gotten into much expansionism lately.

edited 4th Nov '11 1:02:13 PM by SavageHeathen

India is very live and let live, so long as its own interests (buffer against China) are covered. Which is why I reject breadloaf's point that it would lead to insurgency...India isn't going to try to annex it, just keep China from reannexing it, which only requires them to support local forces. Thats why the Afghans who weren't part of the Taliban like India alot, since they were the only ones, during the 90s, to have their back when they were struggling against the Pakistani/Saudi-backed Taliban government and militia.

Well I'm more or less saying that they can't have it both ways. Either India has to have permanent troop presence, or Tibetan independence stands little chance of being long-lived.

Nothing is that black and white. India can and would support it without landing troops there (or getting the UN to place peacekeepers in lieu of themselves). Its not having it both ways, its having it the only way India wants...a buffer state. Taking over Tibet would be expansion, not a buffer.

Oh dear god, I am going to sleep much worse now.

The whole situation isn't good, but if you want China to pay in blood for that, do you know who are going to pay? Mostly the peasants who are too exhausted trying to make a living to be aware of the whole thing.