Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Putin is Putin. Xi is Xi. Russia ex Soviet Union. China minus Taiwan. China by my very limited understanding of the situation has more claim to Taiwan than Russia has to Ukraine. Just i don't see Xi feeling as threatened as Putin says he was. That lie, or not. And i don't see Xi trying to recreate a disintegrated setup as people see Putin wanting to do. And i see Xi being happier with the Taiwan situation as it is than Putin was with his Ukraine fears. Right or wrong i just don't see the parallels with Taiwan and Ukraine as some others seem to see.

You're totally right on the question of arms sales. The whole scene is means good money for many. Lotsa jobs involved too.

That said here are good little Quora efforts on Chinese invasions? Or not?

The first one by Feifei Wang is pretty cool. her approach and style is becoming. The two at the end are very short ones. Then there is a good little gif.

Feifei Wang
Author has 9.1K answers and 109.9M answer viewsUpdated 5y
Originally Answered: How many countries has China invaded in its history?

Update: After reading the comments, I feel that I need to make clear (even it's pretty lame to make notes like this): The sarcasm and irony is intended. (Man I feel so lame.......but, better be lame than offensive I guess. )

Through out history, Chinese people were not very aggressive in expanding Chinese territory. Even during our most prosperous dynasties (Han, Tang...), we're more concerned about defending our people and current land, instead of expending and invading other countries. When Zheng He started his great voyage in early 15th century, the idea was to establish diplomatic relationships with Southeast Asian countries, instead of "colonize the new lands" like western voyagers.

China as a unified country was established by Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of Qin Dynasty....

MORE WITH MAPS there, it's easy to see. Then there is this one, more wordy ..

Stephen Hou
Perpetual student of history Author has 171 answers and 1.4M answer views7y
Originally Answered: How many countries has China invaded in its history?

This is an imprecise question because the modern Westphalian concept of a nation-state called "China" didn't exist until the 19th century. In fact, no government called itself "China" (??) until the founding of the Republic of China in 1912.

Throughout history, there were many kingdoms and empires in East Asia invading one another, each with varying degrees of "Chinese-ness", which perhaps you can measure based on the ethnicities of the ruling class and of the common people, the languages spoken in court and on the street, and whether the state used a Chinese name. These measures could even change retrospectively. For example, Manchus were not considered Chinese in the 17th century but in modern China, they are. A war between two kingdoms may have been considered foreigners fighting some other foreigners by Han Chinese at the time, but it may be interpreted differently now if one or both of the kingdoms are within the borders of present-day China or if the populations have been absorbed genetically or culturally with Han Chinese since then.

Does a kingdom with an ethnic Chinese ruling elite and army but non-Chinese majority count as "Chinese"? (Nanyue founded in the 3rd century BC in what is now Southern China and Vietnam.) Does it matter that a modern non-Chinese country views this kingdom as an integral part of its own history? (Vietnam.)

What if a non-Chinese kingdom is attracted to Han Chinese culture, eventually abandoning their own nomadic lifestyle and instead adopting Chinese names, clothes, and governance principles, with even the royal family marrying Chinese families? (Xianbei people of the Northern Wei in the 5th century.) Does it matter than these sinophilic policies affected only the court and the aristocracy, but not the commoners?

What if a Jurchen-ruled kingdom with a Chinese name and a small minority of Han Chinese people invades a Khitan-ruled kingdom that also uses a Chinese name and has a small minority of Han Chinese? (Jin vs. Liao in the 12th century.) What if half of these kingdoms are located in what is now China and the other half in Russia and Mongolia? Is this Chinese vs. Chinese? Or non-Chinese vs. non-Chinese? Or something else? What if this Jurchen kingdom then gains all of Northern China and becomes majority Han Chinese, but still has a Jurchen ruling class? (Jin vs. Song in the 13th century.) If it wasn't considered Chinese before, how about now?

How about when Kublai Khan conquered the Kingdom of Dali in the 13th century? Is Kublai considered Chinese because he adopted a Chinese name for his empire (Yuan), moved his capital to a Chinese city (present-day Beijing), and had Han Chinese soldiers? Or is he a Mongol because his grandfather Genghis started the empire in Mongolia and Mongolia is currently a different country from China? Is the Kingdom of Dali considered Chinese because it was located in what is now Yunnan, China and its ethnic Bai and Yi peoples now speak Chinese? Or is it non-Chinese because the Bai and Yi tribes are probably genetically closer to modern Burmese and other Southeast Asians and were never in the same country as the Han Chinese until Kublai's invasion?

When the Qing Empire crossed the Great Wall from Manchuria and invaded the Ming Empire in 1644, does that count as a civil war or a foreign invasion? Does it matter that their rulers were ethnically Manchu, but their armies also had Han Chinese, Mongols, and other ethnicities? When the Qing Empire completed its conquest of Ming in 1662 and Han Chinese finally made up a majority of its population and armies, are its subsequent invasions considered "invasions by Chinese" or "invasions by Manchus"?

How about when Koxinga (???), a half Han Chinese / half Japanese Ming official, invaded Taiwan in 1661 while escaping the Qing conquest, thus kicking out the Dutch East India Company and bringing over thousands of Han Chinese to Taiwan for the first time? What about his invasions of the Spanish-ruled Philippines from Taiwan in 1662? Does he not "count" as a "real Chinese government" because the Mandate of Heaven is considered to have passed from Ming to Qing in 1644? And how about when his short-lived Kingdom of Tungning was conquered by the Qing in 1683?

Finally, what if a Chinese empire invades two different non-Chinese kingdoms that later unify? Does this count as one invasion or two? In the 7th century, the Korean peninsula was divided into three major kingdoms: Silla, Goguryeo, and Baekje. Silla requested aid from the Tang Dynasty to defeat the other two, but Tang, not Silla, ended up occupying Goguryeo and Baekje. When Tang then turned on Silla with the intention of bringing the entire Korean peninsula under Tang rule, Silla assembled soldiers from the two former kingdoms, and the combined Korean armies eventually forced Tang to withdraw, unifying the peninsula for the first time. Koreans today view this as an important event in their national history, with all three kingdoms as "Korean" and thus not foreign to one another. It would be too simplistic to view these wars as "China vs. Korea", which is a 20th/21st century characterization.

As you can see, these are not easy questions, and the answers may vary widely depending on whom you ask.

THEN THERE are these two short ones. The last a good one bringing Rome into it to add some more context, i thought

Jonathan Lowenstein
Anglo-Israeli resident in Tel Aviv, with History MA and Political Science MAAuthor has 121 answers and 153K answer views6y
Originally Answered: How many countries has China invaded in its history?

The Chinese aren't like the Europeans who invade lots of countreis quickly and then are forced to vomit them up a little while later. The Chinese invade one country per century and then spend the rest of the century digesting it and making it truly Chinese. So it looks like they never invade anyone, but the whole country is the result of a slowly rolling process of invasion.

Norman Tan
Frequent visitor to China since 1996 Author has 3.2K answers and 3.3M answer viewsUpdated 2y

Which China?

The People’s Republic of China invaded Tibet in the 1950’s, but was it an invasion of another country? Was Tibet a sovereign country? Not according to the Chinese,but that's another story. Do note that this position was also held by the Republic of China, which was defeated by the communists and had to run away to Taiwan.

The PRC went into Korea also in the 1950’s to help North Koreans and secured its borders. They didn't want American troops near the borders. Then they pulled out after the war.

The PRC also invaded Vietnam, but unilaterally stopped the invasion and pulled their military back behind the borderline. It was meant as punitive expedition. Whether it was successful or not is another matter.

They also had border wars with India and Soviet Union. They have settled border dispute with Soviet. There is still some dispute with India.

Now, if you're talking about China as a civilization, which stretches back to at least 3000 years ago, then of course there were also many conflicts between the Chinese civilization and her neighbors.

The original Chinese civilization first rose up in the Yellow River valley 3,000 years ago in North Central China. From there it spread out in stages, replacing or absorbing other peoples/tribes/kingdoms. Similar to how Rome expanded from a single city to the whole of Mediterranea.

The border of this civilization expanded and contracted many times throughout its long history, until we have what we know as China today. For example, what we today call Vietnam was a Chinese province for 1,000 years. Or at least its northern half was. Xinjiang was under Chinese control in the past, separated, and now once again back under Chinese control. Tibet had their own empire at one time, which actually controlled some parts of China. At other times it was under Chinese domination, like today.

The difference is, Rome has fragmented into many different nation states while China has managed to preserve its core territories, only losing its outer peripheral territories during times of weakness and regaining them back during times of strength.

Another difference is, China never had any overseas colonial possesion. Not for lack of ability. Simply because they never had the will.

The problem with a list is that you need to first define what a country is. When Rome expanded its territories beyond its traditional city limits, was it invading other countries?

When the Chinese civilization expanded and absorbed other tribes and kingdoms in south China (territories now known as Guangdong, Fujian, Hongkong, Yunnan, Szechuan, etc, which have never been questioned as part of China), was it invading other countries?

Country as a nation state concept is a recent Western invention.

https://www.quora.com/How-many-countries-has-China-invaded-in-its-history-I-read-an-article-that-said-China-has-never-invaded-another-country-Has-China-really-never-invaded-another-country-If-it-has-can-you-list-which-countries-it-has-invaded

AND re the Rome mention a good little gif

1) The rise and fall of Rome


Growth of Rome Roke

In 500 BC, Rome was a minor city-state on the Italian peninsula. By 200 BC, the Roman Republic had conquered Italy, and over the following two centuries it conquered Greece and Spain, the North African coast, much of the Middle East, modern-day France, and even the remote island of Britain. In 27 BC, the republic became an empire, which endured for another 400 years. Finally, the costs of holding such a vast area together become too great. Rome gradually split into Eastern and Western halves, and by 476 AD the Western half of the empire had been destroyed by invasions from Germanic tribes. The Eastern half of the empire, based in Constantinople, continued for many centuries after that.
https://www.vox.com/world/2018/6/19/17469176/roman-empire-maps-history-explained