| People's Republic of China 中华人民共和国
Timeline: Scotland says "Yes"
OTL equivalent: PRC | |||||
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| Anthem: "March of the Volunteers"
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 Area controlled by the People's Republic of China shown in dark green; claimed but uncontrolled regions shown in light green.
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| Capital | Beijing | ||||
| Largest city | Shanghai | ||||
| Official languages | Standard Chinese | ||||
| Regional languages | Mongolian • Tibetan • Uyghur • Zhuang • various others | ||||
| Ethnic groups | 91.51% Han 55 minorities | ||||
| Demonym | Chinese | ||||
| Government | |||||
| - | President | Xi Jinping | |||
| - | Premier | Li Keqiang | |||
| - | Congress Chairman | Zhang Dejiang | |||
| - | Conference Chairman | Yu Zhengsheng | |||
| - | First-ranked Secretary of the Secretariat | Liu Yunshan | |||
| Legislature | National People's Congress | ||||
| Area | |||||
| - | Total | 9,596,961 km2 3,705,407 sq mi |
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Officially the Peoples Republic of China (PRC), it is a large single-party Communist state located on Mainland China. It has recently faced rebellions within the Tibetan Region, with significant guerrilla fighting. On the international front, the PRC is involved in the Senkaku Islands dispute with Japan to the east South China Sea dispute with Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam.
History[]
Formation and the Korean War[]
The People's Republic of China was established by Mao Zedong on October 1, 1949 after the KMT was expelled from the mainland at the conclusion of the Chinese Civil War. In 1950, the People's Liberation Army annexed Tibet. In November, the People's Volunteer Army (PVA) crossed the Yalu River and fought against United Nations forces in the Korean peninsula. The PVA successfully drove the UN forces all the way to the 38th Parallel. The Korean War ended on July 27, 1953 with an armistice, with both North Korea and South Korea technically at still at a state-of-war to this day.
Turbulent Times (1950s-1960s)[]
From the 1950s to the 1960s, the PRC would experience a turbulent history from the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. In 1960, the Soviet Union and China ended their alliance, resulting in the Sino-Soviet split and opening another front in the Cold War. In 1962, China fought a brief conflict with India over dispute territory in the Himalayas. In March 1969, a brief border war was fought between the USSR and the PRC.
Opening up with the West (1971-1989)[]
Unofficial relations with the United States started in 1971 with Premier Zhou Enlai inviting an American ping pong team. This was marked as "Ping Pong Diplomacy." On February 1972, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. President to visit China and met with Mao Zedong. Official relations started in 1979 with the break-up of relations with Taiwan (ROC) in favor of the PRC. Nonetheless, the United States continues to maintain unofficial relations with the ROC, even providing military hardware to the nation.
The U.S. and China, along with Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, and West Germany, would covertly support the Mujahideen during the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan.
In 1984, both the PRC and the UK would reach a final agreement with Hong Kong in which the colony would be returned to China in 1997.
From April-June 1989, a series of pro-democracy protests occurred in Beijing and other cities throughout the Chinese mainland. On June 4, 1989, the government ordered a military crackdown on the protests, resulting on the Tiananmen Square massacre. The United States and the West was quick to condemn the action done PLA, enacting trade and military embargoes. The arms embargo remains to this day.
1990s-2000s[]
Throughout the 1990s, China's economy was starting to catch-up with the U.S., Europe, and Japan. In 1994, China seized the Philippine-claimed Mischief reef. On July 1, 1997, Hong Kong was formally handed over to the PRC. Under the "One Country, Two Systems" policy, Hong Kong would be self-governing. The same happened to Macau on December 20, 1999 when it was formally handed over from Portugal.
On April 11, 2001, a U.S. Navy EP-3 collided with a Chinese fighter jet. The crew landed the plane on an airbase in Hainan Island. It resulted with the crew being detained for a few days and a stir of U.S.-China relations in the early days of the Bush administration.
Beijing was the host of the 2008 Summer Olympics. However, it was marred with controversy over human rights issues, Tibet, and pollution. In April 2012, China and the Philippines had a spat over the Scarborough Shoal in which the PRC seized two months later. The Philippines sued China to the Hague in 2013.
Current Situation[]
In 2015, Tibetan insurgents started rising up against the PLA with alleged foreign support.
On July 12, 2016, the UN arbitration filed against China by the Philippines went in favor of the latter. Analysts and geo-politicians agree that with the renewed Tibetan insurgency as well as losing the UN arbitration sued by the Philippines, China would soon be plunged into instability.
By mid-2016, China began experiencing another turbulent event: the 2016 Hong Kong uprising which was originally similar to the Umbrella Revolution two years prior. Hong Kongers took to the streets and in a publicized act, stormed a police station and captured riot gear, tear gas and some firearms. There were also reports of policemen defecting to the protestors. The Provisional Government of Hong Kong was formed, thus leading to the deployment of PLA forces via transport helicopters and a naval blockade. It was reported that the ROC sent special forces to aid the Provisional Government, yet Taiwan denies this. At the same time, tensions in Tibet and Xinjiang began to flare up. The PLA is currently deploying troops to these areas. By October 2016, Manchuria began experiencing a series of revolts whilst Russian troops have been spotted to have increased over the Sino-Russian northeast border.
Analysts predict that the PRC may soon collapse by either 2017 or 2018 due to the multiple insurgencies occurring simultaneously.
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