Questions tagged [china]
Generally refers to the country referred to as the People's Republic of China, a country in E Asia. With a surface area of 3,691,502 sq. mi. (9,560,990 sq. km). The current Capital is Beijing.
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How frequently did the KMT use telegrams to communicate; from where (roughly) and to whom?
This answer to the Chinese Language SE question Historical: How was Chinese written in telegrams and early computers? says (in part):
Following is a telegram code "dictionary" used by Japan ...
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Why is Russian far east less populated than Chinese north east regions?
I was comparing the Russia's Far Eastern zone with the equivalent Northeast China. Anyway the two regions have many difference but by comparing regions at the same latitude I found vast difference to ...
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212 views
Why didn't Japan attack communist China in WW2?
We can see after the fact that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) nourished through the Sino-Japanese War while the Nationalist Army arguably depleted their resources.
The CCP had a strategy of not ...
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1answer
238 views
What really happen to 100k people in Changban? [closed]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Changban
The story is filled with so many things that do not make sense.
Liu Bei is on the run from Cao Cao.
Somehow, he managed to persuade 100k civilians ...
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Why was Wang Zhiming apparently pardoned, unlike other Christian victims of the Cultural Revolution?
Wang Zhiming is a particularly famous Christian martyr of the Cultural Revolution in China – he is one of ten martyrs of the 20th century to have a statue above the Great West Door of Westminster ...
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Did Chinese emperors wear a rectangular hat with suspended gems?
The mythical Jade Emperor is sometimes depicted as wearing a mortarboard hat with strings of jewels suspended from its edges:
According to Shen Yun's post:
Hanging from the front and back of the ...
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1answer
181 views
Could someone become Empress in China more than once?
I read a fictional story before where an empress was wrongly accused of black magic. The emperor loved her so much but the investigation didn't go deeper because the ministers were trying convince the ...
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307 views
Why did the Chinese not use military power to force out early Dutch/English and Portuguese trade encroachments
From what I understand, during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, the Chinese were much advanced in trade and warfare than the Dutch and the Portuguese that tried to (and eventually) succeeded in ...
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Why didn't China vote in UNSC Resolution 344?
According to this Wikipedia article, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 344 in 1973 with 10 votes from non-permanent members and 4 abstentions from the permanent members France, ...
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220 views
What were the American-equipped armies of Nationalist China equipped with?
During the latter years of WWII, the US equipped and trained a number of Chinese (Kuomintang) armies to fight the Japanese. Initially the Chinese armies were greatly inferior, armed with bolt-action ...
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Did China ever consider a phonetic writing system?
I was surprised to learn the following about the Japanese and Korean languages:
Japanese used a lot of Chinese characters in their language and had no phonetic system, until around the year 800 when ...
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178 views
Before European Influence circa 1600, did any Chinese scholars propose a heliocentric model?
After this related question, I now want to ask about the heliocentric model. Did any Chinese scholars propose a heliocentric model of the universe? The time period I'm interested is any time before ...
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Before European influence circa 1600, did any Chinese believe the Earth was spherical, and did they ever try to measure it?
The Pythagorans, Aristotle, and Eratosthenese believed the Earth was spherical. Eratosthenes made a measure based on shadows at two cities on the same meridian. An Indian mathematician, Aryabhata, ...
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1answer
186 views
After the Mongol Empire fell, did China really turn away from math and physics?
I came across this from the Wiki article on Chinese Mathematics:
After the overthrow of the Yuan Dynasty, China became suspicious of knowledge it used. The Ming Dynasty turned away from math and ...
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108 views
Are there any archeological finds or primary source drawings of the Chinese bamboo-copter or rotary fans?
Bamboo-copter was a toy in China, dated to 400 BC. A Rotary Fan also existed in China around 180 AD. I'm interested in both of those things, as they work on the exact same principle.
Do we have any ...
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1answer
328 views
Did the first emperor of China die of mercury poisoning?
Did the first emperor Qin Shi Huang die of mercury poisoning? If so, how do we know? I've seen lots of claims that he did (and claims that he didn't), but no citation explaining what primary source ...
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How has China changed since 1989 politically and economically? [closed]
Did China liberalize its government in any way? it's still Communist, but it has adopted some aspects of capitalism.
I know many thought that Democracy would prevail and the CCP would step down, but ...
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169 views
Why was China so underdeveloped until not so long ago? [closed]
A few decades ago, China was at most considered a country starting to develop itself, but usually even a third world country. If a person 30 years ago would have heard that China nowadays would be a ...
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82 views
What were the incentives for war during the Warring States Period?
I've been reading about the Warring States Period in Li Feng's 'Early China', and I don't know if I missed a passage but I can't seem to figure out why the period was so violent.
I've been searching ...
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1answer
186 views
What is this symbol in red box?
Excerpted from China Imperial Maritime Customs, Special Series: Silk
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1answer
153 views
Travelling from England to China in 1810
I'd like to know what would have been the most common route to travel from England to Canton, China, in 1810 and how long the journey would have taken.
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How were Chinese Communist POWs treated after the civil war?
I was watching the film ‘The Assembly’ and the opening scene involved a battle where Chinese Nationalist troops had surrounded a group of Chinese Communists and were about to overrun them. Before the ...
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1answer
150 views
Please post a picture of the mills tonfa were supposedly used to turn
A tonfa is a forearm length club with a handle protruding sideways. A common claim is that the weapon was originally a handle used to turn millstones. German Wikipedia claims that there are pictures ...
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1answer
136 views
Do Manchurian Nationalists Want Independence?
Manchuria existed from the Middle Ages to Present-day China.
The Qing dynasty was founded by the Jurchen Aisin Gioro clan in Manchuria. In the late 16th Century. Source
The Qing dynasty ruled ...
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Why is Shandong named Lu?
Shandong, a Chinese province, is sometimes known as Qilu, after the Zhou dynasty states of Qi and Lu.
However, its name is further shortened as Lu. For example, Shandong cuisine is known in Chinese ...
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When were Liu Hui's mathematical works first translated into English?
I'm researching Liu Hui who lived circa 220 AD to 260 AD. He independently solved many challenging mathematical problems, and was an amazing mathematician previously unknown to me. I came across this ...
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What role, if any, did the Chinese Communist Party play in the Soviet invasion of Xinjiang?
The Soviets invaded Xinjiang to support their client, a warlord who had no connection to the CCP.
Did the CCP support this invasion? Oppose it? Or just try to avoud talking about it?
Related: were ...
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1answer
246 views
How did Mao Zedong's policy abuse affect those in the Five Black Categories during the Cultural Revolution?
Mao Zedong attempted to fragment society by distinguishing between different sectors of society, by labeling those whose presence was a threat to Mao Zedong communist policy the Five Black Categories.
...
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When the Chinese were driven out of modern Vietnam in AD 938, did an Vietnamese ethnic identity already exist?
With some periods of interruption, China dominated Vietnam for more than 10 centuries between 111 BC and 938 AD. This wikipedia article and its subsidiary links spoke of sinification and shifting of ...
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1answer
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What happened at the Battle (or not?) of Luding Bridge, during the Long March of Chinese Communists in 1935?
I've just finished reading Mao: The Unknown Story by Chang and Halliday. She seems very biased against Mao and revels in accusing him of lying and manipulating. If this were to be taken as a serious ...
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1answer
173 views
Before ww2, why did Japan allow Chinese students to study military science?
In 1917, Cheng Fangwu and his friends were openly anti-Japan; yet in Japan they were free to elect whatever major they liked. Cheng studied steel making, guns, ballistics and torpedoes but later ...
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1answer
469 views
What good came from the Great Leap Forward?
I'm currently reading the book "Mao's Great Famine" by Frank Dikötter. It's a very harrowing book covering the unimaginable waste and destruction of resources, environment and life that occurred ...
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153 views
Which tools were available in 1933 for the Chinese government to intervene in the money market?
I do not have profound knowledge of the Chinese banking sector in the 1930s, but, for instance,
Tamagna, Frank M. Banking and finance in China. International Secretariat, Institute of Pacific ...
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What percentage of the British Empire's economy was profits from the opium trade?
Between 1820 and 1840 the British sold a lot of Opium in China. Compared with the total size of the British Empire's economy, how big was the Opium trade?
I have an old friend who maintains that even ...
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3answers
374 views
Why didn’t the Chinese leave troops behind in North Korea after the Korean War?
Why didn’t the Chinese leave a trip wire force in North Korea after the Korean War in a similar fashion to the United States leaving a trip wire force in South Korea?
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1answer
117 views
Is there a biography of Pavel Mif?
Pavel Mif by all Chinese accounts was a ruthless scheming Napoleon (the one in animal farm). Fortunate to the Chinese, Mif was later purged by Stalin. I wonder what sort of family he was from; where ...
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2answers
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Chinese funerary practice of ball/pearl?
What is the the placing a pearl/ball custom/tradition come from in China? I have inferred they used to put pearls in the deceased mouth for safe passage through the underworld but this seems slightly ...
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What was the Chinese Communist Party's organizational hierarchy in the two weeks between 15JUL1927 and 01Aug1927?
According to Zhang Guotao, Nanchang Upgrising (01Aug1927) was Li Lisan's initiative inaugurated and proposed by Zhou Enlai to Zhang GuoTao. The decision to go ahead was made between Zhou Enlai and ...
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3answers
141 views
Is there a Chinese Intelligence Agency? Why is it not well known? [closed]
I'm curious to know why we never hear of an intelligence apparatus of China, as we do of CIA or KGB or FSB (Russia). British MI5/6, Mossad even Indian RAW make headlines or at least one finds them ...
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When did toys first become “Made in China”?
I'm continuing to read about the history of toys.
The U.S. imports between 50%-75% of its toys from Chinese manufacturers (depending on the year), and my understanding is that they many western ...
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1answer
186 views
Was anyone blamed for Japan's defeat at Tai'erzhuang?
The battle of Tai'erzhuang was the first major Chinese victory in the Second Sino-Japanese war. IJA 10th and 5th divisions, aiming to take Tai'erzhuang and ultimately Xuzhou, were instead held up in ...
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3answers
311 views
Animosity between Mandarin-speaking and Cantonese-speaking Chinese?
The PRC-ROC schism aside, has there historically been (or is there today) any animosity or feelings of cultural or racial superiority between Mandarin-speaking Chinese and Cantonese-speaking Chinese?
...
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599 views
Why would Japanese people be in China during the 1920s?
I'm writing a historical fiction novel set in the second World War. One of the characters is a Japanese person who has lived in China since childhood. However, as I attempt to flesh out this backstory,...
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2answers
379 views
How useful were Chinese contributions to the defeat of Japan in WWII?
While there is no doubt China contributed a lot of blood and treasure in the War with Japan, how useful were those contributions given that Japan was strangled by a the navy, bombed by the air force ...
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1answer
163 views
Why did Americans oppose Richard Nixon's visit to China? What “past policies” were Nixon going against? [closed]
Many people opposed Nixon's visit to China. Why? I read an article saying people complained that Nixon's visit to China was going against past policies. What policies were they referring to?
Article ...
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How does Chinese history explain the results of this data? [closed]
This site displays an interactive graph, relating life expectancy and income of various countries over a 200 year period.
I find it interesting to observe China. A little after the year 1950, life ...
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257 views
What was the nature of the Japanese presence in China in the later stages of World War II?
I am trying to understand Japanese punitive expeditions in China such as the Three Alls Campaign and retaliation for the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo. In each case, the Japanese largely retaliated against ...
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When did Wang Mingzhang die?
Wang Mingzhang was a Chinese general of the National Revolutionary Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War. He commanded the defense of Teng County (14-18 March 1938), part of the Xuzhou Campaign, ...
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Why was the Records of the Three Kingdoms composed before that of the Later Han?
Our professor taught that Chinese historiographic tradition demands each dynasty to compose the history of the previous one, using the 實錄 or 起居注 provided by said dynasty. Browsing the Wikipedia ...
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Book on the History of Hong Kong [closed]
I am new to this Stack Exchange community, so please let me know if this question is out of scope.
I am looking for a book on the history of Hong Kong, but I am unsure on whether there are any main ...
