Nation/community name:
The South Western Protection Army
Location:
(South Western Protection Army in red, Kunming Soviet (vassal) in green within the bounds of the “The Greater Chinese Social Community” (red lined area))
History:
Since ancient times, the river was the sign of favor and disfavor of the people of China. The ancient shamanistic kings of the Shang curried the favor of the river gods to become supreme of ancient China, satisfying the lust for sacrifice the rivers must surely take in floods through mass human sacrifice. And then later usurped by the Zhou when the floodwaters of the Shang undermined the foundations of that most ancient dynasty. Managing ceremony, the Zhou curried the ancient spirits of the Chinese world for favor until the force of man themselves under the Qin dynasty wrestled the waters to their need. And so since, Chinese rulers wrestled and fought, and fought with water to build the foundation of their civilization. And after the end of the world the control of the riverine became just as important as it had been in the past to make the best out of the worst.
In many ways, the late period of China had been set out as the most to blame for climatic threats in the world. As a massive developing nation, it had since re-entering the international community in the 1970s turned itself into the factory of the world, and like Poland to Europe was where the developed nations handed over their polluting manufacturing for its lack of regulation and cheap labor. But since the 1980s it recognized its potential for environmental impact. But caught in the free wheeling highs of the 80s, 90s, and into the early 00s growth and accumulation at all costs drove it into the world's chief smog producer. By the 2010s it was the dominant consumer of coal in the entire world, to blame for half the global coal consumption feeding its endless hunger for electricity on mines from Australia to Africa. But in the mid 2010s the country faced a turning point, heading into the Paris Climate Accords of 2015 to make the biggest promises of any of the attendees of that conference. And over the next ten years set and surpassed every challenge it gave itself. It promised peak carbon emissions by 2030, and by the time that year passed, it was already on its way to carbon neutrality. Forever sensitive to the threat of environmental impact, the Chinese government funded and undertook ambitious re-wilding projects and crisis management and abatement infrastructure. But in a global world, the efforts of one nation can not make up for the unimaginative policies and the lack of ambition for others.
In the night's sky, there can not exist two moons as brilliant as the other. In the end one must snuff the other. As is the tragedy of Thucydides in the world stage. China's rapid ascent, powered by a near endless market within its borders put the dominant United States on edge and through the 2010s to the 2020s the United States made powerful efforts to keep China at a distance and to isolate it from sources of high-tech raw materials necessary for the Green Revolution of the 20s. Soft proxy battles in the cloakrooms of Latin America were carried out to keep China as far from the Lithium of Chile, or to dislodge China from Africa. For its own response, China countered with the construction of its own sphere of influence, as is natural to all great powers in this historical tragedy. BRICS becoming its NATO it fought subtly to secure lithium to feed its investments in renewable energy. Already fast outpacing Western development in the late 20s the Chinese accelerated renewable development at the alienation of the Saudis by opening up common development markets to help its allies compete on the world stage. In the 30s it struck on the option of going to the moon to explore the option of mining rare minerals in space, where the options were wider. But orbital catastrophe became the trigger of crisis that brought the tragedy to its conclusion, and war and its runaway effects fully broke the catastrophic threshold.
As the typhoon season roared to new heights, four million people in China would die for climate related reasons. Internal migrations, famine, and sickness from highly dense cities packed with internal refugees would claim an additional four-hundred million. The wars of the late 30s and into the 50s ten million. Approximate. The abundant crises was not unknown to the world, and broke the state capacities of many nations leading to their collapse. But for nearly a hundred years, China built a robust state and even it was tested to its brink and then beyond. The loss of Beijing forced the government into exile within its own borders and it settled on Xi'an, returning the nominal heart of government to China's most ancient imperial capital. But the considerably massive losses to, property, and commerce would far overshadow a mere relocation of government duties.
China in the 2010s had been described as a federal state in the cloak of a highly centralized one, where the capital Beijing sent down absolute decrees to the provinces. But often, the provinces enjoyed significant liberties in interpreting and carrying out state policy. Under the crisis period of 2030-2060 the broken government was forced to recognize the existing provincial autonomy without much power of its own to put teeth behind its own demands. So in the 2060s devolving powers within the remnants of China began to melt down and shift the internal character. Beijing, now in Xi'an began to drift slowly away from the moorings of absolute power and took on the role of a city which could offer plans and rules which did not need to be adhered to absolutely. It could acknowledge rising stars, and denounce falling ones and became in this way valuable.
By 2070 the make up of China was resembling something like that of the Warlord Era. Many thousands would die in conflicts between private militias hoping to curry favor with Xi'an and be gifted an official promotion. But these wars were small, often comparable to banditry. By the 2080s and into 2090s real power in China was beginning to ossify into the current period, referred to degradingly as the “Three Republics, Five Armies” period.
In this Three Republics, Five Armies period was the South Western Protection Army. Spawned out of regional NPLA units, the SWPA swept in early to assert political dominance in Sichuan, putting down violent protests and clamping down on banditry. It became a firm military dictatorship, whose strong hand brought favor for the desperate people of the land it controlled for being swift and firm in enforcing order. Under the flag of the Common Good, it seized the Three Gorges Dam, from which it could control the flow of the Yangtze river, which with the depletion of Himalayan glaciers was for once running week and a reservoir of water was a necessity between the violent lashing typhoon seasons. Control of this dam gave it the ability to produce electricity, such as it may and the SWPA assumed significant influence over the Kunming Soviet, one of the Three Republics of the late era, passed out of Kunming in humid Yunnan. Its most recent adventure was enforcing its claims to the high, dry Tibetan plateau, under the argument of “securing the peaceful interests of the civilian population of Sichuan, by ensuring the physical safety of the sources of the Yangtze, Yellow, and Mekong rivers there-in”.
They are not known for being obtuse about their policy and intents. Secure these resources they have.
Culture and beliefs:
Since ancient times, Chinese culture has been heavily influenced by Confucianism. Chinese culture, in turn, has heavily influenced East Asia and Southeast Asia. For the SWPA opportunities for social advancement could be provided by high performance in the prestigious examinations, or military service.
Today, the military government has accepted numerous elements of traditional Chinese culture as being integral to society. With the fall of China writ-large as a unitary vision, various forms of traditional Chinese art, literature, music, film, fashion and architecture has assumed an important role in uniting all Chinese peoples, irregardless of their territorial affiliation. Thus, in regional and local politics, and even from official bulls issued from out of Xi'an to all successors of China reference and deference is made to “The Greater Chinese Social Community”, a reference to the once-unity, and now disfigured state China is in presently. Prestigious persons are often free to travel between the regions, albeit it is significantly helpful to secure an internal passport from Xi'an acknowledging you as a person of merit and a national; the Republics and Military Dictatorships of China may not be inclined to assist an unknown national or person of unknown merit on the road or pursue justice, with their interests often so distracted by internal and regional policy.
As momentum of policy in the early half of the 21st century, there is a habit to petition to Xi'an the extension of national parks along various border zones. These represent not only de-militarized zones established to create official buffers, but Red Line areas which obliges belligerents to cease even development and activity in a region so as to reduce the likelihood of conflict further and not threaten areas of “Broad Social Interest”
Science and technology:
China as it exists presently exists on the momentum of advances and surviving infrastructure from sixty-years prior. Robust industrial sectors exist, but for want of advanced machining much of it is slowly turning towards old craft production techniques and a cottage industry. With the swelling of the seas, the old international shipping ports and major military shipyards have disappeared with the land itself, obliging many of the Chinese states to turn inward. Out of a sensitivity to scarcity there is an abundant return to the use of swords and black-powder rifles because these are most readily produced by everyone. But in the many old cities that survived the end of the last world – Chengdu, Chongqing, Kunming, Xi'an, Shenyang, Harbin, Urumqi, Lanzhou – a robust modern manufacturing resembling the 2040s can still be found.
The automotive industry is absolutely decimated. Get on the flying pigeon.
Character names:
