China's historical grand strategy: defensive or offensive?

A possible way to compare "aggressiveness of states" is to define "agressiveness" as the rate of historical territorial expansion. This makes for a nice culture&moral agnostic approach, amenable to various numerical techniques.

Let's compare now the Han dynasty (202BC-220AD) with the Roman Empire (27BC-476AD). I am using the figures from Wikipedia. If someone has more detailed tabulated data, please share.

Roman Empire


Han Dynasty

In their first 150y, the Roman Empire increased their territory by 1.81 and the Han Dynasty by 2.6. Han Dynasty wins hands down in aggression. Actually, Han reached 6Mkm2 already by 100BCE, which is a terrifying rate of expansion.

There are great videos on Youtube to track various historical states through time. You can see here how explosive the growth of Han was in their first 100 years:
By the same metric, it is easy to demonstrate for example that overall, Japan was far less aggressive than China (their only "successful" campaigns being confined to a short 50y period)

W20 said:

"His reply:

We can't judge other people from different times through our own moral and ethical standards.

Sound familiar?"

E x a c t l y

The opium wars is as a paradigmatic example the walnut, the hinge, the nucleus and the crux of the dispute between the Romans and the Chinese

(I) "we had to make an Empire to defend ourselves" (said the Roman patricians... OMFG)

(II) "War is a racket" but our palace scribes and poets are very skilled at embellishing the imperial Beast

(III) and the insufferable moral relativism of the West is the icing on the cake that crowns the mountain of lies that is the Western narrative, a world of fantasies that has accelerated after the last end of the world (1914-1949)

Moral sentiments are universal: in all times and places people have had in general lines and for serious questions the same or similar feelings, what changes is to whom it is applied:

"slavery is unfair", among us, say the slave traders

"you will not kill" (one of us) say the sacred scriptures, and you will kill the men, women and children of these lands that I (large rag doll in hands of ventriloquists) give you, says the Lord your God

we can argue whether Chinese history has been embellished by palace scribes, well, but there is no comparison with the gigantic lie crowned with insufferable moral relativism that is the West empire, heirs of the Roman empire

Click to expand...

Amen.

nlalyst said:

A possible way to compare "aggressiveness of states" is to define "agressiveness" as the rate of historical territorial expansion. This makes for a nice culture&moral agnostic approach, amenable to various numerical techniques.

Let's compare now the Han dynasty (202BC-220AD) with the Roman Empire (27BC-476AD). I am using the figures from Wikipedia. If someone has more detailed tabulated data, please share.

Roman Empire

Date	Area
25 BCE	2.75M km2
117 AD (peak)	5M km2
390 AD	4.4M km2

Han Dynasty

Date	Area
202 BCE	2.3M km2 (?) - based on the area of Qin
50 BCE	6M km2
100 AD (peak)	6.5M km2

In their first 150y, the Roman Empire increased their territory by 1.81 and the Han Dynasty by 2.6. Han Dynasty wins hands down in aggression. Actually, Han reached 6Mkm2 already by 100BCE, which is a terrifying rate of expansion.

There are great videos on Youtube to track various historical states through time. You can see here how explosive the growth of Han was in their first 100 years:

By the same metric, it is easy to demonstrate for example that overall, Japan was far less aggressive than China (their only "successful" campaigns being confined to a short 50y period)

Click to expand...

So you're now comparing a dynasty that is 2000 years gone with an atrocity that happened within living memory?

Why don't you compare the rate of expansion of Nazi Germany with the Roman empire and tell us Hitler was far less aggressive than Caesar?

What you said above shows how despicable your mindset is. You are willing to whitewash one of the greatest crimes against humanity in order to push your twisted ideology.

solarz said:

So you're now comparing a dynasty that is 2000 years gone with an atrocity that happened within living memory?

Why don't you compare the rate of expansion of Nazi Germany with the Roman empire and tell us Hitler was far less aggressive than Caesar?

What you said above shows how despicable your mindset is. You are willing to whitewash one of the greatest crimes against humanity in order to push your twisted ideology.

Click to expand...

Once again you display a complete failure of reading comprehension. The comparison was between the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire.

What I actually wrote:

By the same metric, it is easy to demonstrate for example that overall, Japan was far less aggressive than China

Click to expand...

Overall means the entirety of those two countries histories. Since we are comparing them as countries, the dates of first unification are a good candidate for the start of the period. For China 221 BCE is the commonly accepted year. For Japan it's a less clear cut, but around 250 AD during Yamato period seems to be the most commonly accepted date.

W20 said:

"His reply:

We can't judge other people from different times through our own moral and ethical standards.

Sound familiar?"

E x a c t l y

The opium wars is as a paradigmatic example the walnut, the hinge, the nucleus and the crux of the dispute between the Romans and the Chinese

(I) "we had to make an Empire to defend ourselves" (said the Roman patricians... OMFG)

(II) "War is a racket" but our palace scribes and poets are very skilled at embellishing the imperial Beast

(III) and the insufferable moral relativism of the West is the icing on the cake that crowns the mountain of lies that is the Western narrative, a world of fantasies that has accelerated after the last end of the world (1914-1949)

Moral sentiments are universal: in all times and places people have had in general lines and for serious questions the same or similar feelings, what changes is to whom it is applied:

"slavery is unfair", among us, say the slave traders

"you will not kill" (one of us) say the sacred scriptures, and you will kill the men, women and children of these lands that I (large rag doll in hands of ventriloquists) give you, says the Lord your God

we can argue whether Chinese history has been embellished by palace scribes, well, but there is no comparison with the gigantic lie crowned with insufferable moral relativism that is the West empire, heirs of the Roman empire

Click to expand...

As a patriotic Chinese and a Daoist-Confucianist-Buddhist (儒释道三教合流), I would not be nearly as extreme as you are. We Chinese are pretty much the later people on earth that would ever need to worry about our own long term well-being and existence. We are pretty much the only culture with a literally immortal cultural identity, and we are actually much much more well loved by alien cultures than any other civilization with a comparable history.

As a Daoist, I don't understand why you are so fused about the so-called "atrocity" in human history. Pardon me for my bluntness and lack of political sensitivity, but I don't believe that every season has its due time: there is a season for blossoming and prosperity (生长) , and there is a season for reaping and death (肃杀).

- Slavery is not bad, it's simply primitive. There are time for it, but once the time passes, it will be replaced by better (more efficient and productive) form of control.
- Killing is not necessarily bad, it's simply against human conscience. When there is not the need for it, people will predominantly opt not to kill. Therefore, senseless slaughter simply can not last. However, it also won't entirely disappear from earth.

As for Palace Scribes and such narrative. It is just plain false. Because there is NO one single dynasty or court called "China", China is a series of successive dynasties each rise out of the carcass of the fallen former one. Their history are all written by their successive dynasties. And as opposed to the European tradition of gaining legitimacy from blood relations from the an earlier Empire/Kingdom, Chinese dynasty's legitimacy come from the idea of "The Mandate of Heaven".

The idea of the "Mandate of Heaven" actually forces every successive dynasties to prove that their predecessors had necessarily done wrong and lost favor with Heaven and thus losing the Mandate, thus legitimizing their replacement of their predecessor as Just, and they themselves as in favor with Heaven to gain the Mandate. Therefore, as a whole, China's official history written by their Palace Scribes, would turn out of be more of a defamed and vilified record of the dynasties.

nlalyst said:

Once again you display a complete failure of reading comprehension. The comparison was between the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire.

What I actually wrote:

Overall means the entirety of those two countries histories. Since we are comparing them as countries, the dates of first unification are a good candidate for the start of the period. For China 221 BCE is the commonly accepted year. For Japan it's a less clear cut, but around 250 AD during Yamato period seems to be the most commonly accepted date.

Click to expand...

You are not wrong, except your narrative is a typical example of using a one-dimensional model to try to explain a multi-dimensional system, and thus ended up mis-representing the characteristics of the whole system.

First of all, you narrative of comparing Japan to China is naive at best. However, it is also quite commonly seen in among Japanese. Using a simple Chinese narrative to counter your argument, I would say: "你们小日本小家子气，不够厚德载物，所以成不了气候。" Again, Don't use Google Translate, you won't understand what I am saying. I will explain in length:

China (the civilization) has never been unwelcoming to conquerors. You just have to be worthy of inheriting the Dragon Throne (which them Japanese has sadly proven to be unworthy). The Chinese people might hate the result of foreign conquest, because it brings death and poverty, but the reality is that:

1. Any powers strong enough to conquer China is pretty much the best of humanity (thus most likely will rule China better than the incumbent), and,

2. If they are smart enough to be able to control China, they would understand that their legacy can only last if they can continue to impress the Chinese people with prosperity, glory and strength,

thus, China (the civilization) has thus far been lucky enough to have encountered worthy conquers (like the Xianbei, Mongol and Manchu, etc) who succeeded, or unworthy ones (like the Xiongnu, Turks and Japanese, etc) who failed. In fact, back in the early 1900s, there are an large group of Japanophile Chinese among the upper class and intellectuals in China. It's not like the Chinese people or History didn't give you Japanese chances, YOU FUCKED IT ALL UP! Just accept the damn fact already and stop looking for excuses!

It is as simple as that. I am sorry if my harsh words hurt the feeling of Japanese. But come on! You Japanese had much much much better chances than Xiongnu, Turks, or Mongols ever did. Even the Jurchens and the Khitans faced a more formidable foe than you Japanese. You guys had fighter jets, tanks, bombers and a full set of modern industry, while China weren't even a real country back than (more of a fail state divided by juntas and warlords, and next to no industry).
In comparison:
1. The Manchus faced the Ming, which was, if not the most richest and most powerful countries back then.
2. The Mongols faced the Jin (Jurchen) and the Song (which took the mongols more than 60 years to conquer both, while it only took a couple of years for Mongols to conquer other countries back then. Any one could see how much tougher time the Mongols had).
3. The Xiongnu faced the Han, nothing more need to be said.
4. The Turks faced the Tang, nothing more need to be said.

Therefore, Japan has no excuse. Japan is just too weak. Just like how the daughter of a servant girl will NEVER grow out to be a proper Empress: even if she is crowned as such by chance, she will still soon show her lowliness and worthlessness.

jimmyjames30x30 said:

You are not wrong, except your narrative is a typical example of using a one-dimensional model to try to explain a multi-dimensional system, and thus ended up mis-representing the characteristics of the whole system.

Click to expand...

Yes, the metric is simplistic by intention. And it is set it in those terms to avoid the complicated comparison once culture and morals are brought into the story. But the intention was not to present a theory.

Having said that, there are theories in the realm of international relations that despite being very simplistic and largely single-variable, have proven quite successful. Structural realism comes to mind. In that model, the internals of states are considered irrelevant, be they democracies, autocracies, theocracies, etc. The only thing that matters in the anarchic world is the structure of the system, which is essentially the distribution of great powers' capabilities. In other words, power is the most important factor in international relations.

In mathematical terms, what is desirable when creating a coherent and testable theory is some form of dimensionality reduction. It hardly ever possible to understand the system in its full complexity.

jimmyjames30x30 said:

You are not wrong, except your narrative is a typical example of using a one-dimensional model to try to explain a multi-dimensional system, and thus ended up mis-representing the characteristics of the whole system.

Click to expand...

I forgot to add that the above definition of agressiveness is "unfavorable" to successful conquerors like the Han or the Romans, as it only takes into account settled territories after successful conquest. Since most of Japan's invasions failed, that indeed skews the result.

A structural realist would say that Japan was "peaceful" precisely because it was relatively weak through most of its history. Each time they tried to conquer China was when they perceived themselves stronger (Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Hirohito) and they failed both times.

To be fair, China tried to conquer Japan in the 13th century and failed. Projecting power overseas has always been difficult.

nlalyst said:

Once again you display a complete failure of reading comprehension. The comparison was between the Han Dynasty and the Roman Empire.

What I actually wrote:

Overall means the entirety of those two countries histories. Since we are comparing them as countries, the dates of first unification are a good candidate for the start of the period. For China 221 BCE is the commonly accepted year. For Japan it's a less clear cut, but around 250 AD during Yamato period seems to be the most commonly accepted date.

Click to expand...

Japanese is what Northeastern Chinese people calls: "扣扣索索，贼眉鼠眼".
In WW2, the Japanese called their country An Empire（帝国）. Yet, officially, they refuse to even admit that Manchuria is part of Japan. They call it Manchukuo, making it a de jure ally of (and thus de jure equal in status to) Japan, and even found Puyi to be their puppet. This is a smear, a sh*t stain on the two great Hanzi (Kanji) that made up the term "帝国"(Empire)! This what a thief does! Utterly gutless and full of cowardice. The whole world knows what Japan is doing, yet the Japanese NEVER admitted it.

If you are a King, why don't you have the guts to declare so? When Christ was hung on the Cross, when even his own disciples has betrayed and denied him, he STILL answered in full confidence and claimed that he is indeed truly the King of Jews, when asked. This is a TRUE KING! Japs was NEVER even remotely close!

To lower a notch, if you snatched a bunch girls to be your concubine, why don't you have the guts to declare them as yours, fair and square? What don't you have the guts to act like a real man and say: "I love these girls, they are my wives, I shall love them everyday, we shall make many children. And no one will take them away from me as long as I live!" Now that's is a great man with a great charisma that Chinese people respect and admire.

What the Japanese did, is like a man kidnapping a bunch of girls to be his sex slaves, yet he refuse to admit what he is doing. Instead, he claims that they have became sworn brother-and-sisters, and thus living together. We call this kind of man as "衣冠禽兽"、"龌龊至极"、”无耻小人“. How could Chinese people ever find themselves to have an ounce of love for such a petty thing?

Any educated Japanese should know that any regime based on such dirty thuggery can not stand, not because of moral reason. But because thuggery actually exposes one's weakness and lack of confidence. Confidence is really the most important thing. How can your "EMPIRE" stand the test of time, if you don't have the guts to claim that a large bulk of this empire as de jure part of the Empire, in all legitimacy?

How do you expect the people of conquered Manchuria and China Proper to support and be loyal to the Japanese Empire, when you Japanese are officially telling them that they are de jure NOT a part of Japan and actually is still their own country? Chinese people are simple and direct: "if this land is our own country, then get the hell out of here and let us run it ourselves! If this land is now part of Japan, than who are we now? Japanese?", "If you make us Japanese with your swords and tanks, why is our Sovereign Hirohito and our representatives nowhere to be seen?". "If you just want to kill us, then do it fast and out in the open. Don't fret like a wuss, and stab a person in the secrecy of dark nights." The Germans is at brutally honest and confident enough to declare and claim their intensions to exterminate Jews and Slavs. The Japs, on the other hand, keep claiming that they are here to befriend and unite with the Chinese and other East Asians. Such disgusting cowardice of the Japs!

"A house divided can not stand", an Empire with confused and unclear identity, boundaries and systems, also can NOT stand.

We Asian and Orientals speak of the Great ONENESS as a part of our culture, be it the Hindu, or Daoist, or Buddhist, or even Shinto. The Japanese has always been doomed to NEVER attain greatness, because they NEVER had an ounce of true confidence risen out the Enlightened Spirit at ONE with Itself. They have always been apologetic. Always striving to prove themselves worthy or legitimate in the eyes of others. It seems that the Japanese NEVER really cared about Greatness. What they did care about, is once it's all over, they would have enough excuses to talk themselves out of retribution and reproach.

Such gutless petty fools!

nlalyst said:

I forgot to add that the above definition of agressiveness is "unfavorable" to successful conquerors like the Han or the Romans, as it only takes into account settled territories after successful conquest. Since most of Japan's invasions failed, that indeed skews the result.

A structural realist would say that Japan was "peaceful" precisely because it was relatively weak through most of its history. Each time they tried to conquer China was when they perceived themselves stronger (Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Hirohito) and they failed both times.

Click to expand...

True. That's pretty legit.