Quote Originally Posted by gaelic cowboy View Post
Because before real sea trade got going everyone was landbased which removed any cmopetitive adavantage they might potentially have.
A cart driver needs to stop at night and change horses to contiue the journey safely, while a boat has a crew that can eat and sleep in shifts.

As already discussed once colonialism got really going the ship massively boosted trade and the train while good back then was not nearly good enough to go from China to France.


Crucially Russia and China also have problems with both restive populations and with greater actual security threats to the core. This has encouraged expansion to give strategic depth to secure there cores. There economies are landbased and while that was fine in the 14th century it was not fine in the 16th century and as discussed already China shut itself off which negatied it's own maritime advantage.

This has all combined to give them the typical landbased mindset always looking west and east in Russias case or inwards in Chinas case.
Okay, so if size and rivers and trade are so important, then how do you explain the success of Meiji Era Japan? No land to speak of, no resources to speak of, no colonies, almost completely isolated until the 1850s, and yet by 1900 Japan was a world class imperial power.