What actually happened:In 1644, the Ming dynasty was overthrown. After a confused period, the Manchus took over as emperors of China. Chinese resistance to the Manchus continued in various forms. One of the more spectacular resistors was Koxinga, a trader and sometime pirate who was half-Japanese. Koxinga's father controlled a trade network up and down the coast of China, and even stretching to Japan from a fortified base in Amoy. His father accepted Manchu domination of China, but Koxinga didn't. His fleets fought the Manchus along the coast of China until the Manchus took his base at Amoy in the early 1660's. As the Manchus closed in, Koxinga and his followers fled to Taiwan, took it over from the Dutch, and used it as a base against the Manchus. Koxinga himself died in 1662, at age 38. His children continued the struggle until 1683, when the Manchus organized a fleet of 300 war vessels, defeated the Taiwanese fleet, and occupied Taiwan.

What might have happened: Koxinga was preparing for an attack on the Spanish settlements in the Philippines when he died. If he had lived, and that attack had happened, things could have gotten very interesting. Let's say he succeeds in taking the Spanish bases in the Philippines. There was already a fairly substantial Chinese population in the area. Koxinga and his supporters use the Philippines and Taiwan as the basis for a trade-based empire. They are more open to new ideas than the Manchus and by trade are able to get access to Western technology, and to some extent deny it to the Manchus. This empire might be able to hold off the eventual Manchu attack on Taiwan. Even if it didn't, Koxinga's bases in the Philippines would force the Manchus to continue to develop their naval power. An even more interesting possibility is that the increased threat from Koxinga could influence events in the war of the Three Feudatories (Chinese collaborators with the Manchus who revolted and almost established one or more separate countries in southern China in a war that lasted from 1673 to 1681.)

With possibly as many as four separate political bodies in China itself, plus Koxinga's maritime empire, the competition between those rival kingdoms would make it very difficult for a Chinese dynasty not to innovate militarily. That in turn could make for a second center of innovation to rival Europe. What do you think? Should I do a full-fledged scenario on this one?