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If you look at Chinese history they are remarkably non expansionist. Chinese power has always come from their culture and trade. Japan uses Chinese characters

• scarmig 7y ago
  > Chinese history they are remarkably non expansionist That's a narrative story, not a history. "China" has never been a continuously consolidated political entity. The PRC (and the ROC, and previous imperial governments) find it a useful myth to equate its current geography of control with a tradition that hearkens back through millenia, but it's quite simply not. The Qin dynasty initially controlled the area of a small province, and conquered its neighboring state rivals one by one to establish a dominion over them; it fell, just as countless other empires fell, leading to centuries of alternating fragmentation and consolidation. Even in modern times, various political entities that position themselves in the history of China have engaged in expansionist colonial missions over a range of territories, from Xinjiang to Taiwan to Tibet. Even Inner Manchuria is only considered "part of China" because the Qing dynasty ruled it and China simultaneously. (As an interesting aside, contemporaneous Han historiography considered the Qing ruling class foreign usurpers; it was only in the 20th century that ROC/PRC historiography decided to incorporate the Qing Dynasty into China's lineage, for political reasons.)