The Committee to Nuke Elysium

Meanwhile, the Chinese colonies in Africa continue to grow at an extraordinary rate, shipping minerals and diamonds back to the mother country. Only the Indian Empire, which recently signed a trans-continental alliance with booming Brazil, comes close to rivalling China’s dominance of Eurasia.

Some experts insist that Chinese growth is unsustainable. But Beijing’s victory over Russia in 2028’s Four-Day War tells a rather different story. For years, tensions had been growing over influence in the crucial Central Asian oil states. But when border clashes escalated into open warfare, even military experts were shocked by the speed of the Chinese advance.

And culturally, too, the Chinese still make all the running. On the University of Beijing’s East Anglia campus (formerly Cambridge University), Chinese Studies remains by far the most popular subject.