AH Challenge: Boxer Rebellion

[JimmyJimJam]

Heres the challenge, and I think its a difficult one. In 1900, at the behest of the Foreign nationals essentially trapped in Beijing by "Boxer" rebels, 8 nations rushed nearly 20, 000 troops to rescue them.

The challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to manipulate the incident in such a way that the Western powers present in Beijing at the time (plus Japan) end up shooting at each other instead of the Boxers. Describe how it would happen, what would happen, and the aftermath.

You will be considered an AH superstar if the Beijing incident can plausibly be made into WWI.

 

[Lamna]

Well the best thing I can think of is Japan and Russia getting into a fight over Manchuria. Other powers would most likely stay neutral in this. I would expect that Japan would win against the Russians, and that Manchuria might have become part of the Japanese empire.
To turn this into a world war then other powers would have to ally with Russia or Japan. Britain would probably back Japan and France would back Russia. However this seems very unlikely to happen as neither country would want a war that could spread so close to home.