… That's a really caricatural and reductive way to look at Chinese history. You are right that China's history is a long succession of warring states (as the saying goes: "the empire, long divide, must unite; long united, must divide") but reducing most chinese rulers (do you even realize how many leaders there have been through China's extremely old history?) to 'powerhungry control freaks' and the population as 'all messed up' is straight up ignorant. Please don't let your (justified) hostility toward the CCP affect your view of the entire chinese peoples.

The left costume is only wear by emperors of Qing dynasty （1635-1912）, there's no way an emperor of sui dynasty (581-619) can dress like that.