Question by Prime: Question about History of Opium in China to foreign trade?
What was the role of opium in opening China to foreign trade and, ultimately, Western domination?
Best answer:
Answer by dragonfly489
When European nations started trading with China, they were very restricted by the Chinese authorities on where they could trade. This made trading difficult for them.
China produced many goods at the time, its estimated at probably around 25% of the total world GDP. Britain wanted Chinese goods but China would only accept silver as payment for their goods. Britain did not like this. They had their Indian colony nearby which produced Opium which they could trade with Chinese people for these goods so they smuggled it in.
China did not like the Opium trade and they had outlawed it. When Britain continued to smuggle opium they seized and destroyed it. The British used these ‘illegal’ seizures as a pretence for war.
The war was very one sided. The military technology of the British was far beyond that of the Chinese. They could bring their boats within cannon range of Chinese cities and bombard with impunity because China had neither guns that could shoot that far nor vessels that could successfully engage them. Chinese Geography with many cities built along huge rivers allowed british ships to use the same tactic on more inland cities in the Chinese industrial heartland.
China was forced to surrender and as a part of the terms they were forced to completely open all of china to British merchants. The British merchants operating in China were not subject to Chinese law and Hong Kong also became a British possession.
Once the other European nations saw the results of the war they all declared their own wars on China and forced similar terms.
Good old Western values at their best 🙂
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