Dbq Qing Dynasty

China has 5000 years of history which experienced wars, collapses, failures and successes. The Opium War in the year 1839 and 1856 marked the changing point of China’s trade policy with foreigners, especially with British in opium and tea. China changed from getting tributes to being forced to sign the Nanjing Treaty and Tianjing Treaty with British and French. Due to China’s over confidence and unwelcome attitude toward foreigners and opium, it caused the British to declare the Opium War to China which made Chinese suffer for many years, but at the same time it also forced China to open its doors to the foreigners.

In conclusion, the 1839 “Letter to Queen Victoria” by Lin Zexu argued that Opium is a source of evil and pain and appealed to the Queen of Great Britain to abolish sale and smuggling of opium in China. Zexu did this through exemplifying the past trading relationship of China and Great Britain, also by moral persuasion, and last by means of warnings and

In the early eighteen hundreds, Britain and other European countries demanded more and more Chinese commodities, especially tea and silk. However, only the port in Canton was opened to foreign countries, and Chinese would not take any other form of payments besides silver. The desire to make China into a free market that foreigners have more access to and the increasing, though illegal, European opium import to China eventually created tension between the European countries, especially Britain, and the Chinese government (Allingham Par. 1-2). The two battles fought and won by European powers were known as the Opium Wars. China’s politics, economy, and intellects were both positively and negatively

Xu’s memorandum advocates for the government allowing opium to be brought into China by foreign traders as a taxable good as the best way to combat the opium problem. Xu views strict laws against opium as ineffectual for tackling the drug problem in China, noting in the first paragraph that, “the more severe the interdicts against [opium] are made, the more widely do the evils arising therefrom spread” (Xu page 1). While he acknowledges the addictive and destructive effects of opium on those who use it, Xu believes that the stricter the laws proscribing the dissemination and use of opium, the more widely used the drug becomes. Xu argues that the prohibitions against the opium trade led to increased smuggling by foreign traders and increased use of the drug across China. Conversely, when the state’s policy towards opium was one of leniency, in which opium was allowed into China and taxed as a medicine, the issues involving opium were

British Merchants were trading opium for chinese tea that was very popular in Britain. But when people in China started getting addicted to opium, they needed more and more. Because of this, it meant losing so much money in trade, which affected their economy. Chinese government officials outlawed opium, executed drug dealers in China, and asked Britain to stop with the trade. But it was helping Britain economically and they insisted that it was the right of free trade. This refusal to eliminate it later led to the Opium War.

Foreign military and economic intervention by European imperial powers created greater instability in China. Western powers, through an unequal treaty system, engaged in legal imperialism that gave them protection through special rights and privileges that gradually reduced Chinese tradesmen to a subordinate role. Opium trade, fueled by Britain, drained China of silver, and drove up the price of silver. Silver was the standard payment for taxes, but rising prices made tax payments an economic burden for peasants. The First Opium War, 1839 to 1842, resulted in the defeat of the Chinese and the signing of the Treaty of Nanjing. The treaty forced ceded Hong Kong to the British and open treaty ports to the British along the southern coast providing Britain with greater access to foreign trade. The emerge of western competition in China threaten the livelihood of people throughout the country and weakened China’s economic power in the region overall. New trade routes, commodities, and the introduction of western business practices affected many people in various parts of the country.

You may be asking yourself, why did opium even become an object of trade? Well, Opium originally started becoming an object of trade when, "Western traders, including those from the United States, had long sought a variety of Chinese products (including furniture, silk and tea), but found there were few products that China wanted from the West."(The Opening to China Part I: the First Opium War, the United States, and the Treaty of Wangxia, 1839–1844) Before the war, Opium was very highly used in trade, because the British couldn't find any other values which China wanted from them. The opium started to become addictive to the Chinese creating a greater connection between Canton and Guangxi Guangdong region. But Opium soon became unwanted in China because of the addictions, a majority of the population, was just lethargic and also all of the silver in China was being poured into the British banks through the Opium trade. "The sums of money circulating in the southeast because of the opium trade and the stock piling of silks and teas for export in turn brought heightened official corruption and a rise in state revenues from transit dues and from taxation of legitimate foreign trade”. (Spencer

The growing tensions between the British and Chinese governments led to the First Opium War. The essay will discuss the key events and causations leading up to this conflict and discuss how it effectively stopped the Chinese government’s interference with the trade but did not legalize it within

Around the early 19th century, China began to have many issues with a drug called opium. British merchants longed for Chinese goods, but the Chinese did not want many of the goods that they had. This situation caused a trade imbalance to occur between China and Britain (3). In order to pay for the Chinese luxuries that they wanted, the British increased the production of opium in India and began to trade Bengal opium in China (2). The Chinese empire objected to the opium trade many times, but the demand for opium kept increasing (2). The drug caused many problems in China because much of the population became addicted and many economic issues occurred (2). In 1839, Commissioner Lin attempted to end the foreign trade on opium in China by

The chinses did not accept the foreigners and they viewed them as barbarians and they didn’t want them anywhere near them but that didn’t stop the British because they started sell opium (a drug) and they made people addicted to it so they kept buying more while they were making a profit, and even after it was made illegal the British bribed guards to bring in even more opium and while that was happing the Chinese got a new detective who’s mission was to get rid of opium, his name was Lin Zexu he was an honest man who was un-bribable and after he destroyed all of the opium, and after that the emperor told the queen that he never wants opium near china, so he closed the shipping ports and blocked them with Junkers but the British brought gun

It wasn't until 1839 did Emperor Qin ban the opium after the death of his son from addiction. When Britain continued to trade opium Emperor Qing appointed Lin Zexu as the Governor of Canton. His job was to cease all opium coming into China. When a blockade was broken and the opium ships came sailing back in Lin, convinced Charles Elliot, the British superintendent of all trade in China, to handover all the opium. It is referenced in ‘Cultural China (2010) First opium war’ “Lin banned the sale of opium, asked that all opium be surrendered to the chinese authorities” Lin then destroyed it all, thus sparking the First Opium War. The letter that Lin sent to Queen Victoria stating what would happen to anyone who would continue the trade, it is clearly shown that Lin is very angry at the Queen: “ May you, O king, Check your wicked and sift your wicked people before they come to china, In order to guarantee the peace within your nation.” Unlike most letters this one is written with sarcastic comments and insults. Yes, China did spark the Opium Wars by blowing up the opium, but if it weren't for Britain's continuous trade, they would have never

The Opium wars affected China in many positive and negative ways which ultimately led to further violent uprising and rebellions such as the Boxer Rebellion and the Xinhai Revolution. The 1st Opium war was fought between China and Britain and the second between China and Britain allied with France (Robert, 2003). The wars were fought because of China’s refusal to enter the family of nations on a basis of equal trade and equality in diplomatic relations which meant that Britain decided to use force instead. This war (which was won by the British) lead to the treaty of Nanjing which conclusively led to the loss of the Chinese emperor’s dignity and respect (Fairbank, 1987). The Opium wars negatively and positively impacted China’s political, cultural and economic aspects of life on the short term and the long term.

Their ignorance as a government in the 1730’s led them to take extreme steps to stop the illegal trade by burning the British opium and trying to destroy the British ships in the 1830’s. China’s justification for allowing opium to be legal in 1729 can be viewed as the root of the opium wars.

Opium was first introduced in China by the Turkish and Arab traders and although at first it was used in limited quantities, a trend of opium smoking became quite fashionable and swept through China. This lead to a rapid increase in addiction and opium export and this instigated some of the first government prohibitions in 1723, but the opium trade continued to flourish. At the same time in Britain there was a high demand for Chinese silks and porcelain, but above all tea, because tea at the time only came from China. Due to this, China had a considerable amount of power over Britain. Britain had an insatiable greed for tea and made enormous demands for it at the time and solely because of this they ended up having to pay almost $6 million silver dollars every year to China. The only other commodity that the Chinese desired besides this was Opium. The British found that they could grow poppies in abundance in India and so the British began bartering tea with opium. This became a way of balancing the trade deficit and the Chinese seemed to have no issue in depleting their silver reserves for opium. This lead to detrimental effects on Chinese society, economy and public health as widespread addiction was caused due to the

However, there are some scholars arguing that the Opium War actually had nothing to do with the opium. In their views, opium is merely an external excuse and the war was inevitably to happen even if British sold other commodities to China. I have to admit that even without opium, there would also be great tensions between Britain and China because of their irreconcilable cultural conflicts in considering trade and commerce. However, great tensions did not mean that the war was inevitable and opium, the last straw that breaks the camel's back, was the necessary catalyst to trigger this war. First, scholar who thought the war was unrelated to the opium failed to recognized the harms of opium-smoking: first and most well-known, opium-smoking could seriously jeopardize the health of human body; second, the opium-smoking could increase the crimes and damaged stability of the society; third and most important, opium-smoking deprived a man's ability to work.