Why did the capitalist invaders such as Britain smuggle opium into China? In the second half of the 18th century, Britain started the Industrial Revolution. Large-scale machine production gradually replaced the handicraft industry, and capitalism developed rapidly. In order to open up foreign markets, sell industrial products, and plunder cheap raw materials, British capitalists targeted China, a country with a vast territory, a large population, and a backward political and economic system. In 1793 (the fifty-eighth year of Qianlong in the Qing Dynasty) and 1816 (the twenty-one year of Jiaqing in the Qing Dynasty), the British had successively sent Macartney and Amethyst as special envoys to Beijing to negotiate with the Qing government, and proposed opening commercial ports, Unreasonable demands such as ceding islands and reducing tariffs were rejected by the Qing government. At the same time, Britain tried to open the door to China with arms. In 1808 (the thirteenth year of Jiaqing), 13 British warships once broke into Humen, but were repelled by the Qing Dynasty navy. In 1833 (the thirteenth year of Daoguang), Lu Fenbei, the first British commercial supervisor stationed in China, commanded the warship to invade Humen again, launched an artillery attack, and was repelled by the Qing army. Various methods have been tried, but China's door has not yet been opened. So the British invaders used a special commodity opium to open the door to China.
The word "opium" is a transliteration of the English opium. It is a kind of brown or black dry paste-like block made by drying the milk in the poppy fruit, with a special odor. Medicinal opium is in powder form and has the functions of analgesia, cough and diarrhea. Opium originated in southern Europe and Asia Minor, and later spread to Arabia, India and Southeast Asia. In the 7th and 8th centuries, opium poppy was brought to China by Arab merchants, and it was initially used as a medicinal material orally. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Portuguese and the Dutch introduced the smoking method of opium to China. Later, the Portuguese transported foreign opium to China as a hobby. Opium contains a lot of morphine and nicotine, and it is an addictive drug that is difficult to quit.People who smoke opium gradually become very weak, scrawny, and mentally sluggish, like a crippled person, until they die. It is said that the emperor Ming Shenzong of the late dynasty "reigned for 30 years and did not summon the ministers, that is, he was burdened by this thing".
Western colonists sold opium to China, the earliest was Portugal and began to sell opium to China in the 1720s, when the Qing government allowed the importation of opium for medical use. In the middle of the 8th century, Britain occupied Bengal, India's opium producing area. By 1767, the opium sold by Britain to China had increased to 1,000 boxes. Six years later, the British Indian government decided to invade China by importing a large amount of opium. policy, and gave the British East India Company an opium monopoly. Later, the East India Company was given the privilege of producing opium. The East India Company used this privilege to force Indian farmers to grow opium poppy, and set up an opium processing factory in Calcutta. In 1813, the cost per box of opium produced in Bongara was 237 rupees, and the auction price in the Indian market was as high as 2,428 rupees, earning nine times the profit. Then the British opium dealers loaded the opium into the sea spring and transported it to China. Haiquan cannot directly dock on the barge within the distance of the unloading section of the wharf. In the bulk of opium, it is first unloaded to the offshore where there is a smuggling of opium, and the opium is smuggled in small boats and sent to smugglers, who wholesale or retail the duck on board. In the process of changing hands, each person will be approved for silver dollars. In this way, the opium trade brought astonishing profits to the British before the invasion of opium, and many opium dealers turned into millionaires. For example, Chatton, a big opium dealer, was originally a British dentist. In 1822, he came to China, and later came to India to do speculative business. Smythenic Company.Charton was particularly cunning and the largest opium smuggler at that time, so the Chinese called him an "iron-headed swindler, daring, and committed all kinds of evil. He founded a company himself in the big year and became the largest opium dealer and millionaire in Guangzhou. In his private letter, he stated that in the best years the profit per box of opium could be as high as 1,000 silver dollars, and he boasted shamelessly: "As far as I know, this is the safest and most gentlemanly speculative production. "It was this opium dealer who started by poisoning China, Charlton, who accumulated a lot of wealth and became a member of the British House of Commons in 1841. Another big opium dealer, Madison, in 1842, ran the entire Isle of Lewis on the west coast of Scotland. After buying it, he invested 329,000 pounds in order to develop the island. It was this big opium dealer who was later knighted by the King of England.
The sinful opium trade not only made the British East India Company and the opium prodigal huge profits , and the British government has a close interest with the entire British bourgeoisie. Because the British forced India to produce opium in exchange for a large amount of silver in China, thereby expanding the sales of British industrial products in India. India used the income from growing chicken chips to buy British In textiles, the British exchanged opium produced in India for silk and tea from China, which were sold to the UK and around the world. Therefore, the British government is the general backend of the opium dealers.
The Opium War paralyzed the will of the Chinese people at that time, and thus opened the door of the Qingzheng government. Do not forget the national humiliation, strive for self-improvement, and resist aggression. Every Chinese starts.
