The Opium Wars, 1839-1860 - A thread

In the 18th Century, the use of the term "international" began to blossom. The rapidly industrializing west had figured out this whole colonialism stuff and got pretty good at it. So good, they gained the ability to wage warfare on already existing states across the entire globe

One country got really good at it, Great Britain. As mentioned before, they ruled the absolute shit out of the waves. But their none stop wars had left the treasury dry, despite their highly advanced system of banking. Napoleon wasn't going to defeat himself, bro.

The British had another problem. They really fucking loved tea. Like, it's a stereotype because it's true, they fucking ADORED tea. 10% of all households income was spent towards tea. It was in high demand, but the enthusiasm wasn't reciprocated regarding it's supply.

China had been in contact with the west via trading for a while now (1st century BC) but with the increasing western industrialization, this naturally grew. Problem was, China never really wanted anything back from the west. There was a Trade Imbalance.

So, Britain wanted tea. It was lucrative, but they had nothing in terms of trade or money to offer the Chinese in return and the Chinese trade regulations in Canton stifled them further.

However, they struck gold.

After the slapping up the Indians and French in the 7 years war, the Brits had hegemony over India and free reign to do what they liked. They wanted to grow Cotton in Bengal as profit, but the Americans had that sorted so they couldn't compete. Poppy's, however, grew very well.

After converting the Poppy's into Opium, they'd sell them to the Chinese. It was the one thing that the Chinese had in high demand.

Un problemo though, it was kind of.. illegal..but that didn't stop them anyways. They set up shop at the border, and let smugglers do the business

This worked...way too well lmao. It pretty much reversed the trade imbalance in Canton and filled the country up with drug addicts, something that the emperor could not let slide

He appointed a man called Lin Zexu to fix this. A man described as 'incorruptible'. He sent a letter to Queen Victoria which she aired tremendously so he decided to get aggressive. He seized 21,000 chests of opium worth millions of pounds....and burnt that shit to crisp.

The merchants thought fair enough, they kind of deserved it and they headed home..that's a lie, they were pissed.

The superintendent of trade, Charles Elliot promised that they would be compensated, which would be like me promising Hamilton wouldn't break Schumacher's records.

In 1839, two drunk British sailors wandered into a bar and decided to beat some Chinese man to death, you know, as you do.

Elliot tried them onboard a British vessel but refused to hand them over to the Chinese. They were sentenced to hard labor back home, which was overruled

Zexu decided that the British merchants didn't need food anymore and cut off all their supplies. Elliot asked for this to be repealed but got aired remarkably

The British sent a ship to shore to purchase food, but a Chinese ship tried to seize their goods. A battle broke out.

War officially began. The British blockaded the Pearl River and through the little scuffles it was easy to see the the modernized British were too much for the Chinese, who barely had rifles and mainly used hand weapons.

The British seized two forts on the Pearl River. The Chinese thought they'd kill whoever they captured, so they fought to the death. 500 Chinese were killed, 38 British were...wounded....from their own artillery. It was then a physician came to Elliot and begged for peace talks

The British soldiers wanted to turn his head into an expensive vase and level Canton to the fucking ground but Elliot wanted peace. Talks began again with Britain being reimbursed with 6m pounds, but buying Hong Kong for 6m as well

They returned to their superiors, expecting to be lauded for their diplomatic brilliance.

Elliot was fired and Qishan was ordered to be executed (he was fine dw). The war continued with the British ready to bomb the shit out of Canton only for a local official to pay them off

They moved on, capturing Shanghai and Zheijang. The road to the then capital Nanking (a lovely city, hope nothing bad ever happens to it). The Chinese knew they were toast and peace talks once again begun.

The Treaty of Nanking. This time they were to give the British 20 million compensation, fix their trade customs, open 5 more ports and give Hong Kong to the British. They had no choice but to accept.

This plunged China into civil unrest, but it wasn't over yet. In 1960 The British seized a Chinese ship believed to have contained former pirates. They negotiated for the release but only three were...so naturally this meant they should invade again. The Second Opium war began

A repeat of last time, they bombarded forts around Canton. The Chinese struck back, including at a random US ship minding it's own business, which then decided to briefly fuck them up too.

The European powers eyed the situation up. France decided to join the British.

They launched the Battle of Taku Forts...and got slapped. Then they did it again, and won. Bla bla bla yada yada yada, China once again got a shitty treaty to sign as the US, Russia, Britain and France were allowed to set up legations all around the country

This began a century of humiliation for China and their status as an isolated eastern power began to fall, notably with the rise of the Japanese.

So next time you come into contact with the enemy of God, parasitic life force and all round warped corrupted amalgamation of a French Viking that is a British person, direct them to this thread, tell them they're a dickhead, and then tell them to follow me!

Anyways if you've made it this far, dub. Ily. Which should I do next?