The Opium Wars

 

  The goal of capitalism is to make money by giving people what they want. Depending on what people want, that's good, as long as there are rules to keep things from getting out of hand. People have always wanted drugs. In ancient China opium was expensive and only the rich could afford it.

  The British East India Company got going and started producing opium in India. The East India Company had its own army and ruled large parts of India. By the late 1700s it was importing large quantities of cheap opium into China. 

  The British people had their own addiction: for Chinese tea, which was causing a balance payments problem. China didn't want anything Britain made. The solution was opium. By the 1830s the Chinese emperor said enough and seized several million pounds (£) worth of opium and destroyed it.

  The British merchants appealed to Parliament. The government sent warships to China to bombard several cities. The Chinese could not resist the advanced arms of the British and were forced to sign a treaty paying for the destroyed opium and giving the island of Hong Kong to Britain as well as other trading concessions. 

  Opium was still illegal, but the East India Company continued to import the drug via Chinese smugglers. Tensions rose and in October, 1856 Chinese marines took over a Chinese ship known for piracy. However the ship was registered in Hong Kong and was considered British. On this day in 1857 Britain declared war on China. Again the army was sent in and a treaty was signed.  

  This treaty gave land on the mainland around Hong Kong to the British "for 100 years" (now expired). China had been closed to foreigners. The treaty allowed Christian missionaries and businessmen to flood the country. And opium became legal. Nowadays China reminds us of the "century of unequal treaties" when it wants to do something we don't like. 

  Opium is a gift from God. It’s the best pain reliever there is.  People figured out how to extract morphine from opium for more precise dosing. It’s the drug of choice for wounded soldiers. Drug dealers figured out how to extract heroin for quick sales. Heroin has half the weight of morphine and twice the value. The history of opium shows it to be about as harmful as our other pain and stress relievers: alcohol and tobacco, with which we kill ourselves legally in great numbers. 

The perfect crop to finance a pariah nation.