Why did Britain start the Opium Wars with China? Britain started the Opium Wars with China to force China into a trading and diplomatic system that was favorable with British interests.
There are two basic causes of the First Opium War, which started in 1839 and lasted until 1842, but its causes go back at least several decades before that. The first cause was mainly financial. China and Britain were trading partners. From China, Britain bought porcelain, silk, and tea. From Britain, China bought … nothing. China didn’t need anything that Britain exported. In most trades, goods could be swapped instead of money changing hands. Because China didn’t need anything, Britain was forced to use silver to purchase the things they needed. The traders quickly realized that one thing they had that Chinese people did want was opium they grew in India. They started to import that and trade it for goods. Very quickly, Chinese people became addicted and Britain started trading more into China than they took out. China started losing silver. China obviously couldn’t let its population become addicted to opiates, so they tried to crack down on them. By 1833, Britain and other countries were selling 2,310 tons of opium into China a year and draining the country of silver.
The second reason was diplomatic. Britain and China obviously had different styes of government. In China, the emperor was top and was a god, then there was a strictly controlled hierarchy below. When people representing foreign governments came to trade with China, they were not allowed to meet the government or the emperor. They were restricted to the port area of Canton and their trade and movements were carefully controlled. They could only trade with recognized merchants and were they could live and travel was restricted. Several representatives of the British government travelled to China, but they were not allowed to deal with the government. The British representatives saw their king as being equal to the Chinese emperor, so they should be allowed an audience. But the Chinese didn’t see it that way.
The Chinese started to crack down on the opium and in 1839 the emperor put Lin Zexu in charge of suppressing the opium trade that was starting to destroy China. Zexu went to Canton with his troops and they surrounded the whole port, forcing the foreign traders to surrender all of their opium. One of the traders, a Scottish physician called William Jardine, sailed to London and lobbied the foreign secretary, Lord Palmerston, for military action against China. He gave Palmerston a lot of very detailed information about the Chinese forces and their defenses. He basically told Palmerston where to attack and how many forces he would need, and what concessions could be extracted from China. Palmerston was swayed, and an expeditionary force was dispatched from India to China.
Canton was captured in 1840 and British forces and the navy sailed along China’s coast, harrying the ports. Finally, they sailed up the Yangtze and captured Zhenjiang, threatening the important city of Nanjing and the Grand Canal. China sued for peace. The peace treaty was very unfair. China gave Britain Hong Kong, 21 million silver dollars, and opened up 5 ports to trade with Britain.
14 years later, Britain had become unsatisfied with only having access to five ports. They wanted greater freedom, more diplomatic access, and legalization of opium in China. The Qing government obviously did not want these things. In 1856, Britain engineered a false flag reason to go to war. Chinese officials boarded a Chinese ship and arrested the Chinese crew for piracy. That ship had been previously registered to Britain, but that registration had expired and it was a fully Chinese ship. Still, Britain claimed China had entered a British ship and demanded an apology. China refused. Britain went to war. France joined in. Both countries sailed up and down the coast bombarding ports before heading for Beijing. China was able to hold them back, but both countries increased their forces and in 1860 they too Beijing. They looted the city and burned the Summer Palace.
China surrendered and Britain and France received many more concessions, including more land, more ports, better diplomatic relations, expanded commercial rights, and the legalization of opium in China. The Opium Wars themselves affected only parts of China, but their consequences were enormous. China was forced to pay indemnities, surrender territory, open ports to foreign powers and accept treaties that weakened its control over its own affairs. The defeats also exposed the military weakness of the Qing dynasty at exactly the time it was facing enormous rebellions at home. And this is what I learned today.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_Wars
https://history.state.gov/milestones/1830-1860/china-1
https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/hong-kong-and-the-opium-wars/ Photo by hasan kurt: https://www.pexels.com/photo/poppy-plant-in-close-up-photography-11192482/