Causes of the Opium War

Historians have christened the wars fought between China and Britain from 1839 to 1842 and from 1856 to 1860 as “The Opium Wars”; however, the Opium Wars really were not about opium. Even President John Quincy Adams asserted, “The seizure of a few thousand chests of opium smuggled into China by the British government was no more the cause of the Opium War than the throwing overboard of the tea in the Boston harbor was the cause of the …

…British frantically explored and colonized “less civilized” countries in a mad dash to find new markets for their surplus goods and capital. These new markets had to possess vast populations capable of sustaining Britain’s industrial “machine.” In the contest to colonize the world, China represented the last prize in the Far East for European countries. The Opium War was merely the first step designed to open the “China Market” and its resources for exploitation.