The Opium Wars weren’t just about drugs they were about power, profit, and empire. This video series breaks down how ...

China was soundly defeated. Among other outcomes, it ceded the vast port city of Hong Kong to Britain at the end of the First Opium War. Hong Kong returned to China's dominion in 1997.

A scene from 1842 during the first Opium War between China and Britain. Such battles more than 150 years ago were about control over trade, finance, and sovereignty — much like China’s ...

Our current best example is the trade imbalance with China and countries' refusal to address the problem in a meaningful way. By the 16 th century China was one of the leading nations of the world.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: The Opium Wars made it clear China had fallen gravely behind the West — not just militarily, but economically and politically.Every Chinese government since ...

Every Chinese schoolchild knows that the modern drive for wealth and power is, at root, a means of avenging the Opium Wars and what followed. How the conflict is remembered still matters very much.

During the 19th century, opium was British India's most valued export and China its most lucrative market. So much so that in 1858 Britain went to war not to prevent drug trafficking, but to ...

Imperial Twilight: The Opium War and the End of China's Last Golden Age, by Stephen R. Platt, Knopf, 592 pages, $35 Stephen R. Platt believes that the so-called Opium War of 1839–1842 was one of ...