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The First Opium War (1839–42), also known as the Opium War and as the Anglo-Chinese War, was fought between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Qing Empire over their conflicting viewpoints on diplomatic relations, trade, and the administration of justice for foreign nationals.〔Tsang, Steve (2007). ''A Modern History of Hong Kong''. I.B.Tauris. p. 3–13, 29. ISBN 1-84511-419-1.〕 In the 17th and 18th centuries, the demand for Chinese goods (particularly silk, porcelain, and tea) in the European market created a trade imbalance because the market for Western goods in China was virtually non-existent; China was largely self-sufficient and Europeans were not allowed access to China's interior. European silver flowed into China when the Canton System, instituted in the mid-17th century, confined the sea trade to Canton and to the Chinese merchants of the Thirteen Factories. The British East India Company had a matching monopoly of British trade. The British East India Company began to auction opium grown on its plantations in India to independent foreign traders in exchange for silver. The opium was then transported to the Chinese coast and sold to local middlemen who retailed the drug inside China. This reverse flow of silver and the increasing numbers of opium addicts alarmed Chinese officials. In 1839, the Daoguang Emperor, rejecting proposals to legalise and tax opium, appointed viceroy Lin Zexu to solve the problem by abolishing the trade. Lin confiscated around 20,000 chests of opium (approximately 1210 tons or 2.66 million pounds) without offering compensation, blockaded trade, and confined foreign merchants to their quarters. The British government, although not officially denying China's right to control imports of the drug, objected to this unexpected seizure and used its naval and gunnery power to inflict a quick and decisive defeat,〔 a tactic later referred to as gunboat diplomacy. In 1842, the Treaty of Nanking—the first of what the Chinese later called the unequal treaties—granted an indemnity and extraterritoriality to Britain, the opening of five treaty ports, and the cession of Hong Kong Island. The failure of the treaty to satisfy British goals of improved trade and diplomatic relations led to the Second Opium War (1856–60).〔Tsang 2004, p. 29〕 In China, the war is considered as the beginning of modern Chinese history. == Background – European trade with Asia == Direct maritime trade between Europe and China began in 1557 when the Portuguese leased an outpost at Macau. Other European nations soon followed the Portuguese lead, inserting themselves into the existing Asian maritime trade network to compete with Arab, Chinese, Indian, and Japanese traders in intra-regional trade. Mercantilist governments in Europe objected to the perpetual drain of silver to pay for Asian commodities, and so European traders often sought to generate profits from intra-regional Asian trade to pay for their purchases to be sent back home. After the Spanish acquisition of the Philippines, the exchange of goods between China and western Europe accelerated dramatically. From 1565, the annual Manila Galleon brought in enormous amounts of silver to the Asian trade network, and in particular China, from Spanish silver mines in South America. As demand increased in Europe, the profits European traders generated within the Asian trade network, used to purchase Asian goods, were gradually replaced by the direct export of bullion from Europe in exchange for the produce of Asia. British ships began to appear sporadically around the coasts of China from 1635; without establishing formal relations through the tributary system, British merchants were allowed to trade at the ports of Zhoushan and Xiamen in addition to Guangzhou (Canton). Trade further benefited after the Qing dynasty relaxed maritime trade restrictions in the 1680s, after Taiwan came under Qing control in 1683, and even rhetoric regarding the "tributary status" of Europeans was muted. Guangzhou (Canton) was the port of preference for most foreign trade; ships did try to call at other ports but they did not match the benefits of Guangzhou's geographic position at the mouth of the Pearl river trade network and Guangzhou's long experience in balancing the demands of Beijing with those of Chinese and foreign merchants. From 1700–1842, Guangzhou came to dominate maritime trade with China, and this period became known as the "Canton System".〔 Official British trade was conducted through the auspices of the British East India Company, which held a royal charter for trade with the Far East. The British East India Company gradually came to dominate Sino-European trade from its position in India. From the inception of the Canton System in 1757, trade in goods from China was extremely lucrative for European and Chinese merchants alike. However, foreign traders were only permitted to do business through a body of Chinese merchants known as the ''Cohong'' and were restricted to Canton. Foreigners could only live in one of the Thirteen Factories, near Shameen Island, and were not allowed to enter, much less live or trade in, any other part of China. While silk and porcelain drove trade through their popularity in the west, an insatiable demand for tea existed in Britain. However, only silver was accepted in payment by China, which resulted in a chronic trade deficit.〔Alain Peyrefitte, ''The Immobile Empire—The first great collision of East and West—the astonishing history of Britain's grand, ill-fated expedition to open China to Western Trade, 1792–94'' (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992), p. 520〕〔Peyrefitte 1993, p487-503〕 From the mid-17th century around 28 million kilograms of silver were received by China, principally from European powers, in exchange for Chinese goods.〔(Early American Trade ), BBC〕 Britain had been on the gold standard since the 18th century, so it had to purchase silver from continental Europe and Mexico to supply the Chinese appetite for silver.〔Liu, Henry C. K. (4 September 2008). (Developing China with sovereign credit ). ''Asia Times Online''.〕 Attempts by a British embassy (led by Macartney in 1793), a Dutch mission (under Van Braam in 1794), Russia's Golovkin in 1805 and the British again (Amherst in 1816) to negotiate access to the Chinese market were all vetoed by successive Emperors.〔 By 1817, the British realized they could reduce the trade deficit as well as turn the Indian colony profitable by counter-trading in narcotic Indian opium. The Qing administration initially tolerated opium importation because it created an indirect tax on Chinese subjects, while allowing the British to double tea exports from China to England, thereby profiting the monopoly on tea exports held by the Qing imperial treasury and its agents.〔Peyrefitte, 1993 p520〕 Opium was produced in traditionally cotton-growing regions of India under British East India Company monopoly (Bengal) and in the Princely states (Malwa) outside the company's control. Both areas had been hard hit by the introduction of factory-produced cotton cloth, which used cotton grown in Egypt. The opium was auctioned in Calcutta (now Kolkata) on the condition that it be shipped by British traders to China. Opium as a medicinal ingredient was documented in texts as early as the Tang dynasty but its recreational use was limited and there were laws against its abuse. British sales of opium began in 1781, and sales increased fivefold between 1821 and 1837 . The East India Company ships brought their cargoes to islands off the coast, especially Lintin Island, where Chinese traders with fast and well-armed small boats took the goods for inland distribution, paying for them with silver and causing a shift in its flow. By 1820, just when the Qing treasury needed to finance the suppression of rebellions, the flow of silver had reversed: Chinese merchants were now exporting it to pay for opium. The imperial court debated whether or how to end the opium trade, but its efforts were complicated by local officials (including the Governor-general of Canton) who profited greatly from the bribes and taxes involved.〔Peter Ward Fay, ''The Opium War, 1840–1842: Barbarians in the Celestial Empire in the Early Part of the Nineteenth Century and the Way by Which They Forced the Gates Ajar'' (Chapel Hill, North Carolina:: University of North Carolina Press, 1975).〕 A turning point came in 1834: reformers in England who advocated free trade had succeeded in ending the monopoly of the British East India Company under the Charter Act of the previous year, finally opening British trade to private entrepreneurs, many of whom joined in the lucrative trade of opium to China. American merchants then got involved and began to introduce opium from Turkey into the Chinese market — this was of lesser quality but cheaper to produce, and competition between and among British and American merchants drove down the price of opium, increasing sales.〔 〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「First Opium War」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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