 let's look at card number two opium and empire opium and empire Anglo-Chinese opium war beautiful artwork the Chinese ships were a lot smaller eh that's why they got knocked around the British navy opium and empire card number two when Britain conquered India's Bengal province in the mid 19 in the mid 1700s the regions Patna opium came under the control of British corporate proxy the British East India Company China refused to accept English manufactured goods in exchange for tea and silk insisting on hard currency so each year the East India Company brought the entire opium crops and brought in brought the entire opium crops and smuggled it into China for Chinese silver with which it legally purchased Chinese tea the emperor of China viewed opium as a poison introduced by foreign devils to destroy his nation and in 1799 banned opium smoking and importation the British ignored the ban because opium finance Britain's growing tea habit 10% of Britain's revenue was derived from taxing tea and the booming drug economy in Bengal provided a market for English textiles between 1773 and 1839 British exports of opium to China multiplied 30 fold by the 1830s after the British East India Company lost this monopoly the smuggling trade was handled by firms like Jar Jordan Matheson and company and Denton company who operated under British protection and bribe Canton officials to allow the drug drug traffic in 1839 the Chinese the Chinese again took a stand blockading shipping routes and confiscating 3 million pounds of opium one year's production but British naval forces backed by backed up by armed merchant ships destroyed all Chinese resistance by 1842 following their defeat in the first opium war there was a later conflict in 1860s the Chinese were forced to see certain port cities to the British and could no longer contain the flood flood of opium by the early 1900s there were 15 million Chinese addicts and China which had begun its own opium cultivation in 1880 was the world's leading producer that's card number two