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Article: Britain's opium wars. (fact and myth about the opium trade in East)
- Article from:
- Monthly Review
- Article date:
- October 1, 1997
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 Monthly Review Foundation, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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It is a little known fact that during the reign of Queen Victoria, the British capitalist state was the largest drug pusher the world has ever seen. The smuggling of opium into China was by the 1830s a source of huge profits, played a crucial role in the financing of British rule in India and was the underpinning of British trade throughout the East. This is one of those little historical details that are often overlooked in the history books where the opium trade is either played down or ignored altogether. Most recently Professor Denis Judd's Empire, a 500-page history of British Imperialism has no discussion of either the trade or the wars it occasioned, while the ...