[antidesitter]

> Opening markets when these foreign actors very recently attacked your population is basically suicide.

Do you have evidence to support this claim? You seem to be conflating these countries’ governments with their businesses.

Also, can you clarify what you mean by “attacked their population”?

[IllogicalLogic]

>"Also, can you clarify what you mean by “attacked their >population”?"

The opium epedemic and wars drove the Chinese economy into the ground.

British invasion and colonization of India pushed one of the top trading nations and #1 GDP (China & India competed to maintain #1 status for 2000 years) in the world into the ground.

[seanmcdirmid]

The decline of the Qing dynasty drove the economy into the ground even before the British started opium there. China loves to blame foreigners for all of their problems, but a lot of it was self inflicted.

[IllogicalLogic]

Your timeline is a little off. The Qing dynasty decline was partly to blame but be sure that almost 1/4 of Chinese young adults under the age 25 being addicted to illegal opium (thanks to western traders) didn't help. If you think that wasn't a contributing factor, it is being ahistorical.

US and Western Europe is facing this growing opioid issue today (during an economic decline), if we are not careful, we will see very clearly the effects (both socially and economically) of opioids poisoning the gene pool en masse.

[seanmcdirmid]

That is like blaming the Mongolians for the fall of the Song Dynasty? Symptomatic of a dynasty in decline? Yes. Causal of that decline? No.

[IllogicalLogic]

So western power invading and enslaving China's major trading partners and drugging their population had 0 negative economic effect?

It seems the history books you have been exposed to detail a narrative that economic/trade flow history (narrative independent) does not recognize...

[seanmcdirmid]

No, it was symptomatic of a declining dynasty, it didn’t cause the decline in the first place. And even then, it wasn’t as comprehensive as you describe, the Japanese did way more damage to the Qing than the british did.

[reaperducer]

The opium epedemic and wars drove the Chinese economy into the ground.

You mean the ones from the 1800's? Seriously?

[IllogicalLogic]

You need a history lesson (most Americans do)

The Coming War on China (2016) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rTVwLNhojI

[IllogicalLogic]

Trump is actively setting trade/economic policy considering 18-19th century history (economic history more specifically).

Remember the Opium Wars and the families it made rich (most famous, Coolidge (descendants of Thomas Jefferson), Roosevelts (through the Delano family), Forbes (John Kerry's family), etc.. in the US). On the otherside of the pond, in 1890 (peak opium crisis), 30% of Britain's GDP was illegal opium smuggling to China.

https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/3/30/opium-at-harvar...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_%26_Company

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0AJ59vqzzg

The seperator between government and companies isn't as big as you think when this much multi-generational wealth and political power is invloved.

Kind of funny that many don't know their own history (Roman history is tough...going through 300 years of US history is trivially easy but most still don't).

[mirimir]

Yes, there's lots of ugly in US history. It's been very effectively suppressed. Most Americans will think that you're some sort of conspiracy theorist :(

And by the way, US tobacco manufacturers also managed to addict most of Southeast Asia. I highly recommend Drugs and Rights by Douglas N. Husak (Rutgers, 1992).[0]

0) https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/drugs-and-rights/0C9669...

[IllogicalLogic]

Economic history has less incentive to lie and it's hard to retroactively change 100 years of accounting/trade history to maintain a fake national narrative.

Remember in international trade, atleast 3 seperate entities end up with copies of every transaction (buyer/seller/shipper).

It's why I consider it more trustworthy...

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/business-history-rev...

[mirimir]

Thanks. Great paper.