Human society seems to be caught in a strange circle.
The evolution of human society over thousands of years has emerged from the forest, gained a foothold in the desert and grassland, multiplied and grown in the plain, and completed the complete transformation of nature. For thousands of years, the only thing that may not have changed is human nature, greed for wealth, and the pursuit of pleasure, which has promoted the progress of human society and made human society spin around in a strange circle without breaking through.
Throughout the history of human development, history who will not simply repeat, but always in some keyword nodes with the same rhyme foot, in the fog of history is still unconscious, once a period of history, suddenly look back, only to realize that history is always so similar!
A few days ago, I was writing an article about the Tea War, which involved the Opium War as the beginning of China's modern history. Behind the Opium War is the invisible battle for tea market share, if you push this timeline forward, the Opium War in 1840, the outbreak of the Boston Tea Pouring Incident in North America in 1773, and the beginning of the founding of the United States of America, there is a certain invisible connection between the two.
If the political situation of the Manchu Qing Dynasty on the eve of the Opium War is compared with the current situation in the United States, it is suddenly found that the two are so similar, and history seems to repeat itself, but the protagonist of the story has changed from the Manchu Qing Dynasty to the American Empire!
Before the Opium War, the Manchu Qing government relied on silk tea to absorb global wealth, achieved the name of the Silver Empire, a veritable economic power, an Opium War unveiled the true face, and the huge empire was weak and weak under the surface prosperity.
Today's United States, holding the dollar, the global hard currency, lying on the back of the world's people to suck blood, the most powerful country in the global economy, politically wielding the big stick of long-arm jurisdiction, God blocks the killing god, the military US military bases are all over the world, the aircraft carrier fifth-generation aircraft dominates the world, everything looks so indestructible, powerful!
However, the of a thousand miles, destroyed by the ant nest, any of the strongest fortresses, often from the inside, the United States is now strong, is it as weak as the Qing government before the Opium War? Is the United States really just a big Qing Dynasty?
This article is an extension of the previous tea war, the pipe peeps, many times the collapse of a large empire often comes from the initial humble little things! I am the history of the green shirt bomb, this article is exclusive original, without permission, please do not reprint, like friends can click to support the oh ~ tea war article link: tea war: sin and evil, reward and punishment, the politics behind tea is too complicated
The full text is more than 3200 words, divided into 3 subsections:
Session 1: Silk Tea and Silver
Session 2: Dollars and Wealth
Section 3: The Great Qing and the United States
01 Silk tea with silver
In 1799, as the new century was approaching, a shocking case shocked both inside and outside the Qing Dynasty's officialdom.
The Qianlong Emperor's most favored courtier, the foreman of the military aircraft and the chancellor, and The Emperor Of Qianlong, had just died of illness and his bones were not cold, and what was the reason why the reigning Jiaqing Emperor was so eager to execute Hezhen? From the results of the He yan family, we may be able to get a clue, from the he Yan family copied out a huge amount of silver 800 million taels, equivalent to the total tax revenue of the Qing Dynasty in the past 10 years, how can such a huge wealth not make the Jiaqing Emperor, who is anxious about the government treasury, can't wait?
So, the question is, the ancient Chinese silver production is actually not high, it can even be said to be very low, where did such a huge amount of silver come from?
The answer lies in the thirteen lines of Guangzhou, which is deeply related to Hezhen, although the Qing Dynasty implemented the policy of closing the country to the outside world, it still left a small window to communicate with the world, this window is located in Guangzhou, undertaken by the government, monopolizing all trade between China and Europe, Latin America, South Asia, the Orient, ocean, Oceania, the British, the Dutch, the Portuguese, the Spaniards, and even the newly established Americans flock to the country, endlessly, just to get a ship of Chinese goods to bring back to China, to earn huge wealth.
At that time, the Manchu Qing government people sat at home, wealth came from the sea, and Chinese goods were the hard currency of the world at that time. Among them, the most dazzling star products are silk, porcelain and a huge amount of tea! This phenomenon has appeared as early as the middle and late Ming Dynasty, when the adventurers of Spain and Portugal explored the New World with a mortal heart, Chinese sat at home and easily used the three major products of silk porcelain and tea to turn the wealth of Portugal and Spain's bloody plunder into innocent snowflake silver, a large amount of silver flowed into the impact, the already shaky Ming Dynasty finances completely collapsed, the central government had no silver, only taxes, and the Ming Empire under the intensification of the conflict walked into the road of no return.
Qing Chengming system, the Qing Dynasty period this trend not only did not shrink, but there is a trend of expansion, a large amount of silver into China, the Qing Dynasty also with the silk porcelain tea and other trade achievements in the title of silver empire, the peak period, the Qing Dynasty alone tax revenue has 80 million two silver, ranking first in the world, the Qing Dynasty's GDP accounted for more than one-third of the global total, compared to today's United States not to mention more than let go!
The time came to 1840, the twenty years of The Qing Dynasty, the Year of the Gengzi Rat, and the eve of the outbreak of the Opium War.
This year, only 41 years after Qianlong's death, the earth-shattering case of Hezhen's downfall seems to be yesterday. This year was only 36 years after the Qing Dynasty's bloody suppression of the White Lotus Rebellion. The aura of Kang Yongqian's prosperity does not seem to be far away, the majesty of the Qing Empire is still singing and dancing in the four seas, the meat eaters in the imperial court are dancing, and the greedy hands are by no means soft.
The Qing Dynasty seems to be very rich and powerful in the eyes of outsiders! No one could have imagined that this kind of prosperous scene, like the emperor's new clothes, would be broken at a poke and would collapse in a battle!
02 USD with wealth
On July 1, 1944, under the signature confirmation of the representatives of 44 countries, the predecessor of the World Bank, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the International Monetary Fund, was proclaimed, which was signed in the town of Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA, so the newly established international monetary system, also known as the Bretton Woods system, the hegemony of the US dollar in the post-war international was established.
Europe, once the center of the world, was reduced to ruins after two world wars, and the United States, which watched the fire from across the shore, not only did not suffer much, but also made a lot of war wealth in the course of the war. After the war, in order to support an outpost position capable of countering the Soviet Union, the United States implemented the Marshall Plan, a large amount of economic aid entered Europe, American goods became hard currency, the us dollar was able to replace the financial status of the pound, and the United States took over the baton from the hands of the last world hegemon, Britain, and became a veritable world hegemon.
Initially, the dollar still needed an equal amount of gold to provide credit guarantees, but with the successive defeats of the United States in the Korean battlefield, especially in the Vietnam battlefield, a large amount of gold investment was not rewarded, and the US financial crisis was revealed. The shrewd French took the lead in running on the dollar, and the troubled United States directly announced the decoupling of the dollar from gold, and the first crisis of trust in the dollar broke out.
However, the United States soon found a better alternative than gold, oil! The development of modern society is inseparable from oil, oil is also known as the blood of industry, from the national defense industry to food, clothing, housing and transportation, oil is everywhere, who can control oil, who can grasp the right to speak in modern society.
So the dollar jumped from the world currency to the human currency, no matter where on the earth, the dollar is always the hard currency of human society, you can buy anything you want, of course, provided you have to have money!
The upper echelons of the United States also lived a comfortable life for the Qing Dynasty magnates, people sat at home, wealth rolled in, hands did not have to be stained with blood and mud, did not have to risk life and death to carry out the black slave trade to make some black money, nor did they have to work hard to squeeze the workers in Bala's sweatshops to make some hard money, the Qing Dynasty magnates only needed to produce as much porcelain and tea as possible, and the Americans could simply print some dollars with full horsepower.
03 The Great Qing and the United States
In 1792, King George III of england sent a delegation led by Macartney to visit China in the name of celebrating the 80th birthday of Qianlong, and the emerging country visited the hegemonic country of the world at that time (note: at least economically barely able to claim hegemony).
The twilight of an old empire, without the half vitality of a young country! The mountains and rivers are desolate, all you see is poor, and the wind and rain of falling flowers hurt spring even more!
In 1793, in the summer of the fifty-eighth year of Qianlong, the first British mission to Visit China arrived in China. The British are curious about this mysterious country. They believed that China, as Marco Polo wrote in his travels, was full of gold and everyone was wearing silk silk.
However, as soon as they landed on Chinese soil, they immediately discovered the shocking poverty. The Qing Dynasty hired many ordinary people to come to the ships of the British mission, pour tea and water for the British, and sweep the floor to cook. The British noticed that these people were "so emaciated". "In the middle of ordinary Chinese, it is difficult to find a beer belly similar to that of a British citizen or the cheerful face of a British farmer." These ordinary Chinese "Every time we receive our leftovers, we must be thankful." For the tea leaves we used, they always greedily scrambled and then boiled water to drink."
--- excerpt from the preface to the book "The Age of Hunger"
The people at the bottom lived so hard, but what were the nobles of the Qing Dynasty doing at this time? The Qianlong Emperor went to Jiangnan six times, and his extravagant and wasteful extravagance and extravagance were beyond the imagination of today's people, and in order to please Qianlong, the rich merchants could build a white pagoda with salt overnight. The Qianlong Emperor saw that the supremacy of imperial power was also deeply imprinted on the hearts of local magnates, but he threw the suffering to his people, but who cares about this?
Today's United States is really like the Qing Dynasty on the eve of the Opium War, where the rich and the powerful are full of dogs and horses, indulging in pleasure; the poor and commoners are in deep trouble, struggling for life and death. Unemployment has soared, the middle class has fallen, marches and violence have flown together, homeless people and slums are the same, and the beautiful scenery of the United States is really beautiful!
In my previous work, the trap of developed countries elaborated in detail on the hollowing out of the country, the gap between rich and poor, arrogance, and the three external manifestations of the trap of developed countries, the Qing Empire and the British Empire were once deeply involved, and as a result, one completed a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society for himself, and one lost his hegemony, lost his former glory, and retreated to the appearance of prosperity and prosperity, and what was inside was nothing more than a large empire that was weakening day by day!
04 Final Chapter
History shows a spiral forward, the evolution of human society for thousands of years, many times before and after a comparison, suddenly looking back, as if the past has reappeared, but the protagonist of the story changed from the Manchu Qing Dynasty to the American Empire! More than a hundred years after the fall of the qing dynasty, I actually saw its ghost in the United States, and I was extremely frightened and terrified!
After reading the Qing Dynasty on the eve of the Opium War, you may understand why the United States, which is also the old empire, is so anxious now, outsiders still can't feel this desolate feeling of twilight and beauty, but the people in the bureau are feeling it.
In the process of determining the hegemonic status of the United States, it has also established the hegemony of the us dollar, and the dollar and the United States complement each other, and this life rises and falls.
On July 4, 1776, the United States declared its independence, and now that 245 years have passed, the United States has also entered the ranks of the old empire from a nascent country of teenagers, and twilight is entangled in the empire inside and out. With the rise of the United States, the dollar has jumped from worthless to global hard currency that everyone is competing for, completing a magnificent turnaround.
The dollar relies on the hegemony of the United States to penetrate into all aspects of human society, and the United States also relies on the dollar to easily harvest global wealth, just like the Qing Dynasty on the eve of the Opium War.
The road is divided into yin and yang, yin and yang are declining, the prosperity will be defeated, the dollar from 1945 to the road of hegemony, after 75 years have passed, it has also entered the twilight years, how long can the hegemony of the dollar support? Whether the US hegemony, which has lost its dollar hegemony, will fall into the predicament of our Qing Dynasty on the eve of the Opium War is especially clear, but through history, we seem to have already seen the end!
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Resources:
1. Zhang Hongjie, "The Age of Hunger"
2. Frederick Pierucci and Matthew Allen, The American Trap
3. Galton, "The Collapse of the American Empire"