One
The history textbook gives us the impression that the emperors of the middle and early Qing Dynasty, from Shunzhi to Kang Yongqian, were all brilliant and ambitious. In the late Qing Dynasty, Daoguang, Xianfeng to Guangxu, one by one cowardly and incompetent, China fell behind and was beaten.
However, in fact, if you carefully read the historical materials, you can easily find that the outbreak of the Opium War had multiple direct and indirect relations with the Qianlong Emperor.
Speaking of China, it is really a lot of disasters. Before the great geographical discovery, China had always been interested in the outside world. Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty sent people out on expeditions many times and almost reached Europe. The Sui Emperor also repeatedly "recruited pedestrians and divided up the territory" and sent envoys as far as Persia and other places. The gathering of merchants of all races in Chang'an in the Tang Dynasty has always been a landmark proof of the openness of the Tang Dynasty. Overseas trade between the two Song Dynasties was more prosperous, and the foreign trade revenue of the Southern Song Dynasty occupied a very important weight in the national finances. The opening of the Yuan Dynasty led to the birth of Marco Polo's Travels.
After the great geographical discovery, Westerners came to the surface of the eastern sea that had long been fascinated. The process of globalization has since begun, and it is no longer possible for any country to shut itself up. It was precisely at this time that China began to turn to a closed country. In the view of Zhu Yuanzhang, the Ming Emperor, overseas trade cannot bring any benefits to the country except for the import of some unused luxury goods and the overseas forces that bring danger. Therefore, he issued an edict to strictly enforce the sea ban, "the plates are not allowed to go to the sea." Although the sea ban was partially opened in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, it was still heavily banned. During the Jiajing period, Emperor Ming Shizong stipulated that it was forbidden to build large ships with more than two masts, and to destroy all forbidden large ships. The effects of this ban lasted for more than 300 years, and until 1820, Chinese ships bound for Southeast Asia were still limited to two masts.
Two
The visit of the British envoys to China actually provided Qianlong with a good opportunity to understand the West and promote China's participation in the competition of world maritime trade.
The mission of the British mission was to establish the first-ever formal diplomatic relations with China. The British want to set up an embassy in China, exchange ambassadors with China, and hope to sign a diplomatic treaty with China and establish stable diplomatic relations.
Of course, Britain's most urgent goal is to get the Chinese government to reform the foreign trade system, abolish the thirteen lines, open a few more ports, allow free trade, and disclose tariff rates to alleviate the exploitation and difficulties of Chinese officials on foreign investors.
The British also have a "non-divided please". At that time, Macau had been under the actual rule of Portugal for many years, so it was hoped that the Chinese emperor would also "give" The British a "small island" to "pile up goods".
In order to achieve this goal, the British brought many gifts to Qianlong. Of course, these gifts are not mainly luxury goods, but industrial products that reflect Britain's military strength and scientific and technological strength. The British brought with them the most advanced weapons in the world at the time, bringing with them a full set of models of the British fleet. In addition, it also brought a lot of "high-tech products", such as a celestial orbiter, which is a model of the solar system, with a sun in the middle, driven by gears, and several large planets orbiting the sun after the winding. They also brought an astronomical telescope, which Europeans used to discover the existence of nebulae and know that humans live in the Milky Way. They brought Qianlong a large globe marked with British colonies in various places, showing Qianlong the majesty of the Empire where the sun never sets. They even brought Qianlong a hot air balloon and a hot air balloon driver, and if the Qianlong Emperor wanted to, he could take a hot air balloon to the sky and become the first person in the Eastern Hemisphere to fly into the sky. The British were fully convinced that these latest achievements of all human civilization must have opened the eyes of the Chinese emperor and impressed the Europeans. Because they know through trade that China's industry is still stuck in the medieval era.
But Qianlong did not receive this information, why? Because there is a liturgical dispute in between. After the British envoys came to China, the Qing officials asked them to learn to kneel three times and bow nine times, and all foreign envoys who came to pay tribute had to do so. However, the British envoys refused to agree, believing that the British Empire and the Qing Empire were equal, and the two sides clashed fiercely.
After many rounds of negotiations, the British envoys reluctantly agreed, and on the day of Qianlong's birthday, they mixed with the envoys of various countries and knelt down together, but the British knelt down on one knee. When others prostrate, they bow down with the crowd, and from a distance it looks like they have performed three kneeling and nine prostrations. Qianlong was very unhappy in his heart, so later when Qianlong watched the gifts brought by the British envoys, he did not ask these British envoys to explain to him, because he knew that they would not kneel for themselves. Qianlong himself watched there alone, and didn't understand anything after watching for half a day. He saw the model of the solar system and thought it was a large Western clock, because there were gears turning, he gave it a name called "Astronomical Geography Watch", thinking that there was no essential difference from the clocks and watches bought before the Qing Palace. Seeing the astronomical telescope, he said that it was a clairvoyant, because there were already telescopes in the palace, of course, for hunting. The British wrote a detailed English instruction manual for the telescope, indicating that "this was invented by the mainland scientist Newton, what principles were applied", and Qianlong could not understand it at all. The British colonies marked in English on the globe were not noticed by Qianlong. Therefore, the British did their best to show Qianlong the level of development of the Western world, but Qianlong did not receive this information at all. Therefore, Qianlong rejected the British envoys' demands on equal exchanges between the two countries, the establishment of embassies each other, and the reform of China's foreign trade system, and rejected them all. He replied to the British that your demands did not conform to Chinese practice, that the Heavenly Dynasty system was perfect, that not a word needed to be changed, and that your hasty making of these requests was obviously a ridiculous move by the ignorant barbarian country.
Qianlong did not know that he had missed the last opportunity that the world had left for China. By the second half of the 17th century, Portugal and Spain's maritime hegemony had declined, and the late Netherlands had also entered a process of decline. Britain's massive expansion into East Asia followed since the mid-18th century. From the second half of the 17th century to the first half of the 18th century, it was a blank period of sea power in Southeast Asia. If Qianlong can keenly feel the imminent threat through Macartney's visit to China and seize this last opportunity to actively explore the sea, it is not impossible to obtain the latest Western military and scientific and technological achievements and strive to catch up with the world level.
Unfortunately, this is only a hypothesis. The cultural character of the Qing Dynasty determined that this possibility was extremely small.
After returning from China, Macartney predicted that once the Chinese giant ship was attacked, "it would never be repaired." Trade in Asia and around the world will be "disrupted ... Adventurers from all over the world will come to China" in an attempt to exploit the decay of Chinese to build their prestige. And "there will be a relentless struggle between them." In this confrontation, the rich are richer and the poor are poorer. "Britain, by virtue of its entrepreneurial spirit, has become the world's first power in navigation, trade and politics; from such drastic changes it will reap the greatest benefits and will strengthen its hegemonic position."
Three
Although there was no economic gain, the British gained greatly militarily.
For this visit of the British, the Qianlong Emperor not only made meticulous preparations for the reception work, but also gave many instructions in terms of showing off force. The Emperor informed the military everywhere that wherever the British passed, they should be fully armed and lined up to greet them, showing the British the powerful force of the Heavenly Dynasty, opening their eyes and being in awe of the strength of the Heavenly Dynasty.
However, it was better not to show it, and as soon as it was shown, the British immediately discovered China's military backwardness. The British were extremely contemptuous of China's armament: "Their cannons are few, and the few guns they have are dilapidated." I suspected that the guns were borrowed from the Portuguese, because those arquebusiers were. This military display became a joke in the eyes of the British. Upon his return to England, Macartney's words quickly spread around the world:
The Chinese Empire was just a dilapidated old ship, and it was only fortunate to have a few cautious captains that it did not sink for nearly 150 years. Its huge shell frightened its neighbors. If an incompetent man comes to the helm, then the discipline and safety on the ship will be finished. The ship will not sink immediately. It will drift around like a wreckage and then crash into smashes on the shore.
In addition to the overall assessment of China's military, they also examined China's specific defense. Macartney initially explored the waterway from Ningbo to Tianjin Dagukou and from Dagukou to Tongzhou, and made a detailed observation of the defense facilities of Chinese cities such as Beijing, Tongzhou, and Dinghai, providing a large amount of military information for westerners to invade Beijing later.
Why did the British choose Dinghai as the first Chinese city to attack in the Opium War? It was because the British envoys detailed the defensive layout of Dinghai City.
The opium factor of the Opium War also appeared in the Qianlong period. As mentioned earlier, because British goods could not be spent in China, in Sino-British trade, the British could only exchange silver for Chinese tea. China's astonishing appetite for silver has led to the depletion of many silver mines in the Americas. The British were so distraught that Colonel Watson, a senior employee of the British East India Company, formally proposed a plan to grow opium on a large scale in India and sell it to Chinese. In 1773, the thirty-eighth year of Qianlong, the plan was approved and implemented. Of course, Qianlong knew nothing about this.
In the beginning, the British were not prepared to carry out this evil plan on a large scale, but still hoped to open the door to China through negotiations. It was not until after the failure of the Macartney mission that the British began to organize the import of opium into China on a large scale. According to statistics, from 1775 to 1797, China imported an average of 1814 boxes of opium per year. From 1798 to 1799, the average increased to 4113 cases per year, and by 1800, it reached 4570 boxes.
It was the opium smuggling that arose during the Qianlong period that turned China's trade from a previous surplus into a deficit, a large amount of silver flowed out, and decades later the finances were on the verge of bankruptcy, causing the Daoguang Emperor to have to ban smoking.
Four
In the process of the Opium War in England, one man played a decisive role. His name was George Thomas Staunton, and he was known as "Little Staunton".
On April 7, 1840, the British House of Commons held a heated debate on the question of "whether to send an expeditionary force to China." During the long debate, the speech of a parliamentarian named Little Staunton attracted special attention. When he spoke, the audience was silent, and people listened very seriously. Little Staunton said in a decisive tone that, with his knowledge of the character of The Rulers of China, he believed that war was inevitable: "I know very well the character of this nation, the character of the class that rules it despotically, and I am sure that if we want to achieve some kind of result, negotiations will be accompanied by the use of force to show off." ”
The impact of Staunton Jr.'s statement on the decisions of the MPs was crucial. After the speech, there was a long round of applause in the House of Commons. In the subsequent voting, the main war faction had 271 votes, and the anti-war faction had 262 votes, a difference of 9 votes.
Why are Staunton Jr.'s words so convincing? Because he was the most famous Chinese expert in Britain at that time, and he had been to China since he was 13 years old, he had a "cordial conversation" with the Qianlong Emperor.
It turned out that Staunton Jr. was the son of Staunton, the deputy envoy of the Macartney Mission. When Macartney visited China, at the age of 13, he was brought to China as a "trainee waiter". During the long journey to China, Little Staunton learned simple Chinese. Therefore, when he was on a visit, he had the opportunity to chat directly with Qianlong with Chinese, and Qianlong was happy and rewarded him with a purse.
After returning to England, Little Staunton continued to study hard Chinese, becoming a well-known sinologist and a member of the House of Commons.
Such a person certainly has the most say in Sino-British relations. He told the British that they had to take a tough approach against China and that it was impossible to get Chinese to respect Britain through peaceful means. This was what he learned in the course of dealing with Qianlong.
Five
What the British did not get through peace negotiations in 1793, more than 40 years later through war, they did not get a lot. The five-point core content of the Treaty of Nanking was almost identical to what Macartney begged the Qianlong Emperor.
In 1793, Macartney proposed multi-port trade, adding Zhoushan, Ningbo, Tianjin and other places; the Treaty of Nanjing in 1842 stipulated that Shanghai, Ningbo, Fuzhou, Xiamen, Guangzhou and other places were opened as treaty ports.
Macartney demanded, as for Macau, Portugal, a small island for England to stack goods. The Treaty of Nanking ceded Hong Kong Island to Britain.
Macartney demanded an end to the thirteen-line monopoly, free trade, and openly fixed tariff rates, all of which were implemented in the Treaty of Nanking.
Therefore, the Opium War was directly related to the Qianlong Emperor.
(Source 丨"A Brief Reading of Chinese History: China under the Coordinates of World History" author 丨 Zhang Hongjie Jiangsu Phoenix Literature and Art Publishing House 丨 Publishing)