Editing Opium (section)

==== Prohibition and conflict in China ====
{{Main|Destruction of opium at Humen|Opium Wars|History of opium in China}}
{{See also|Japanese opium policy in Taiwan (1895–1945)}}
{{More citations needed section|date=February 2021}}
[[File:Destruction of opium in 1839.jpg|thumb|[[Destruction of opium at Humen]], June 1839]]

A large scale opium prohibition attempt began in 1729, when the [[Qing dynasty|Qing]] [[Yongzheng Emperor]], disturbed by ''[[madak]]'' smoking at court and carrying out the government's role of upholding [[Confucian]] virtues, officially prohibited the sale of opium, except for a small amount for medicinal purposes. The ban punished sellers and [[opium den]] keepers, but not users of the drug.<ref name="Trocki" /> Opium was banned completely in 1799, and this prohibition continued until 1860.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.goldentrianglepark.org/swf/timeline.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090420193731/http://www.goldentrianglepark.org/swf/timeline.htm|url-status=usurped|archive-date=April 20, 2009|title=Opium timeline|publisher=The Golden Triangle|access-date=September 13, 2009}}</ref>

[[File:William John Huggins - The opium ships at Lintin, China, 1824.jpg|thumb|left|British opium ships]]

During the Qing dynasty, China opened itself to foreign trade under the [[Canton System]] through the port of [[Guangzhou]] (Canton), with traders from the [[East India Company]] visiting the port by the 1690s. Due to the growing British demand for Chinese tea and the Chinese Emperor's lack of interest in British commodities other than silver, British traders resorted to trade in opium as a high-value commodity for which China was not self-sufficient. The English traders had been purchasing small amounts of opium from India for trade since [[Ralph Fitch]] first visited in the mid-16th century.<ref name="Trocki" /> Trade in opium was standardized, with production of balls of raw opium, {{convert|1.1-1.6|kg|abbr=on}}, 30% water content, wrapped in poppy leaves and petals, and shipped in chests of {{convert|60–65|kg|abbr=on}} (one [[picul]]).<ref name="Trocki" /> Chests of opium were sold in auctions in [[Kolkata|Calcutta]] with the understanding that the independent purchasers would then smuggle it into China.

China had a positive balance sheet in trading with the British, which led to a decrease of the British silver stocks. Therefore, the British tried to encourage Chinese opium use to enhance their balance, and they delivered it from Indian provinces under British control. In India, its cultivation, as well as the manufacture and traffic to China, were subject to the [[British East India Company]] (BEIC), as a strict monopoly of the British government.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bihargatha.in/early-agriculture-based-enterprenureships/opeum-factories |title=Opium Factories of Bihar – Bihargatha |publisher=Bihargatha.in |access-date=October 7, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110910142330/http://www.bihargatha.in/early-agriculture-based-enterprenureships/opeum-factories |archive-date=September 10, 2011 |url-status=dead |df=mdy-all }}</ref> There was an extensive and complicated system of BEIC agencies involved in the supervision and management of opium production and distribution in India. Bengal opium was highly prized, commanding twice the price of the domestic Chinese product, which was regarded as inferior in quality.<ref name="McCoy opium">{{cite web|url=http://www.a1b2c3.com/drugs/opi010.htm |title=Opium History, 1858 to 1940 |author=Alfred W. McCoy |access-date=May 4, 2007 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070404134938/http://www.a1b2c3.com/drugs/opi010.htm |archive-date=April 4, 2007 }}</ref>

[[File:British ships in Canton.jpg|thumb|British assault on [[Guangzhou|Canton]] during the [[First Opium War]], May 1841]]
Some competition came from the newly independent United States, which began to compete in Guangzhou, selling Turkish opium in the 1820s. Portuguese traders also brought opium from the independent Malwa states of western India, although by 1820, the British were able to restrict this trade by charging "pass duty" on the opium when it was forced to pass through Bombay to reach an ''[[entrepot]]''.<ref name="Trocki" />
Despite drastic penalties and continued prohibition of opium until 1860, opium smuggling rose steadily from 200 chests per year under the [[Yongzheng Emperor]] to 1,000 under the [[Qianlong Emperor]], 4,000 under the [[Jiaqing Emperor]], and 30,000 under the [[Daoguang Emperor]].<ref>Wertz, Richard R. [http://www.ibiblio.org/chinesehistory/contents/06dat/bio.2qin.html "Qing Era (1644–1912)"]. ''[[ibiblio|iBiblio]].'' 1998. Retrieved on September 21, 2007.</ref> This illegal sale of opium, which has been called "the most long continued and systematic international crime of modern times",<ref>John K. Fairbanks, "The Creation of the Treaty System' in John K. Fairbanks, ed. ''The Cambridge History of China'', vol. 10 Part 1 (Cambridge University Press, 1992) p. 213. ''cited in'' {{cite news |author=John Newsinger |date=October 1997 |title=Britain's opium wars – fact and myth about the opium trade in the East |url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1132/is_n5_v49/ai_20039205 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060213222236/http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1132/is_n5_v49/ai_20039205 |archive-date=2006-02-13 |newspaper=Monthly Review}}</ref> became one of the world's most valuable single commodity trades, and between 1814 and 1850, sucked out 11 percent of China's money supply.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bradley |first=James |title=The Imperial Cruise, a Secret History of Empire and War |year=2009 |publisher=Little, Brown |isbn=978-0316049665 |chapter=Chapter 10 |pages=274–275 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/imperialcruisese0000brad/page/274}}</ref>

In response to the ever-growing number of Chinese people becoming addicted to opium, the Qing [[Daoguang Emperor]] took strong action to halt the smuggling of opium, including the seizure of cargo. In 1838, the Chinese Commissioner [[Lin Zexu]] [[Destruction of opium at Humen|destroyed]] 20,000 chests of opium (approximately 2,660,000 pounds) in Guangzhou in a river.<ref name="Trocki" /> Given that a chest of opium was worth nearly {{US$|1,000|link=yes}} in 1800, this was a substantial economic loss. The British queen [[Victoria of the United Kingdom|Victoria]], not willing to replace the cheap opium with costly silver, began the [[First Opium War]] in 1840, the British winning Hong Kong and trade concessions in the first of a series of [[Unequal Treaties]].{{Citation needed|date=December 2022}}

The opium trade incurred intense enmity from the later British Prime Minister [[William Ewart Gladstone]].<ref name="Lodwick2015">{{cite book|author=Kathleen L. Lodwick|title=Crusaders Against Opium: Protestant Missionaries in China, 1874–1917|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DrAeBgAAQBAJ&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA86|date=February 5, 2015|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-4968-4|pages=86–}}</ref> As a member of Parliament, Gladstone called it "most infamous and atrocious" referring to the opium trade between China and British India in particular.<ref name="Chouvy2009">{{cite book|author=Pierre-Arnaud Chouvy|title=Opium: Uncovering the Politics of the Poppy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qGl4TN_qIsgC&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA9|year=2009|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-05134-8|pages=9–}}</ref> Gladstone was fiercely against both of the [[Opium Wars]] Britain waged in China in the [[First Opium War]] initiated in 1840 and the [[Second Opium War]] initiated in 1857, denounced British violence against Chinese, and was ardently opposed to the British trade in opium to China.<ref name="QuinaultWindscheffel2013">{{cite book|author1=Dr Roland Quinault|author2=Dr Ruth Clayton Windscheffel|author3=Mr Roger Swift|title=William Gladstone: New Studies and Perspectives|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Hve4IOulDlwC&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PT238|date=July 28, 2013|publisher=Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.|isbn=978-1-4094-8327-4|pages=238–}}</ref> Gladstone lambasted it as "[[Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston|Palmerston's]] Opium War" and said that he felt "in dread of the judgments of God upon England for our national iniquity towards China" in May 1840.<ref name="Foxcroft2013">{{cite book|author=Ms Louise Foxcroft|title=The Making of Addiction: The 'Use and Abuse' of Opium in Nineteenth-Century Britain|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VPosEno3uNYC&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA66|date=June 28, 2013|publisher=Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.|isbn=978-1-4094-7984-0|pages=66–}}</ref> A famous speech was made by Gladstone in Parliament against the [[First Opium War]].<ref name="HanesSanello2004">{{cite book|author1=William Travis Hanes|author2=Frank Sanello|title=Opium Wars: The Addiction of One Empire and the Corruption of Another|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jYmFAAAAQBAJ&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA78|year=2004|publisher=Sourcebooks, Inc.|isbn=978-1-4022-0149-3|pages=78–}}</ref><ref name="IIISanello2004">{{cite book|author1=W. Travis Hanes III|author2=Frank Sanello|title=The Opium Wars: The Addiction of One Empire and the Corruption of Another|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lXiiAAAAQBAJ&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PT88|date=February 1, 2004|publisher=Sourcebooks|isbn=978-1-4022-5205-1|pages=88–}}</ref> Gladstone criticized it as "a war more unjust in its origin, a war more calculated in its progress to cover this country with permanent disgrace".<ref name="Fay2000">{{cite book|author=Peter Ward Fay|title=The Opium War, 1840–1842: Barbarians in the Celestial Empire in the Early Part of the Nineteenth Century and the War by which They Forced Her Gates Ajar|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EgSs61pjvS8C&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PT290|date=November 9, 2000|publisher=Univ of North Carolina Press|isbn=978-0-8078-6136-3|pages=290–}}</ref> His hostility to opium stemmed from the effects of opium brought upon his sister Helen.<ref name="Isba2006">{{cite book|author=Anne Isba|title=Gladstone and Women|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gaxDs8_oz_QC&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA224|date=August 24, 2006|publisher=A&C Black|isbn=978-1-85285-471-3|pages=224–}}</ref> Due to the First Opium war brought on by [[Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston|Palmerston]], there was initial reluctance to join the government of Peel on part of Gladstone before 1841.<ref name="Bebbington1993">{{cite book|author=David William Bebbington|title=William Ewart Gladstone: Faith and Politics in Victorian Britain|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jEzV7PYYe5kC&q=William+Gladstone+opium&pg=PA108|year=1993|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-0-8028-0152-4|pages=108–}}</ref>

[[File:A busy stacking room in the opium factory at Patna, India. L Wellcome V0019154.jpg|thumb|Storage of opium at a [[British East India Company]] warehouse, {{circa|1850}}]]
Following China's defeat in the [[Second Opium War]] in 1858, China was forced to legalize opium and began massive domestic production. Importation of opium peaked in 1879 at 6,700 tons, and by 1906, China was producing 85 percent of the world's opium, some 35,000 tons, and 27 percent of its adult male population regularly used opium{{nsmdns}}13.5{{nbsp}}million people consuming 39,000 tons of opium yearly.<ref name="McCoy opium" /> From 1880 to the beginning of the Communist era, the British attempted to discourage the use of opium in China, but this effectively promoted the use of morphine, heroin, and cocaine, further exacerbating the problem of addiction.<ref name=Dikotter/>

[[File:Cover page of The Truth About Opium Smoking (1882).jpg|thumb|left|The cover page of the book of The Truth about Opium Smoking]]
Scientific evidence of the pernicious nature of opium use was largely undocumented in the 1890s, when Protestant [[missionaries]] in China decided to strengthen their opposition to the trade by compiling data which would demonstrate the harm the drug did. Faced with the problem that many Chinese associated Christianity with opium, partly due to the arrival of early Protestant missionaries on opium clippers, at the 1890 Shanghai Missionary Conference, they agreed to establish the Permanent Committee for the Promotion of Anti-Opium Societies in an attempt to overcome this problem and to arouse public opinion against the opium trade. The members of the committee were [[John Glasgow Kerr]], MD, American Presbyterian Mission in [[Guangzhou]] (Canton); [[Boudinot Currie Atterbury|B.C. Atterbury, MD]], American Presbyterian Mission in [[Beijing]] (Peking); Archdeacon [[Arthur Evans Moule|Arthur E. Moule]], Church Missionary Society in [[Shanghai]]; Henry Whitney, MD, American Board of Commissioners for foreign Missions in [[Fuzhou]]; the Rev. Samuel Clarke, China Inland Mission in [[Guiyang]]; the Rev. [[Arthur Gostick Shorrock]], English Baptist Mission in [[Taiyuan]]; and the Rev. [[Griffith John]], London Mission Society in [[Hankou]].<ref>Lodwick, Kathleen L. (1996). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=gT42B-69owoC Crusaders Against Opium: Protestant Missionaries in China 1874–1917]''. University Press of Kentucky. {{ISBN|0-8131-1924-3}}</ref> These missionaries were generally outraged over the British government's [[Royal Commission on Opium]] visiting India but not China. Accordingly, the missionaries first organized the [[Anti-Opium League in China]] among their colleagues in every mission station in China. American missionary [[Hampden Coit DuBose]] acted as first president. This organization, which had elected national officers and held an annual national meeting, was instrumental in gathering data from every Western-trained medical doctor in China, which was then published as [[William Hector Park]] compiled ''Opinions of Over 100 Physicians on the Use of Opium in China'' (Shanghai: American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1899). The vast majority of these medical doctors were missionaries; the survey also included doctors who were in private practices, particularly in Shanghai and [[Hong Kong]], as well as Chinese who had been trained in medical schools in Western countries. In England, the home director of the [[China Inland Mission]], [[Benjamin Broomhall]], was an active opponent of the opium trade, writing two books to promote the banning of opium smoking: ''The Truth about Opium Smoking'' and ''The Chinese Opium Smoker''. In 1888, Broomhall formed and became secretary of the Christian Union for the Severance of the British Empire with the Opium Traffic and editor of its periodical, ''National Righteousness''. He lobbied the [[British Parliament]] to stop the opium trade. He and [[James Laidlaw Maxwell]] appealed to the London Missionary Conference of 1888 and the Edinburgh Missionary Conference of 1910 to condemn the continuation of the trade. When Broomhall was dying, his son Marshall read to him from ''[[The Times]]'' the welcome news that an agreement had been signed ensuring the end of the opium trade within two years.

[[File:China & Opium 1908 en.jpg|thumb|right|Map showing the amount of opium produced in China in 1908: The quote "We English, by the policy we have pursued, are morally responsible for every acre of land in China which is withdrawn from the cultivation of grain and devoted to that of the poppy; so that the fact of the growth of the drug in China ought only to increase our sense of responsibility." is by [[Lord Justice Fry]]. ]]

Official Chinese resistance to opium was renewed on September 20, 1906, with an antiopium initiative intended to eliminate the drug problem within 10 years. The program relied on the turning of public sentiment against opium, with mass meetings at which [[drug paraphernalia|opium paraphernalia]] were publicly burned, as well as coercive legal action and the granting of police powers to organizations such as the Fujian Anti-Opium Society. Smokers were required to register for licenses for gradually reducing rations of the drug. Action against opium farmers centered upon a highly repressive incarnation of law enforcement in which rural populations had their property destroyed, their land confiscated and/or were publicly tortured, humiliated and executed.<ref>{{cite journal | author = Windle J | year = 2013 | title = 'Harms Caused by China's 1906–17 Opium Suppression Intervention' | url = http://roar.uel.ac.uk/4336/1/Harms%20caused%20by%201906%20intervention%20-%20pre-print%20copy.pdf| journal = International Journal of Drug Policy | volume = 24 | issue = 5| pages = 498–505 | doi=10.1016/j.drugpo.2013.03.001| pmid = 23567100 }}</ref> Addicts sometimes turned to missionaries for treatment for their addiction, though many associated these foreigners with the drug trade. The program was counted as a substantial success, with a cessation of direct British opium exports to China (but not Hong Kong)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.druglibrary.org/SCHAFFER/History/om/om7.htm|title=The opium monopoly|author=Ellen N. La Motte|access-date=September 25, 2007}}</ref> and most provinces declared free of opium production. Nonetheless, the success of the program was only temporary, with opium use rapidly increasing during the disorder following the death of [[Yuan Shikai]] in 1916.<ref name="Madancy">{{cite web|url=http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/MADTRO.html|title=The Troublesome Legacy of Commissioner Lin|author=Joyce A. Madancy|date=April 2004|access-date=September 25, 2007|archive-date=January 30, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080130233401/http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/MADTRO.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> Opium farming also increased, peaking in 1930 when the [[League of Nations]] singled China out as the primary source of illicit opium in East and Southeast Asia. Many<ref>Windle, J. (2011). 'Ominous Parallels and Optimistic Differences: Opium in China and Afghanistan'. Law, Crime and History, Vol. 2(1), pp. 141–164. http://roar.uel.ac.uk/1692/</ref> local powerholders facilitated the trade during this period to finance conflicts over territory and political campaigns. In some areas food crops were eradicated to make way for opium, contributing to famines in Guizhou and Shaanxi Provinces between 1921 and 1923, and food deficits in other provinces.

Beginning in 1915, Chinese nationalist groups came to describe the period of military losses and [[Unequal Treaties]] as the "[[Century of National Humiliation]]", later defined to end with the conclusion of the [[Chinese Civil War]] in 1949.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dur.ac.uk/chinese.politics/Public%20lectures/William%20A%20Callahan%20RenDa%20Lecture.pdf|title=Historical Legacies and Non/Traditional Security: Commemorating National Humiliation Day in China|author=William A Callahan|date=May 8, 2004|access-date=July 8, 2007|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070711034022/http://www.dur.ac.uk/chinese.politics/Public%20lectures/William%20A%20Callahan%20RenDa%20Lecture.pdf|archive-date=July 11, 2007|df=mdy-all}}</ref>

In the northern provinces of [[Ningxia]] and [[Suiyuan]] in China, [[Hui people|Chinese Muslim]] General [[Ma Fuxiang]] both prohibited and engaged in the opium trade. It was hoped that Ma Fuxiang would have improved the situation, since Chinese Muslims were well known for opposition to smoking opium.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WSl5cl_wt24C&q=ma+fuxiang+opium&pg=PA312|title=Chronique du Toumet-Ortos: Looking through the Lens of Joseph Van Oost, Missionary in Inner Mongolia (1915–1921)|author=Ann Heylen|year=2004|publisher=Leuven University Press|location=Leuven, Belgium|page=312|isbn=978-90-5867-418-0|access-date=June 28, 2010}}</ref> Ma Fuxiang officially prohibited opium and made it illegal in Ningxia, but the [[Guominjun]] reversed his policy; by 1933, people from every level of society were abusing the drug, and Ningxia was left in destitution.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kDxtAAAAMAAJ&q=fuxiang+ban|title=Annals, Volumes 1–5|author=Association for Asian Studies. Southeast Conference|year=1979|publisher=The Conference|page=51|access-date=April 29, 2011}}</ref> In 1923, an officer of the [[Bank of China]] from [[Baotou]] found out that Ma Fuxiang was assisting the drug trade in opium which helped finance his military expenses. He earned {{US$|2{{nbsp}}million}} from taxing those sales in 1923. General Ma had been using the bank, a branch of the Government of China's exchequer, to arrange for silver currency to be transported to Baotou to use it to sponsor the trade.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JQeDYe8mv24C&q=ma+fuxiang+drug+sales&pg=PA31|title=Opium, State, and Society: China's Narco-Economy and the Guomindang, 1924–1937|author=Edward R. Slack|year=2001|publisher=University of Hawaii Press|location=Honolulu|page=240|isbn=978-0-8248-2361-0|access-date=June 28, 2010}}</ref>

The opium trade under the [[Chinese Communist Party]] was important to its finances in the 1940s.<ref name="Matten2011">{{cite book|
editor=Marc Andre Matten|
title=Places of Memory in Modern China: History, Politics, and Identity|
url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ul89eeKHLGEC&pg=PA271|
date=December 9, 2011|
publisher=BRILL|
isbn=978-90-04-21901-4|
page=271}}</ref> [[Peter Vladimirov]]'s diary provided a first hand account.<ref name="Vladimirov1975">{{cite book|
author=Petr Parfenovich Vladimirov|
title=The Vladimirov diaries: Yenan, China, 1942–1945|
url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aPAdAAAAMAAJ|
year=1975|
publisher=Doubleday|
isbn=978-0-385-00928-7}}</ref> [[Chen Yung-fa]] provided a detailed historical account of how the opium trade was essential to the economy of Yan'an during this period.<ref name="SaichVen1995">{{cite book|
author=Chen Yung-Fa |
editor1=Tony Saich|
editor2=Hans J. Van de Ven|
title=New Perspectives on the Chinese Communist Revolution|
chapter=The Blooming Poppy under the Red Sun: The Yan'an Way and the Opium Trade |
chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FdDuL1eewWwC&pg=263|
year=1995|
publisher=M.E. Sharpe|
isbn=978-1-56324-428-5|
pages=263–298}}</ref> [[Mitsubishi]] and [[Mitsui]] were involved in the opium trade during the Japanese occupation of China.<ref>{{cite book |title= Retribution|last= Hastings|first= Max|author-link= Max Hastings|year= 2007|publisher= Vintage|location= New York|isbn= 978-0-307-27536-3|page= 413}}</ref>

[[Mao Zedong]] government is generally credited with eradicating both consumption and production of opium during the 1950s using unrestrained repression and social reform.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Liang|first1=Bin|last2=Lu|first2=Hong|date=2013|title=Discourses of drug problems and drug control in China: Reports in the People's Daily, 1946–2009|journal=[[China Information]]|volume=27|issue=3|page=302|doi=10.1177/0920203X13491387|s2cid=147627658}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Xiao|first1=Shuiyuan|last2=Yang|first2=Mei|last3=Zhou|first3=Liang|last4=Hao|first4=Wei|date=February 2015|title=Transition of China's drug policy: problems in practice|journal=[[Addiction (journal)|Addiction]]|volume=110|issue=2|pages=193–4|doi=10.1111/add.12689|pmid=25602038|doi-access=free}}</ref> Ten million addicts were forced into compulsory treatment, dealers were executed, and opium-producing regions were planted with new crops. Remaining opium production shifted south of the Chinese border into the [[Golden Triangle (Southeast Asia)|Golden Triangle]] region.<ref name="McCoy opium" /> The remnant opium trade primarily served Southeast Asia, but spread to American soldiers during the [[Vietnam War]]; based on a study of opiate use in soldiers returning to the United States in 1971, 20 percent of participants were dependent enough to experience withdrawal symptoms.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hall |first1=Wayne |last2=Weier |first2=Megan |title=Lee Robins' studies of heroin use among US Vietnam veterans |journal=Addiction |date=2017 |volume=112 |issue=1 |page=177 |doi=10.1111/add.13584 |pmid=27650054 |s2cid=206974500 |url=https://doi.org/10.1111/add.13584 |access-date=26 July 2022}}</ref>