Hey everyone, Lausela Montgomery again, C. H.P. 153 this time, the history of opium in China.

I received the inspiration for this week's episode from listener and former long time resident of Taiwan, Gavin S.

He wrote to me and turned me on to a video on blog and heads TV that featured an interview with UCLA Professor of Public Policy, Mark Kliman.

Professor Kliman is someone very respected by many for the breadth of his expertise in the subject of U.S. and international drug policy.

The matter of the Opium War and the well-known narrative about the causes and the outcome,

the unequal treaties, and the national problem of addiction

were brought up.

The interviewer, who was British, even went so far as to apologize on behalf of his countrymen

for Britain's role in the opium war.

Well, Professor Kliman had said in the interview, quote,

part of the anti-colonialist rant had to do with what Britain had allegedly done to China in terms of introducing

opiate addiction as a way of supporting the export trade from India."

End quote.

Professor Kliman maintains that this statement was a myth, that it never existed.

He didn't deny that the British used their military superiority to knock China out, but this was

only in response to the Ching government's policies to push back against

the growing influx of Indian opium exported by the EIC.

This was in the early 1830s and 40s.

Professor Kliman pointed out that the China State-owned monopoly on opium was being directly

challenged with the flood of all this cheap but higher quality imported product, mostly from British India.

This impacted domestic markets that were a very nice stable source of tax revenue for the Ching government. It was as early as 1589

towards the end of the Ming that the government had started earning tax revenue on opium

...