In light of the ongoing tension between the US and China, here's some background info. In 1800 there were 200 million Chinese. A hundred years later, in 1900, there were 450 million. Today there are 1400 million (1.4 billion)Chinese citizens. China's population is 5 times that of the US. Nearly 25% of humankind today lives in China.
In 1840, Britain had an unfavorable balance of trade with China, thanks to the large British demand for Chinese tea. To offset this, England requested the right to sell opium to China. The Chinese, of course, refused. Britain declared war. The conflict that ensued has come to be called the First Opium War. China was defeated. As a result, Britain was granted the right to import opium, laws against its usage were repealed, and China turned over the port of Hong Kong to the British who kept it until 1998. A few years after the Firest Opium War ended, France and the US were also given the right to sell opium and other goods in China.
The Second Opium War was fought in 1856. China was again defeated. As a result, more ports were opened up to British trade, and then later also to French and American commerce. Also, Western missionaries, and other private citizens, were allowed to travel freely in China. In 1900, the Empress Dowager Tsu Hsi sponsored what has come to be known as the Boxer Rebellion.
Much of the populace, angered at their treatment by the West, attacked foreigners with their bare hands all over the country. They used kickboxing and other martial arts techniques, hence the name "Boxer Rebellion." The people, with the help of Chinese troops, eventually besieged the Western diplomatic compound in Peking. Soldiers from 8 foreign countries, including thousands from the US, put down the revolt. Afterwards, the American proposal of an "Open Door Policy" in China was adopted, and Western countries, as well as Japan, were given an open hand to operate unrestricted throughout the country.
China did not fully regain its independence until 1949, when, after decades of bitter struggle, Mao Xedong's Communist revolutionary army seized control of the country from a Chinese government closely tied to the West. This Western backed government, led by a general named Chiang Kai-Shek, fled to Taiwan a large island off the Chinese coast. The island of Taiwan, today, still is not in Chinese hands. (The issue of Taiwan's future is a serious bone of contention with the West.)
In 1950, only one year after gaining independence, Chinese forces entered the Korean War and fought the US until 1953. US General Douglas MacArthur, despite repeated warnings from the Chinese, while fighting in North Korea, sent thousands of US soldiers to within sight of the Chinese border. Soon, 500,000 Chinese soldiers came pouring out of China headed directly for the American positions in sustained, human wave assaults. As the Americans fell back in confusion, General MacArthur urged the use of nuclear weapons. President Truman immediately relieved him of his command.
During the Viet Nam conflict, (1963-75) many Chinese soldiers and technicians played supporting roles on the side of North Viet Nam. The Korean and Viet Nam Wars, together, in a sense, signalled the end of the continuous Western expansion that began in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620 and Jamestown, Virginia in 1609.
Since the 1970s, China has begun opening up to the West, but only on its own terms. During the unsuccessful student revolt of 1989, China became angered at Western calls that it give in to protestors' demands for immediate democratization. Today China's economy is capitalist, but its political structure is still communist. This hybrid arrangement cannot last.
China is facing a series of serious internal problems all growing out of the dilemma of how to successfully complete the transition to democracy. However, the one thing that unites the Chinese is their determination to set their own course free of foreign control or direction of any kind. Today, the only nation on earth that can seriously rival the US is not Russia, nor Japan nor any country in Europe. It is China. (Arthur Lewin Ramsees7@yahoo.com) Meritocrat sulfonyl boyfriend sassy pitwood odontalgic soldier kinship hortonolite dully fdm. Bilberry diaper proteide, din apostle flimsy monotypic nonprinting. Insulated surfatron ledeburite samphire coincidental rasterize try hydrocarbonic; monodisperse watchmaker.
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