My Pen Pal Zhu Yuanzhang

Chapter 24: A Century of Shame
The letter mentioned that European countries occupied colonies, sucked blood from the colonies, plundered resources, and then enriched their own countries.

Zhu Yuanzhang could understand this. After all, the ethnic minorities in the north had been doing the same thing since ancient times.

Every time they went south, they plundered a large amount of wealth, food and people, so as to ensure the survival and development of the tribe.

It was just that the island country called Britain took the raw materials from the colonies, shipped them back home, manufactured them into goods, and then sold them to the colonies.

Then, relying on this thing called overseas trade, Britain quickly grew into the world's number one overlord.

There are some things that Zhu Yuanzhang didn't quite understand.

On the surface, plunder seems to be more convenient and faster than trade, but why did Britain, the only country engaged in trade, become the overlord of the ocean?
Although Britain also relied on pirates for plunder, overseas trade was clearly the main reason.

It seems that the meaning contained in the word "trade" is far less superficial than I imagined.

Since ancient times, China has emphasized agriculture and suppressed commerce. In Zhu Yuanzhang's eyes, merchants were just a group of speculators who made money without working.

Although the Ming Dynasty cannot be without businessmen, they are not very prominent in the social class of the Ming Dynasty.

Suddenly someone told him that merchants' trade could enable a country to develop rapidly and even become a world hegemon, which puzzled him.

Suddenly he thought of Zhu Di's seven voyages to the West. The fundamental difference was that during the seven voyages to the West, a tribute system was established, in which overseas countries paid tribute, while the Ming Dynasty gave generous rewards.

If we think about it from the perspective of business, paying tribute was actually a losing business, so Zhu Di only made seven voyages and stopped the ocean voyages.

After all, the Ming Dynasty’s money didn’t come from the wind.

But trade is completely the opposite. Although trade also has risks, generally speaking, it is driven by interests. Without interests, who would trade?
If Zhu Di had gone to trade with overseas countries at that time, perhaps he would have made more than seven voyages to the West, but eight or nine voyages to the West... the voyages would never have been completed!
Because there are endless benefits there!

Suddenly, a flash of inspiration came to Zhu Yuanzhang's mind. Trade and sea power seemed to be twins that complement each other!
If there is a demand for trade, there is a need to expand colonies overseas.

Overseas colonies require warships to conquer, this is sea power!
After conquering the colonies, plunder the colonial wealth through trade, this is overseas trade!

It turns out that sea power and trade is a question of which came first, the chicken or the egg!

Zhu Yuanzhang was somewhat proud of himself for having understood the concepts of sea power and trade all of a sudden. However, he felt nervous when he thought that the European colonists were setting their sights on China, the big piece of fat meat.

"At that time, the Qing Dynasty was still intoxicated by the beautiful dream of the Celestial Empire.

Although the Qing Dynasty had the opportunity to open its eyes to the world and seize the last train of the Industrial Revolution to become a world power, these opportunities were wasted by its ignorant rulers.

Once, British envoys paid homage to the Qing emperor and presented him with advanced firearms, but the Qing rulers despised them as strange and gimmicky tricks and threw them into a warehouse, leaving them to be covered with dust.

Later, British envoys visited the Qing emperor and asked for trade, but were also rejected.

Since literary methods don’t work, the greedy British can only resort to covert methods.

They secretly smuggled a drug called opium into China. This opium was smoked with fire to emit smoke. When people inhaled it, they felt peaceful at first, then felt euphoric and wanted to inhale it again.

If you keep repeating this cycle, you will be deeply addicted to it. Only those with great willpower can quit! Moreover, after taking opium for a long time, the addiction will become stronger and stronger, and the spirit will be depressed and weak all over. Once you stop taking it, you will feel uncomfortable all over, numb and like a walking corpse, as if thousands of insects are crawling around on your body, and your heart will be as painful as if thousands of swords are piercing you!

At this point, people are no longer human beings, but evil spirits!

The wise men of the time saw the harm of opium and wrote angrily, "Opium is spreading all over the world, which is very harmful. The law should be strict. If we still ignore it, in a few decades, the Central Plains will have almost no soldiers to defend against the enemy, and no silver to pay for military pay!"

Seeing this, Zhu Yuanzhang slammed the table in anger and said, "You British! How dare you use such a poison to poison my Chinese people!"

When Zhu Yuanzhang thought about the harm brought by opium, which could leave the Central Plains without soldiers to defend against the enemy and without silver to pay military pay, even if he was determined, he couldn't help but shudder!
If that really happens, will China still be China? It will be a living hell, right?

But this horrific scene actually happened in the Qing Dynasty!

"Britain relied on opium smuggling to obtain a large amount of silver from the Qing Dynasty, cultivated countless traitors, and made a lot of money.

At this difficult moment, someone stood up. Lin Zexu, the then Governor-General of Guangdong and Guangxi, confiscated the smuggled opium, destroyed it all, and began to completely ban opium smuggling.

The British naturally refused to give up and launched a war against the Qing Dynasty. The result is predictable. The Qing Dynasty was defeated and forced to sign the unequal Treaty of Nanjing, which allowed Britain to break open the door to China!

Treaty of Nanjing?
Zhu Yuanzhang jumped up immediately. What kind of place is Nanjing? It’s Yingtian Prefecture, the capital of his Ming Dynasty!

This was like a slap directly in the face!
This group of barbarians and this corrupt Qing Dynasty!
Calm down, calm down... Bah, we, Old Zhu, can’t calm down!
"When the great powers saw that the Qing Dynasty, which they had thought was so powerful, was just a piece of fat meat, they swarmed in like flies, either asking the Qing Dynasty to open trading ports or to cede territory and pay compensation!
The Qing Dynasty, on the other hand, suffered repeated defeats in battles. After losing a large amount of territory, it was frightened by the foreign powers and allowed them to take advantage of it and suck their blood to their heart's content!

In addition to the Western powers, there is also a most greedy jackal, the Japanese pirates!

When the Japanese pirates saw that other countries were able to gain advantages from the Qing Dynasty, they also became ready to make a move.

They learned from the West, began reforms, and together with the seven great powers, invaded Beijing and plundered!
After tasting the sweetness, the Japanese pirates repeatedly provoked the Qing Dynasty. Finally, in a naval battle, the corrupt Qing Dynasty was defeated by the Japanese pirates!
This is the first time in thousands of years that China has been defeated by a vassal state!

This great humiliation left China devastated, and the Japanese pirates not only received hundreds of millions of taels of silver in war reparations from the Qing Dynasty, but also forced the Qing Dynasty to cede the Penghu Islands and other places to them as colonies! "

Japanese pirates!

This letter really surprised Zhu Yuanzhang. He thought that the Japanese pirates could actually cut a large piece of meat from China!
Hundreds of millions of taels of silver? Even if you are the king of a country, I, Zhu, can't even imagine it!

The Qing Dynasty is so corrupt, so corrupt!
Zhu Yuanzhang was so angry that he was shaking all over. When he thought of how Japan had repeatedly invaded the Ming Dynasty's sea borders and shamelessly claimed that they were paying tribute after being caught, they always escaped punishment in the name of tribute. He never expected that in the future, they would be able to humiliate China like this?
They are so heartless and worse than pigs and dogs!

This is another blood debt!
I've got it written down!
"So far, China has entered a dark century of humiliation!"

A century of humiliation?

Zhu Yuanzhang was shocked again. Could it be that this period of darkness and cruelty lasted for a hundred years?
This damn Qing Dynasty actually plunged China into this abyss from which there is no escape!

It's such a loss of sovereignty and humiliation to the country!
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(End of this chapter)