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Platt’s book is really about the relationship between Britain and China before the Opium War, and shows why a conflict was unexpected, almost right up to when it did happen.

The two had a stable trading relationship for about two centuries. While the very limited contact (all through Canton) seems repressive, in practice it did mean that everyone involved knew what to expect from each other, and how to keep the goods, and cash, flowing.

Instability arrived on the British side in the guise of opium. Notably, while official British trade stayed away from the substance, the East India Company was doing its best to control the sale of opium in India, and make a big profit from it. However, there was competition from areas not yet under control of the EIC, which led to them competing on price, driving the cost of opium in China down so that it was no longer just available to the rich.

On the Chinese side,  there were serious rebellions that sapped much of the available political will, as insane numbers of men and money were spent to put down the White Lotus rebellion, and right after dealing with the ever-growing problem of piracy. The ultimate cause of both is really that the population of China had doubled during the 1700s, while the tax structure meant no more money came in to oversee the greater needs of the greater population; this left the import tariffs claiming a more and more prominent place in the budget.

These combine to create ever-growing corruption in the Chinese government just as they have to deal with a new popular problem: An ever-growing number of people hooked on opium. (This also starts draining silver coinage out of China—historically extremely rare.) The Chinese go through a number of ideas on their war on drugs, including contemplating legalizing opium, before taking a very hard-line stance with a new administrator, who actually starts getting things done. Whether he was really doing enough to start stemming the tide, or just breaking up a couple waves is taken for granted here, but I have my doubts.

Either way, Lin Zexu ended up on a collision course with the latest British superintendent, Charles Elliot, as the EIC monopoly had just been ended (to the immediate benefit of opium smugglers). Elliot was months away from further instructions, did not have as much authority as he generally needed, and increasingly erratic under the strain. Collision was inevitable, and when it happened war followed.

Though the war itself was still not inevitable. Britain fought, on the surface at least, the abstract notions of honor and respect. That other motives lurked under the surface were obvious, and the effort to push the war through nearly caused top members of the government to be censured by Parliament, and may have led to a collapse of the Melborne government.

Overall, the book mostly sticks with the British side of things, partially, I believe, because the two British efforts to send embassies to China that form the beginning parts of the book are much better documented from that side (and still nearly gets stuck in the weeds of conflicting and incomplete accounts). Much of the middle is better on showing the internal challenges of China, but the figures involved never really come to life. The war itself is merely summarized, though Plat points out that the Chinese, operating with a much weaker miliary, didn’t play to its strengths either.