"Opium was a minor cause of the first Opium War"
The statement that Opium was a minor cause of the first Opium War is one with a great deal of substantiality. The war arose from a great number of factors primarily arising from an imbalance of trade and cultural clashes, both of which were exacerbated by the opium trade, but both of which existed before and during the opium trade as independent agents that could have individually caused conflict.
A primary reason for misunderstandings between China and Britain was there very different social structure. In China, primarily due to a Confuci…
