The Second Opium War, the Second Anglo-Chinese War, the Second China War, the Arrow War, or the Franco-British expedition to China, was a war pitting the British Empire and the Second French Empire against the Qing dynasty (present day China), lasting from 1857 to 1860.

Names

"Second War" and "Arrow War" are both used in literature. "Second Opium War" refers to one of the British tactical objectives: legalising the opium trade, expanding coolie trade, opening all of China to British merchants, and exempting foreign imports from internal transit duties. The "Arrow War" refers to the name of a vessel which became the starting point of the conflict.

Origins of the war

The war followed on from the First Opium War. In 1842, the Treaty of Nanking—the first of what the Chinese later called the unequal treaties—granted an indemnity and extraterritoriality to Britain, the opening of five treaty ports, and the cession of Hong Kong Island. The failure of the treaty to satisfy British goals of improved trade and diplomatic relations led to the Second Opium War (1856–60). In China, the war is considered as the beginning of modern Chinese history.

The First Opium War (1839–42), also known as the Opium War and as the Anglo-Chinese War, was fought between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Qing Empire over their conflicting viewpoints on diplomatic relations, trade, and the administration of justice for foreign nationals.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, the demand for Chinese goods (particularly silk, porcelain, and tea) in the European market created a trade imbalance because the market for Western goods in China was virtually non-existent; China was largely self-sufficient and Europeans were not allowed access to China's interior. European silver flowed into China when the Canton System, instituted in the mid-17th century, confined the sea trade to Canton and to the Chinese merchants of the Thirteen Factories. The British East India Company had a matching monopoly of British trade. The British East India Company began to auction opium grown on its plantations in India to independent foreign traders in exchange for silver. The opium was then transported to the Chinese coast and sold to local middlemen who retailed the drug inside China. This reverse flow of silver and the increasing numbers of opium addicts alarmed Chinese officials.

The 1967 Opium War took place in northwestern Laos between February and August 1967; actual fighting took place from 29 July to 1 August 1967. A Burmese mule train carrying 16 tons of opium crossed into Laos to Ban Khwan, where they were attacked by rival drug smugglers from the Chinese Nationalist's Third and Fifth Armies. The intended recipient of the shipment, Royal Lao Army General Ouane Rattikone, bombed both sides while moving in troops to sweep the battlefield. With both Burmese and Nationalist Chinese defeated and expelled from Laos, the Lao general confiscated the opium for himself.

With this supply of raw opium base, plus his greater grasp on the drug trade, Ouane's refineries began to ship their heroin worldwide. He also supplied this injectable heroin to his allies—U.S. troops in the Vietnam War.

Background

As World War II ended, the French found themselves embroiled in the First Indochina War. On 23 December 1950, the United States signed the Pentalateral Treaty with France, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam binding them to financially support the French effort. From that point onwards, the U.S. would fund an ever greater proportion of the French war effort; by 1952, it was funding about a third of the French budget for the war. Beginning as early as 6 May 1953, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) used its proprietary airline, Civil Air Transport, for combat supply drops in support of the French Army in Laos. Following the North Vietnamese 1953 invasion of Laos and the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu, the independence of the Kingdom of Laos was confirmed by international treaty on 20 July 1954. In December 1955, the secretive Programs Evaluation Office was established in the American embassy in Vientiane, Laos to help the Royal Lao Government battle the communist insurgency.

Opium Wars is a collective term for the mid-1800s conflicts between Western powers and China including the First Opium War (1839–1842) and the Second Opium War (1856–1860).

Opium War(s) or The Opium War(s) may also refer to: