Drugging a Nation

In the nineteenth century, the British Empire conducted one of history's most devastating drug operations. Through the British East India Company, they flooded China with opium, addicting millions and destabilizing an entire civilization. Merwin's investigative work documents how this deliberate poisoning of a nation served imperial interests, weakened China through addiction, and paved the way for invasion and humiliation. The book traces the mechanics of the trade, the deliberate cultivation of addiction among the Chinese population, and the political treaties forced upon a drugged and weakening empire. What emerges is a disturbing portrait of how economic ambition and imperial power created a humanitarian catastrophe that still echoes in global conversations about addiction, sovereignty, and exploitation. This is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the roots of modern China, the true costs of empire, and the disturbing history of deliberate addiction as a tool of statecraft.