alternatehistory.com

Just before the First Opium War, there was a serious debate in the Chinese royal court on whether to legalize opium. Some officials thought that legalizing it would mean a barter system between tea and opium would develop, stopping the drain of precious metals that was one of the causes of China's economic decline, and that it would cause the development of a domestic opium industry, thus stopping the reliance on British opium. But the anti-opium side won, and China suffered the Opium Wars.

What if China legalized opium instead?
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