2- have been about "discovery" when they went along trade routes that were known for centuries by mariners from Africa to China. Just because Europeans didn't know about them doesn't mean that the rest of the world didn't! When Vasco de Gama arrived in Ethiopia, he hired /3
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
4- to conquer those lands or control the trade routes. All those distant lands were quite happy to go themselves to China to sell their stuff, and buy goods in return, and in fact China had more to sell than any need to buy. Quite the opposite to the Europeans who had /5
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
6- they were mainly an exercise in power projection. After the Ming had retaken China from the Yuan (Mongol dynasty), it was a message that "China was back", with the goal of establishing or re-establishing diplomatic relations, not conquer the lands.
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
Of course, such large /7
8- they didn't "discover" America. Crossing the Pacific toward the East, not knowing at what distance some unknown land will be found, would have been suicide. it took decades to the Europeans to find the way, and they knew where to go!
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
Sailing across the Atlantic, as Menzies /9
10- normally sail up in the red sea and transport goods by camel to the Nile. And we know they stopped to go to Mecca, and to Africa, bringing back a giraffe.
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
So in the end, you cannot compare Zheng He's expeditions to whatever Columbus or de Gama did. It's just not the same./11
12- (1) get rich quick, and (2) die young, as the chances of coming back alive were probably around 25%. Vasco de Gama came back from his first expedition with only a handful of his crew, and it's a miracle that even that small number survived the voyage. Tropical diseases, /13
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
14- Europeans just got lucky! Because they found literally a mountain of silver in Peru, and more silver in Mexico. Which allowed the trade between China and Mexico via the Philippines to flourish, as silver was scarce in China.
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
Remove America from the equation, remove the /15
15- silver from Potosi, and today, Europe would still be the backwater that it was in the 14th century, the arse end of the world.
— Le Vieux François 🐦方老师 (@FrancoisOuell15) April 16, 2024
And now, after 5 centuries of violence and plunder, it seems they're going back to their original state.
Barbarians with nothing to sell but copium
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