The Gunpowder Age: China Military Innovation and the Rise of the West in World History

About this book

A first look at gunpowders revolutionary impact on Chinas role in global history The Chinese invented gunpowder and began exploring its military uses as early as the 900s four centuries before the technology passed to the West. But by the early 1800s China had fallen so far behind the West in gunpowder warfare that it was easily defeated by Britain in the Opium War of 183942. What happened? In The Gunpowder Age Tonio Andrade offers a compelling new answer opening a fresh perspective on a key question of world history: why did the countries of western Europe surge to global importance starting in the 1500s while China slipped behind? Historians have long argued that gunpowder weapons helped Europeans establish global hegemony. Yet the inhabitants of what is today China not only invented guns and bombs but also as Andrade shows continued to innovate in gunpowder technology through the early 1700smuch longer than previously thought. Why then did China become so vulnerable? Andrade argues that one significant reason is that it was out of practice fighting wars having enjoyed nearly a century of relative peace since 1760. Indeed he demonstrates that Chinalike Europewas a powerful military innovator particularly during times of great warfare such as the violent century starting after the Opium War when the Chinese once again quickly modernized their forces. Today China is simply returning to its old position as one of the worlds great military powers. By showing that Chinas military dynamism was deeper longer lasting and more quickly recovered than previously understood The Gunpowder Age challenges long-standing explanations of the so-called Great Divergence between the West and Asia.