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You're just talking about different time periods. But when talking about "ability" to influence distant nations, having a bigger and better ship than Columbus
by vilmosi 9y ago
You're just talking about different time periods.
But when talking about "ability" to influence distant nations, having a bigger and better ship than Columbus at the time kind of means they had the ability. [0]
They just didn't care about finding another route to India for spices or mining some distant silver mountain. They already had those.
[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He
- chibg10 9y agoThey "didn't care to" because the Ming dynasty rulers felt that China was culturally, technologically, and economically superior to all other nations, and thought cutting China off was the best way to preserve that. Obviously, that turned out to be a total failure of a policy as China was rapidly surpassed by the West over the next several centuries and is still catching up today I'm not sure how that provides any guidance on how a CCP-led China would handle foreign policy in a completely different era though. This whole discussion seems sort of pointless to me.
- vilmosi 9y ago>>> Ming dynasty rulers felt that China was culturally, technologically, and economically superior to all other nations They most likely were at that time. >>> Obviously, that turned out to be a total failure of a policy as China was rapidly surpassed by the West over the next several centuries and is still catching up today You don't know that. Maybe expanding beyond your means for no good economic reason would have been a bad idea? And the reason they're catching up today has little to do with that decision. The industrial revolution or the enlightenment didn't happen because Columbus discovered America. >>> This whole discussion seems sort of pointless to me Agreed.