Figure 1 Base your answer to the question on the passage below and on your knowledge of social studies.
The Opium War of 1839-42 was short and one-sided, due to the superiority of European weapons, which
came as a complete surprise to the Chinese. In the first skirmish alone, in July 1839, two British warships defeated
twenty-nine Chinese ships. On land, the Chinese and their medieval weapons were no match for British troops
armed with state-of-the-art muskets. By the middle of 1842 British troops had seized Hong Kong, taken control
of the key river deltas, and occupied Shanghai and several other
cities. The Chinese were forced to sign a peace
treaty that granted Hong Kong to the British, opened five ports for the free trade of all goods, and required the
payment of reparations to the British in silver, including compensation for the opium that had been destroyed by
Commissioner Lin
- Tom Standage
Refer to Figure 1 and answer the following Question:
Considering the war spoils extracted from the Chinese, we can assume that the British were motivated by
1 religion
2 politics
3 economics
4 science​