This is not relevant, because the British began trading opium before that. The opium market was a normal and legal part of commerce in China for several hundred years; the British did not need to manufacture demand.

>This is not relevant, because the British began trading opium before that

So what? The fourty years after that still saw the British smuggle in opium against the wishes of the Chinese empire, eventually declaring war for the right to deal drugs.

That China had some opium use without British influence doesn't mean the British did not manufacture a demand for it. They massively reduced the price of an addictive substance, making it available to a whole new market.

China had rising opium demand prior to British involvement.

That China had some opium use without British influence doesn't mean the British did not manufacture a demand for it.

We can't take it as given, without proof that the British did manufacture a demand for it. This is a form of "argument from ignorance". Lowering prices is not manufacturing demand. How could the British have manufactured demand, if they could not even enter China outside of Hong Kong?

>We can't take it as given, without proof that the British did manufacture a demand for it.

We know that the British increased poppy cultivation and manufactured a monopoly on opium for the purpose of export to China. Without it, I don't see how the Chinese demand would grow at the level it did. I have no idea what "proof" would be, an alternate world without British interference?

>How could the British have manufactured demand, if they could not even enter China outside of Hong Kong?

Guessing you meant Canton here, by smuggling/buying off locals.

How do these things increase demand for opium?

Having a monopoly on opium doesn't make people want more of it. Smuggling doesn't make more of it, either. What you're describing are both forms of taking control of supply, and don't speak to demand.

By taking control of supply they were able to lower the sale cost, allowing more people to partake in the addictive substance. Making more people want opium isn't difficult.

The arrow of causality runs in the other direction. Lower prices meet unmet demand.

When one supplier takes control of supply, that doesn't generally lead to lower prices; but expanding production -- which the British did -- certainly can.

The interesting thing is that Napoleon made that famous quote about China, because of the British shenanigans in opium dealings in China.

“China is a sleeping lion. Let her sleep, for when she wakes she will shake the world.”

He was trying to warn the Europeans to not destroy the good thing that they had going with China: Trade and Commerce.

Sadly, the British were too corrupt and greedy, and they had to destroy it.