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The Open Door Dbq

Decent Essays

Imperialism was a policy that dominated the world from the 16th century to the early 19th century. In 1899 China was under the threat of being conquered by Japan, Russia, France, Germany, and Great Britain. All these countries had spheres of influence over large parts of China, and the United States was worried they might miss out on trade relations with the Chinese. This led to the United States of America creating the Open Door Policy. The Open Door Policy proposed to keep China open to trade with all countries on an equal basis, to keep any one power from total control of the country, and calling upon all powers, within their spheres of influence, to refrain from interfering with any treaty port or any vested interest, to permit Chinese …show more content…

Since the Philippines is exceptionally close to China, the United States had an increasing interest in trading with the Chinese or even claiming a part of China for themselves. However, this was a problem for the United States because most of the East Coast of China had already been seized by other imperial powers. The reasons why China was so weak and so easily conquered is because, they had many rebellions and their military technology was vastly inferior to western …show more content…

believed this violated the “Open Door” policy. America’s opposition to Japanese expansion ultimately led the U.S. to deploy its Pacific Fleet to Pearl Harbor, where Japan attacked it on December 7, 1941. When the U.S. entered the war, it flew squadrons of B-29s from China, and sent it substantial amounts of aid. After the war, it was the U.S. that insisted that China be included as one of the five Permanent Members of the U.N. Security Council. Things were looking great between the two countries, until the Communists took over and pushed Chinese Nationalists onto the island of Taiwan. This caused American and Communist Chinese forces to fight each other during the Korean War, which began in 1949. Communist threats against Taiwan in the 1950's drove the U.S. and the Chinese Communists to the brink of nuclear war. The U.S. went to war in Vietnam in part to prevent the expansion of Chinese Communism. For the United States, China today is neither an outright enemy, nor a trusted friend. Today tensions exist because of the kind of government China has, and the actions it takes. One of the biggest fears the United States has is that China will try to conquer one of our allies in the

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