The great geographical discoveries have opened up a true process of economic globalization. Before the establishment of modern diplomatic norms of sovereign equality, war was an important means for the development of European capitalism into global capitalism. However, although warships could help the powers to monopolize production, control trade and plunder manpower and resources, they couldn’t create market demand. For countries like China that couldn’t be completely conquered by force, the great powers could only use opium as their primary means of plunder. The several changes in the consumption patterns of opium in modern times led to a significant increase in addiction among users, thus creating market demand through the process of from transmission to addiction and from addiction to transmission repeatedly. It can be said that the powers, at the cost of the wealth and health of millions of people, used a combination of opium and warships to channel the wealth of the world to Europe, accelerating European industrialization while also promoting economic globalization.