Some foreign forces have turned their attention to cotton in Xinjiang, China, seemingly just to criticize the seemingly insignificant cotton. However, cotton has played an important role in global history, and the issues behind it are worthy of our deep consideration.

This incident also makes it necessary to re-examine the memory of cotton in the long history of mankind.

As a natural resource, our understanding of cotton is very limited compared to heavy industrial energy sources such as oil.

It is generally known that cotton products are common items in daily life, but less is known about the key role it played in the development of human history.

Cotton is not just an ordinary crop or resource, it also contains rich historical value at multiple levels, including agriculture, commerce, and society. Ignoring this is actually a lack of understanding of the importance of cotton.

In the development process of modern capitalism, cotton fabrics have actually become a global commodity. Its influence is unexpected and huge, and it plays an extremely critical role in world business transactions.

In the long history of mankind, the Indian subcontinent was home to the first people to start weaving cotton cloth.

They realized early on that cotton fibers could be woven into threads and began preliminary experiments.

A global trading system had not yet been formed at that time. Although India was in an important position in the early days of cotton production, the scale of transactions was limited and limited to local areas. It was not yet possible to make an overall layout of the global cotton market.

At that time, the development of the cotton industry was mainly limited to certain regions and had not yet been promoted on a global scale.

Around 1600, the British and the Dutch established the East India Company respectively.

In that era, European countries began the process of primitive accumulation of capital. By occupying land and establishing the system of slavery, they closely connected the continents of Europe, America, Asia, and Africa.

This was the beginning of the era of "war capitalism" proposed by Beckett.

In this process, the cotton market began to gradually become an important part of primitive accumulation of capital.

Much of the land was used for cotton cultivation, and the cotton industry initially expanded by squeezing labor. This expansion was accompanied by cruelty and oppression, and also laid the foundation for the establishment of the cotton empire.

Europe was eager to expand cotton sales, but existing supplies from India and other places were no longer enough to meet market demand.

At the end of the 18th century, the market was overexpanded and European merchants encountered a shortage of cotton supplies.

This forced them to seek new cotton-growing areas in the colonies in response to rising market demand.

Beginning in 1780, the American South began to use black slaves to grow cotton.

With the impetus of "war capitalism", especially the slave trade in the triangular trade, American cotton cultivation expanded rapidly and exports also increased significantly.

At that time, the United States implemented an export-oriented intensive production method, but the black slaves in the cotton plantations lived in poverty and suffered extremely poor treatment. This abuse was closely linked to the price of cotton.

It can be said that the early development and capital growth of the United States came at the expense of the huge sacrifices endured by black slaves.

Behind the prosperity of the American economy is the blood, sweat and tears of black slaves on cotton plantations. Countless black slaves endured unimaginable oppression in that ruthless environment.

Before the Industrial Revolution, China had its own special commercial status during the Ming Dynasty.

Compared with Western European governments, the Ming Dynasty interfered relatively little with merchants.

However, thinking from another perspective, the Ming Dynasty government did not actively provide more opportunities for businessmen like Western governments.

This model makes it difficult for businesses to expand on a larger scale, thus affecting the long-term development of businesses.

The business conditions during the Ming Dynasty were significantly different from the business evolution path in the embryonic stage of Western capitalism.

This shows that during the Ming Dynasty, my country's social development model was significantly different from the trends in cotton trade in Western countries.

With the accelerated pace of modern industrialization and urbanization, a large number of contradictions have emerged in various countries and regions in the competition for resources and industrial competition.

Cotton may seem ordinary, but it has played a key role in the history of capitalist development and promoted its progress.

The transformation of production relations and the innovation of economic models are the core forces that promote social progress. However, we cannot forget that behind it is the development process of the cotton industry that was exchanged for blood and guns.

This is a darker chapter in the history of mankind. It constantly reminds the world that social progress requires fairness and justice, and business activities should also adhere to the lowest standards of morality.

I would like to ask everyone to think about it. In this era of globalization, when foreign forces make unreasonable accusations against Xinjiang cotton, what lessons should we learn from the history of cotton?