The Strategic Decision after Zheng He's Journey

Around 1400 China's relations with the outside world began to change. Under the Yuan dynasty China had made contact with the West by reopening the old silk routes and bringing Muslim, Christian, and Jewish traders into China. The expulsion of the Mongols in 1367 and the seizure of power by the Ming reversed the processes that were tying China more strongly to the outside. Following the seven expeditions (1405-1433) of admiral Zheng-He, who sailed the imperial fleet into the Indian Ocean and to the coast of Africa, China folded in on itself and closed off its external connections.