As the first attempt of China's rise in modern times, the Westernization Movement played an important role in the modern history of China. The reasons for its failure and its experience and lessons have always been the focus of historians.

Keywords Westernization Movement; War of aggression; Centralization; Qing government

First, the external cause of the failure of the Westernization Movement-the powers did not allow China to "strengthen itself".

1. Capitalist countries build a strategic encirclement of aggression against China.

In the whole16th century and17th century, China won a great victory in the struggle against western colonial aggression, and even some remnants of the Ming Dynasty, including Zheng Chenggong, defeated the Netherlands, a powerful country known as the "sea coachman". There are two main reasons for China's victory: first, China has a unified central government, which can concentrate the strength of the whole country against foreign aggression; Second, the western colonists are still in the stage of factory handicraft industry, and their productivity is not absolutely superior to that of the eastern feudal countries. The failure of the invasion of China made the western colonialists realize that China was too big and too strong. If China was to yield, it was necessary to prepare for the invasion. For this reason, throughout the18th century and the middle of19th century, the western invaders were doing this work-building the frontier position of aggression against China.

2. Capitalist countries use force to interrupt China's road to self-improvement.

During the Westernization Movement, the Qing government was not in the war. There are two main ways for imperialist countries to interrupt China's road to self-improvement by means of war of aggression. One is to start a war in China and then encourage other countries to interfere in China's internal affairs. A typical incident was to support Agubo's invasion of Xinjiang, and finally forced the Qing government to send a left expedition, which lasted for several years and cost a huge sum of 52.3 million yuan. The joint aggression of western countries against China and the endless war in China caused the Qing government to go bankrupt financially and economically.