But when one da Gama and those who followed
him returned from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic
they faced the same problem. There is a variation
of easterlies and westerlies in the Indian Ocean,
depending on where one is. The easterlies help
one to get from Asia to Africa and operate all through
the zone between the Tropics. Da Gama had to go
against those to get across the Indian Ocean to
India from Africa. The only point where Chinese or
other Asians would have had a problem with the
prevailing winds would have been at the Cape of
Good Hope itself. But by no accounts that I am aware
of did any of them ever get down there to encounter
that problem even.
Barkley Rosser
-----Original Message-----
From: Louis Proyect <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 7:19 PM
Subject: [PEN-L:11231] Capitalist development
>> Of course this does not answer the crucial question as
>>to why the Chinese did not go around the Cape of Good
>>Hope in the 1400s while the Portuguese did in 1497 with
>>Vasco da Gama. Thus we had the Portuguese in Goa
>>and Macau rather than the Chinese in Cadiz and Lisbon.
>>Barkley Rosser
>
>Blaut argues that sailing from the Indian Ocean into the Atlantic one sails
>against prevailing winds, while from the Canaries to the West Indies
>(Colombus's route), there blow the trade winds, and the return voage is
>made northward into the westerlies. Columbus knew that the trade winds (or
>easterlies) would assist him outbound and had good reason to believe the
>westerlies would assist the return voyage.
>
>Louis Proyect
>(http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
>
>
