Cheng Ho’s voyages demonstrated that China was once the most powerful nation in the world, a seagoing empire that Spain or Portugal would have feared and envied, had they known of its reach. The reputation of the Treasure Fleet never made it to European shores. Portuguese and Spanish explorers sailed into the vacuum of power left by China. Like the Chinese, they came in search of wealth, but quite unlike them, they fiercely battled for territory, for commercial and political advantage over one another, and for religious conquest.
