> do the winners of the Opium Wars have a verifiable historical claim to the land for thousands of years?

No. Similar to how the Han Chinese don’t have one to Tibet (and other parts of modern-day China).

Practically all land touched by humans has multiple verifiable historical claims to it. The further back we go, the more there are and the more ambiguous they become. The only thing we can say with certainty is who is there today. Every other path means violence and is honestly a bit stupid.

Oh I’m sorry, did you forget that it wasn’t Han Chinese that laid claim to Tibet during the Qing dynasty, whose emperors were Manchus (even though Han was and still is the main ethnic group)?. But snark aside, your argument doesn’t address my central point.