History of Tibet

Tibet is situated between the two ancient civilizations of China and India, but the tangled mountain ranges the Tibetan Plateau and the towering Himalayas serve to distance it from both. The Tibetan language is a member of the Tibeto-Burman branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. Tibetan history is characterized by an isolation from the outside world and by a special dedication to the Buddhist religion, both in the eyes of its own people as well as for the Mongol and Manchu peoples. Tibet is nicknamed "the roof of the world" or "the land of snows" (the later preferred by Tibetans themselves).

Prehistory

Tibetans are thought to have originated as a nomadic people on the steppe. Chinese and "proto-Tibeto-Burman" may have split sometime before 4000 BC, when the Chinese began growing millet in the Yellow River valley while the Tibeto-Burmans remained nomads. Tibetan split from Burman around AD 500. In Tibetan and Burman, the main verb follows all the nouns whereas Chinese follows a subject-verb-object grammar. All three languages are tonal. Racially, Tibetans can be divided into brachycephalic, or round headed (historically peasants), and dolichocephalic, or long headed (historically nomadic or noble). This suggests a nomadic conquest in the distant, unrecorded past.

Prehistoric Iron Age hill forts and burial complexes have recently been found on the Chang Tang plateau but the remoteness of the location is hampering archaeological research. The initial identification of this culture is as the Zhang Zhung culture which is described in ancient Tibetan texts and is known as the original culture of the Bön religion.

Mythological origins

The first Tibetan king, Nyatri Tsanpo (Wylie: Gnya'-khri-btsan-po), is supposed to have descended from the sky, or immigrated to Tibet from India. Because of his strange physical features such as having webbed hands, and eyes which close from below, he is supposed to have been greeted by the locals as a god. The king remained connected to the heavens with a rope and rather than dying ascended the same rope again.

The legendary King Drigum Tsenpo (Dri-gum-brtsan-po) provoked his groom Longam (Lo-ngam) to fight with him, and during the fight the King's heaven-cord was cut, he was also killed. Drigum Tsenpo and subsequent kings left corpses and were buried. (cf. Haarh, The Yarluṅ Dynasty. Copenhagen: 1969).

In a later myth, first attested in the Maṇi bka' 'bum the Tibetan people are the progeny of the union of a monkey and rock ogress. The Monkey in fact a manifestation of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara (Tib. Chenrezig) and the ogress in fact the goddess Tara (Tib. 'Grol-ma).

The Tibetan Empire

Map of Tibetan Empire in 820 in relation to other signficant powers

A series of emperors ruled Tibet from the 7th to the 11th century. At times Tibetan rule extended as far south as Bengal and as far north as Mongolia. In general the Tibetans faced a greater military threat from China than India due to the protection of the Himalaya; thus China was called Gyanag (Rgya-nag) meaning the "Black Empire", whereas India was called Gyagar (Rgya-gar), meaning the "White Empire".

First appearance in history

Tibet first enters history in the Geography of Ptolemy under the name batai (βαται), a Greek transcription of the indigenous name Bod. Tibet next appears in history in a Chinese text where it is referred to as fa. The first incident from recorded Tibetan history which is confirmed externally occurred when King Namri Löntsen (Gnam-ri-slon-rtsan) sent an ambassador to China in the early 7th century. .

Founding of the dynasty

Tibet began at the castle named Taktsé (Stag-rtse) in the Chingba (Phying-ba) district of Chonggyä (Phyongs-rgyas). There, According to the Old Tibetan Chronicle

"A group of conspirators convinced Stag-bu snya-gzigs [Tagbu Nyazig] to rebel against Dgu-gri Zing-po-rje [Gudri Zingpoje]. Zing-po-rje was in turn a vassal of the Zhang-zhung empire under the Lig myi dynasty. Zing-po-rje died before the conspiracy could get underway, and his son Gnam-ri-slon-mtshan [Namri Löntsen] instead led the conspiracy after extracting an oath of fielty from the conspirators." .

The group prevailed against Zing-po-rje. At this point Namri Löntsen was the leader of a fledgling state that would become the Tibetan Empire. In 608 and 609 the government of Namri Löntsen sent an embassy to China, marking the appearance of Tibet on the international scene.

Recent historical research indicates the presence of Christianity in Tibet in as early as the sixth and seventh centuries, a period when the White Huns had extensive links with the Tibetans.. A strong presence existed by the eighth century when Patriarch Timothy I (727-823) in 782 calls the Tibetans one of the more significant communities of the eastern church and wrote of the need to appoint another bishop in ca. 794..

The reign of Songtsen Gampo and the arrival of Buddhism

Songtsen Gampo (Wylie: Srong-brtsan Sgam-po) (born ca. 609-613, died 650) is the great king who expanded Tibet's power and is credited with inviting Buddhism to Tibet. When his father, Namri Löntsen died by poisoning, Songtsen Gampo took control after putting down a brief rebellion (probably at the age of 13).

A statue of Emperor Songtsen Gampo in a cave at Yerpa

Military and diplomatic career

Songtsen Gampo proved adept at diplomacy as well as on the field. The emperor's minister Myang Mangpoje (Wylie: Myang Mang-po-rje Zhang-shang) defeated Sumpa ca. 627 . Six years later (c. 632-3) Myang Mangpoje was accused of treason and executed . He was succeeded by minister Gar Songtsän (Mgar-srong-rtsan).

The Chinese records record an envoy in 634. On that occasion the Emperor requested marriage to a Chinese princess and was refused. In 635-6 the Emperor attacked and defeated the Azha (‘A zha) people, who lived around Lake Koko Nur in the northeast corner of Tibet, and who controlled important trade routes into China. After a successful campaign against China in 635-6 . The Chinese emperor agreed to marry Songtsen Gampo to a Chinese princess.

Circa 639, after Songtsen Gampo had a dispute with his younger brother Tsänsong (Brtsan-srong), the younger brother was burnt to death by his own minister Khäsreg (Mkha’s sregs) (presumably at the behest of his older brother the emperor ).

The Chinese princess Wencheng (Tibetan (Mung-chang Kung-co) departed China in 640 to marry Songtsen Gampo, she arrived a year later. Peace between China and Tibet prevailed for the remainder of Songtsen Gampo's reign.

Songtsen Gampo’s sister Sämakar (Sad-mar-kar) was sent to marry Lig-myi-rhya the king of Zhang Zhung. However, when the king refused to consummate the marriage, she then helped her brother to defeat Lig myi-rhya and incorporate Zhang Zhung into the Tibetan Empire.

In 645, Songtsen Gampo overran the kingdom of Zhang Zhung in what is now Western Tibet. Zhang Zhung is thought to have a written script, although no samples of it have been found, and was a major centre for the Bon religion, which has survived, although much reduced in numbers, until today.

In 648, A Chinese envoy who had been attacked in India by Arjuna of Kannauj, who had taken control of most of northern Bihar following the death of Harsha. The Chinese envoy had to flee to Nepal for safety. Songsten Gampo sent troops who, with the Nepalese, defeated and captured Arjuna, who was sent back to China.

According to the Old Tibetan Annals, discovered by Paul Pelliot at Dunhuang, "the text of the Laws" were written in 655.

Songtsen Gampo died in 650, he was succeeded by his infant grandson Trimang Lön (Khri-mang-slon). Real power was left in the hands of the minister Gar Songtsän.

Inviting Buddhism to Tibet

Songtsen Gampo's greatest contribution, in the eyes of Tibetan Buddhists, was his invitation to the Indian guru Padmasambhava who brought tantric Buddhism to Tibet.

Buddhism was very late arriving in Tibet compared with surrounding countries. It had circled around Tibet, passing through the Gandhara region in western Pakistan, along the Silk Road, and then to China, where it was introduced nearly 800 years before it was introduced in Tibet. Given that Tibet was surrounded by Buddhist countries, it is naturally interesting to ask how it finally was transmitted into the country. Historian accept the broad outline offerred in Tibetan Buddhist religious history, which credits Padmasambhava, the tantric guru from the Swat valley near Gandhara as bringing the faith to Tibet, although Chinese influences are recognized as King Songtsen Gampo is said to have done so because he married Buddhist Princess Wenchang, daughter of Chinese Emperor Taizong of Tang. Traditionaly it is also said he was married to another Buddhist wife, Princess Brikuti of Nepal

The reign of Trimang Löntsen (650-677)

The minister Gar Songtsän died in 667, after having incorporated Azha into Tibetan territory. Between 665-670 Kotan was defeated by the Tibetans. Emperor Trimang Löntsen (Khri-mang-slon-rtsan) married Thrimalö (Khri-ma-lod), a woman who would be of great importance in Tibetan history. The emperor died in the winter of 676-677, and Zhang Zhung revolts thereafter. In the same year the emperor's son, Tridu Songtsen (Khri-'dus-srong-rtsan), was born..

The reign of Tridu Songtsen (677-704)

Emperor Tridu Songtsen ruled in the shadow of his powerful mother Thrimalö on the one hand and the influential Gar (Mgar) clan on the other hand. In 685, the minister, Gar Tännyädombu (Mgar Bstan-snyas-ldom-bu) died and his brother, Gar Thridringtsändrö (Mgar Khri-‘bring-btsan brod) was appointed to replace him.. In 692, the Tibetans lose the Tarim Basin to the Chinese. Gar Thridringtsändrö defeats the Chinese in battle in 696, and sues for peace. Two years later in 698 emperor Tridu Songtsen invites the Gar clan (over 2000 people) to a hunting party and has them executed. Gar Thridringtsändrö commits suicide, and his troops loyal to him join the Chinese. This brought to end the power of the Gar family. .

From 700 until his death the emperor remained on campaign in the north-east, absent from Central Tibet, while his mother Thrimalö administrated in his name (Petech 1988: 1081). In 702 China and Tibet concluded peace. At the end of that year, the Tibetan imperial government turned to consolidating the administrative organization (Tibetan: khö chenpo, Wylie: mkhos chen-po) of the northeastern Sumru (Wylie: Sum-ru) area, which had been the Sumpa country conquered 75 years earlier. Sumru was organized as a new "horn" of the empire. During the summer of 703, Tridu Songtsen resided at Öljag (‘Ol-byag) in Ling (Gling), which was on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, before proceeding with an invasion of Jang (‘Jang). In 704, he stayed briefly at Yoti Chuzang (Yo-ti Chu-bzangs) in Madrom (Rma-sgrom) on the Yellow River. He then invaded Mywa but died during the prosecution of that campaign..

The reign of Tridé Tsuktsen (704-754)

Gyältsugru (Wylie: Rgyal-gtsug-ru), later to become King Tridé Tsuktsen (Khri-lde-gtsug-brtsan), was born in 704. Upon the death of Tridu Songtsen, his wife Thrimalö ruled as regent for the infant Gyältsugru . The following year the elder son of Tridu Songtsen, by the name of Lha Balpo (Lha Bal-pho) contested the succession of his one-year-old brother but, at Pong Lag-rang, Lha Balpo was "deposed from the throne" (རྒྱལ་ས་ནས་ཕབ་). .

Thrimalö had arranged for a royal marriage to a Chinese princess. The Princess Jincheng (金成) arrived in 710, but it is somewhat unclear whether she married the seven year old Gyältsugru (as argued by Yamaguchi 1996: 232) or the deposed Lha Balpo (as argued by Beckwith 1983: 276). Gyältsugru was officially enthroned with the royal name Tridé Tsuktsen in 712, the same year that dowager emperess Thrimalö died.

The Arabs and Turgis became increasingly prominent during 710-720. The Tibetans were allied with the Arabs and eastern Turks. Tibet and China fought on and off in the late 720s. At first Tibet (with Turgis allies) had the upper hand, but then started losing battles. After a rebellion in southern China, and a major Tibetan victory in 730, the Tibetans and Turgis sued for peace.

In 734 the Tibetans married their princess Dronmalön (‘Dron ma lon) to the Turgis Qaghan. The Chinese allied with the Arabs to attack the Turgis. After victory and peace with the Turgis, the Chinese attacked Tibet by surprise. The Tibetans suffered several defeats in the east, despite strength in the west. The Turgis empire collapsed from internal strife. By 750 the Tibetans had lost almost all of their central Asian colonial possessions to the Chinese.. Despite going through a transition of dynasties, the Arabs managed to fare fairly well. In 751 the Arab-Chinese alliance broke down, and the two countries fought. The Chinese lost to the Arabs, but did well against the Tibetans.

In 755 Tridé Tsuktsen was killed by the ministers Lang and ‘Bal. Then Tagdra Lukong (Stag-sgra Klu-khong) presented evidence to prince Song Detsen (Srong-lde-brtsan) that "they were disloyal, were causing dissension in the country, and were about to injure him also. … Subsequently, Lang and ‘Bal really did revolt, they were killed by the army, their property was confiscated, and Klu khong was, one assumes, richly rewarded." In 756, Prince Song Detsen was crowned Emperor with the name Trisong Detsen and took control of the government after a one-year interregnum during which there was no empreror. In 755 China was greatly weakened by internal rebellion, which would last until 763. In contrast, Tibet had regained most of its lost possessions by 764, and, in 764, Tibetan troops occupied for fifteen days Chang'an, then capital of China, and installed a minor emperor.

The Mongols and the Sakya school

After the Mongol Prince Köden took control of the Kokonor region in 1239, in order to investigate the possibility of attacking Song China from the West, he sent his general Doorda Darqan on a reconissance mission into Tibet in 1240. During this expedition the Kadampa monasteries of Rwa-sgreng and Rgyal-lha-khang were burned, and 500 people killed. The death of Ögödei the Mongol Khan in 1241 brought Mongol military activity around the world temporarily to a hault. Mongol interests in Tibet resumed in 1244 when Prince Köden sent an invitation to Sakya Paṇḍita, the leader of the Sakya sect, to come to his capital and formally surrender Tibet to the Mongols. Sakya Paṇḍita arrived in Kokonor with his two nephews Drogön Chögyal Phagpa ('Phags-pa; 1235-80) and Chana Dorje (Phyag-na Rdo-rje) (1239-67) in 1246. This event marks the incorporation of Tibet into China, according to modern Chinese historians. Pro-Tibetan historians argue that China and Tibet remained two separate units within the Mongol Empire.

Kublai Khan

After an internecine feud among the Mongol princes Kublai Khan was appointed by Möngke Khan to take charge over the Chinese campaigns in 1253. Since Sakya Paṇḍita had already died by this time Kublai took Drogön Chögyal Phagpa into his camp as a symbol of Tibet's surrender. Kublai was elected khan in 1260 following the death of his brother Möngke, although his ascendance was not uncontested. At that point he named Drogön Chögyal Phagpa 'state preceptor' (Chinese: Guoshi). In 1265 Drogön Chögyal Phagpa returned to Tibet and for the first time made an attempt to impose Sakya hegemony with the appointment of Shakya Bzang-po (a long time servant and ally of the Sakyas) as the Dpon-chen ('great administrator') over Tibet in 1267. A census was conducted in 1268 and Tibet was divided into 13 myriarchies.

In 1269 Drogön Chögyal Phagpa returned to Kublai's side at his new capital Qanbaliq (modern day Beijing). He presented the khan with a new script designed to represent all of the languages of the empire. The next year he was named Dishi ('imperial preceptor'), and his position as titular ruler of Tibet (now in the form of its thirteen myriarchies) was reconfirmed. The Sakya hegemony over Tibet continued into the middle of the 14th century, although it was challenged by a revolt of the Drikung Kagyu sect with the assistance of Hulagu Khan of the Ilkhanate in 1285. The revolt was suppressed in 1290 when the Sa-skyas and eastern Mongols burned Drikung Monastery and killed 10,000 people..

Rise of the Geluk school

Lobsang Gyatso (Wylie transliteration: Blo-bzang Rgya-mtsho), the Great Fifth Dalai Lama, (1617-1682) was the first Dalai Lama to wield effective political power over central Tibet.

The 5th Dalai Lama is known for unifying Tibet under the control of the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism, after defeating the rival Kagyu and Jonang sects and the secular ruler, the prince of Shang, in a prolonged civil war. His efforts were successful in part because of aid from Gushi Khan, a powerful Oirat military leader. The Jonang monasteries were either closed or forciblly converted, and that school remained in hiding until the latter part of the 20th century.

In 1652 the Fifth Dalai Lama visited the Manchu emperor, Shunzhi. He was not required to kowtow and received a seal.

The fifth Dalai lama initiated the construction of the Potala Palace in Lhasa, and moved the center of government there from Drepung.

The Potala Palace in Lhasa

The death of the fifth Dalai Lama in 1680 was kept hidden for 15 years by his assistant, confidant, and possibly son Desi Sangay Gyatso (De-srid Sangs-rgyas Rgya-'mtsho). The Dalai Lamas remained Tibet's titular heads of state until 1959.

During the rule of the Great Fifth, the first Europeans visited Tibet. Two Jesuit missionaries, Johannes Gruber and Albert D'Orville, reached Lhasa in 1661. They failed to win any Tibetan converts to Christianity. Other Christian missionaries spent time in Tibet, with equal lack of success, until all were expelled in 1745.

18th and 19th centuries

The Sixth Dalai Lama enjoyed a lifestyle that included drinking, the company of women, and writing love songs. Declaring him to be unworthy as a monk, Mongol leader Lha-bzang Khan invaded Tibet with the approval of China's Kangxi emperor in 1705. The Dalai Lama died soon afterwards, probably murdered. Tibetans angrily rejected the spurious Dalai Lama candidate Lha-bzang brought with him and turned to the Dzungar (or Oyrat) Mongols for relief. The Dzungars defeated and killed Lha-bzang, but then proceeded to sack Lhasa and loot the tomb the the fifth Dalai Lama. They stayed until a Chinese expedition expelled them in 1720. The Chinese were hailed as liberators and patrons of Kelzang Gyatso, who they installed as the seventh Dalai Lama. Following the Qing withdrawal from central Tibet in 1723, there was a period of civil war. Amdo, meanwhile, was declared a Chinese territory under the name Koko Nor (blue lake). (This became the province of Qinghai in 1929.)

China began posting two high commissioners, or ambans, to Lhasa in 1727. Pro-Chinese historians argue that the ambans' presence was an expression of Chinese soveriegnty, while those favoring Tibetan claims tend to equate the ambans with ambassadors. "The relationship between Tibet and (Qing) China was that of priest and patron and was not based on the subordination of one to the other," according to the 13th Dalai Lama.[1]

Pho-lha-nas ruled Tibet with Chinese support in 1728-47. He moved the Dalai Lama from Lhasa to Litang to make it more difficult for him to influence the government. After Pho-lha-nas died, his son ruled until he was killed by the ambans in 1750. This provoked riots during which the ambans were killed. A Chinese army entered the country and restored order. In 1751, the Qianlong emperor issued a 13-point decree which abolished the position of king (desi), put the Tibetan government in the hands of a four-man kashag, or council of ministers, and gave the ambans formal powers. The Dalai Lama moved back to Lhasa to preside over the new government.

In 1788 the Gurkha King Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded Tibet. Unable to defeat the Gurkhas alone, the Tibetans called upon reinforcements from the Chinese Qing Dynasty. The Qing-Tibetan army defeated the Gurkhas and invaded Nepal.

The Qianlong emporer was dissappointed with the results of his 1751 decree and the performance the ambans. "Tibetan local affairs were left to the wilful actions of the Dalai Lama and the shapes [Kashag members]," he said. "The Commissioners were not only unable to take charge, they were also kept uninformed. This reduced the post of the Residential Commissioner in Tibet to name only."[2] In 1792, the emperor issued a 29-point decree which appeared to tighten Chinese control over Tibet. It strengthened the powers of the ambans, who were in theory put on a par with the Dalai and Panchen Lamas and given authority over financial, diplomatic and trade affairs. It also outlined a new method to select both the Dalai and Panchen Lama by means of a lottery administered by the ambans in Lhasa. In this lottery the names of the competing candidates were written on folded slips of paper which were placed in a golden urn. The tenth, eleventh and twelfth Dalai Lamas were selected by the golden urn method, but with only one name put in the urn. The ninth, thirteen, and fourteenth Dalai Lamas, however, were selected by the previous incarnation's entourage, or labrang, with the selection being approved after the fact by Beijing.

The British forced the Tibetans to withdraw from Nepal. In the 19th century, the power of the Qing government declined. As Chinese soldiers posted to Lhasa began to neglect their military duties, the ambans lost influence. Tibet fought wars and concluded peace treaties with Ladakh in 1843[3] and Nepal in 1856[4] without the involvement of Beijing. The 1856 treaty provided for a Nepalese mission in Lhasa which later allowed Nepal to claim a diplomatic relationship with Tibet in its application for United Nations membership in 1949.

Britain intervenes

The authorities in British India renewed their interest in Tibet in the late 19th century, and a number of Indians entered the country, first as explorers and then as traders. Treaties regarding Tibet were concluded between Britain and China in 1886[5], 1890[6], and 1893[7], but the Tibetan government refused to recognized their legitimacy and continued to the bar British envoys from its territory. During "The Great Game", a period rivalry between Russia and Britain, the British desired a representative in Lhasa to monitor and offset Russian influence. In 1904, they sent an Indian military force under Lieutenant Colonel Francis Younghusband, which, after some fighting, occupied Lhasa. In response, the Chinese foreign ministry asserted that China was soveriegn over Tibet, the first clear statement of such a claim.

A treaty was concluded which required Tibet to open its border with British India, to allow British and Indian traders to travel freely, not to impose customs duties on trade with India, and not to enter into relations with any foreign power without British approval.[8] The 13th Dalai Lama fled to Mongolia, so his seal was affixed by Ga-den Ti-Rimpoche.

File:13thdali2.jpg

The 13th Dalai Lama

When the Liberal Party returned to power, London reverted to it's pre-1904 policy of allowing China to negotiate on Tibet's behalf. The Anglo-Tibetan treaty was accordingly confirmed by a Sino-British treaty in 1906 by which "Great Britain engages not to annex Tibetan territory or to interfere in the administration of Tibet."[9] As part of wide-ranging set of accords signed in 1907, Britain and Russia recognized the "suzerainty of China over Thibet."[10] A suzerain is a nation which has certain authority over a dependent nation. In 1910 the Qing government sent a military expedition of it's own to establish direct Chinese rule. The Dalai Lama once again fled, this time to India. "By going in and then coming out again, we knocked the Tibetans down and left them for the first comer to kick," wrote Charles Bell, a British diplomatic officer stationed in Sikkim and a critic of the Liberal government's policy.

Chinese expelled

Following a revolution in China, the "Three Point Agreement" between Chinese and Tibetan leaders was reached in Lhasa which provided for the surrender and expulsion of Chinese forces in central Tibet. In early 1913, the Dalai Lama returned to Lhasa and issued a proclamation distributed throughout Tibet which condemned, "The Chinese intention of colonizing Tibet under the patron-priest relationship" and stated that, "We are a small, religious, and independent nation."[11] In a Treaty between Tibet and Mongolia (1913), the two nations asserted their independence from China and recognized each other.

In 1913-14, conference was held in Simla between Britain, Tibet, and the Republic of China. The British suggested dividing Tibetan-inhabited areas into an Outer and an Inner Tibet (on the model of an earlier agreement between China and Russia over Mongolia). Outer Tibet, approximately the same area as the modern Tibet Autonomous Region, would be autonomous under Chinese suzerainty. In this area, China would refrain from "interference in the administration." In Inner Tibet, consisting of eastern Kham and Amdo, Lhasa would retain control of religious matters.[12] In 1908-18, there was a Chinese garrison in Kham and the local princes were subordinate to its commander.

In a session attended by Tibetan representatives, British chief negotiator Henry McMahon drew a line on a map to delineate the Tibet-Indian border. Later Chinese governments claimed this McMahon Line illegitimately transferred a vast amount of territory to India. The disputed territory is called Arunachal Pradesh by India and South Tibet by China. The British had already concluded agreements with local tribal leaders and set up the Northeast Frontier Agency to administer the area 1912-13. The Simla Convention was initialed by the Tibetan and Chinese delegations, but finally rejected by Beijing because of dissatisfaction with the way the boundary between Outer and Inner Tibet was drawn. McMahon and the Tibetans went ahead and signed the document as a bilateral accord with a note attached denying China any of the rights it specified unless she signed. The British later concluded that they did not have the right to make a treaty with Tibet directly under the terms of the Anglo-Russia Convention of 1907, so Simla was not published for many years.

By 1918, the government at Lhasa had regained Chamdo in western Kham. A truce set the Yangtze River the border. At this time, the government of Tibet controlled all of Ü-Tsang as well as Kham west of the Yangtze River, roughly the same borders as the Tibet Autonomous Region has today. Eastern Kham was governed by local Tibetan princes of varying allegiances. In Amdo (Qinghai), ethnic Hui and pro-Kuomintang warlord Ma Bufang controlled the Xining area. The rest of the province were under local control.[13]

During the 1920s and 1930s China was divided by civil war and then distracted by the anti-Japanese war, but never renounced its claim to sovereignty over Tibet, and made occasional attempts to assert it. During the reign of the 13th Dalai Lama, Beijing had no representatives in his territories. However in 1934, following the Dalai Lama's death, China sent a "condolence mission" to Lhasa headed by General Huang Musong, the Tibetan government wroted a ten-point note presented to Huang's Mission, saying: "In dealing with external affairs, Tibet shall remain an integral part of the territory of China", Tibet's offer of subordination was also reported by British although no Tibetan original exists. Since 1912 Tibet had been independence-minded, but on other occasions it had indicated its willingness to accept subordinate status as a part of China provided that Tibetan internal systems were left untouched and provided China relinquished control over a number of important ethnic Tibetan groups in Kham and Amdo.

In 1938, the British finally published the Simla Convention as a bilateral accord and demanded that the Tawang monastary, located south of the McMahon Line, cease paying taxes to Lhasa. In an attempt to revise history, the relevant volume of C.U. Aitchison's A Collection of Treaties, which had originally been published with a note stating that no binding agreement had been reached at Simla, was recalled from libraries. It was replaced with a new volume that has a false 1929 publication date and includes Simla together with an editor's note stating that Tibet and Britain, but not China, accepted the agreement as binding.[14] The 1907 Anglo-Russian Treaty, which had earlier caused the British to question the validity of Simla, had been renounced by the Russians in 1917 and by the Russians and British jointly in 1921[15].

The subject of Tibet arose briefly in international affairs in 1942-43 as a result efforts by the U.S. to fly aid to China over the Himalayas following the closure of the Burma Road. An America plane crashed in Tibet and its five crew members were escorted back to India. The U.S. sent a mission to Lhasa led by Captain Ilia Tolstoy to study the possibility of an air supply route crossing Tibetan territory. Although the project was not pushed any further, it created a need to clarify Tibet's status in international law. British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden according wrote a note presented to the Chinese government which describes Tibet as, "an autonomous State under the suzerainty of China" that "enjoyed de facto independence." Meanwhile, the British embassy in Washington told the U.S. State Department that, "Tibet is a separate country in full enjoyment of local autonomy, entitled to exchange diplomatic representatives with other powers."

In 1947-49, Lhasa sent a "Trade Mission" led by W.D. Shakabpa to India, Hong Kong, Nanjing (then the capital of China), the U.S., and Britain. The visited countries were careful not to express support for the claim that Tibet was independent of China and did not discuss political questions with the mission . They did, however, allow the mission to travel using passports issued by the Tibetan government. The mission met with British Prime Minister Clement Attlee in London in 1948[16].

In the People's Republic of China

The Chinese Communist regime led by Mao Zedong which came to power in October 1949 lost little time in enforcing its claim to Tibet. In 1950 the People's Liberation Army entered western Kham (Khams) and Ü-Tsang (Dbu-gtsang) with little resistance. In May 1951 a treaty signed by representatives of the Dalai Lama and local government, provided for Chinese sovereignty . The Chinese government at this time did not try to reform Tibet's social or religious system, inside of the newly created Tibetan Autonomous Region, but Eastern Kham and Amdo were treated like any other Chinese province, and land reform began immediately, sparking discontent.

The Chinese built highways that reached first Lhasa then later to the Indian, Nepalese and Pakistani borders. The traditional Tibetan aristocracy and government remained in place and were subsidized by the Chinese.

During the 1950s, however, Chinese rule grew more oppressive with respect to the lamas, who saw that their social and political power would eventually be broken completely by Communist rule. Prior to 1959, Tibet's land was worked by serfs most of whom were owned by the lamas and were sometimes subjected to cruel conditions, particularly if they tried to escape. Before Chinese rule, over 700,000 of Tibet's population of 1.2 million were in serfdom.

By the mid-1950s there was unrest in eastern Kham and Amdo, where land reform had been implemented in full. These rebellions eventually spread into western Kham and Ü-Tsang. In 1959 (at the time of the Great Leap Forward in China), the Chinese authorities overstepped the mark, treating the Dalai Lama, by now an adult, with open disrespect. In some parts of the country zealous Chinese Communists tried to establish rural communes, as was happening in China. These events triggered riots in Lhasa, and then a full-scale rebellion.

The Tibetan resistance movement began with isolated resistance to PRC control in the late 1950s. Initially there was considerable success and with CIA aid much of southern Tibet fell into rebel hands, but in 1959 with the occupation of Lhasa resistance forces withdrew into Nepal. Operations continued from the semi-independent Kingdom of Mustang with a force of 2000 rebels, many of them trained at Camp Hale near Leadville, Colorado. In 1969, on the eve of Kissinger's overtures to China, support was withdrawn and the Nepalese government dismantled the operation. See [17].

The rebellion in Lhasa was soon crushed, and the Dalai Lama fled to India, although resistance continued in other parts of the country for several years. Although he remained a virtual prisoner, the Chinese set the Panchen Lama as a figurehead in Lhasa, claiming that he headed the legitimate Government of Tibet in the absence of the Dalai Lama, the traditional head of the Tibetan government. In 1965, the area that had been under the control of the Dalai Lama's government from the 1910s to 1959 (U-Tsang and western Kham) was set up as an autonomous region, the Tibet Autonomous Region or TAR. Autonomy provided that head of government would be an ethnic Tibetan; however, de facto power in the TAR is held by the general secretary of the Communist Party, who, as of 2006, has always been a Han Chinese from outside of Tibet. The role of ethnic Tibetans in the higher levels of the TAR Communist Party remains somewhat limited, despite the success of Tibetan cadres such as Raidi and Pasang.

During the mid-1960s, the monastic estates were broken up and secular education introduced. During the Cultural Revolution, Red Guards, which included Tibetan members, inflicted a campaign of organized vandalism against cultural sites in the entire PRC, including Tibet's Buddhist heritage. Of the several thousand monasteries in Tibet, over 6000 were destroyed [18], only a handful remained without major damage, and thousands of Buddhist monks and nuns were killed or imprisoned.

Since 1979 there has been economic reform, but no political reform, like the rest of the PRC. Some PRC policies in Tibet have been described as moderate, while others are judged to be more oppressive. Most religious freedoms have been officially restored, provided the lamas do not challenge PRC rule. Foreigners can visit most parts of Tibet, but it is claimed that the less savoury aspects of PRC rule are kept hidden from visitors.

In 1989 the Panchen Lama died, and the Dalai Lama and the PRC recognised different reincarnations. The Dalai Lama named Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as the 11th Panchen Lama but without confirmation by the vase lot, while the PRC named another child, Gyancain Norbu by the vase lot. Gyancain Norbu was raised in Beijing and has appeared occasionally on state media. The whereabouts of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima and his family are unknown. Tibetan exiles say they are imprisoned, while Beijing contends that they are living under a secret identity for protection and privacy.[19]

The Dalai Lama is now seventy years old, and when he dies a new child Dalai Lama will, by tradition, have to be found. In 1997, the 14th Dalai Lama indicated that his reincarnation "will definitely not come under Chinese control; it will be outside, in the free world." [20]

The PRC continues to portray its rule over Tibet as an unalloyed improvement, and foreign governments continue to make occasional protests about aspects of PRC rule in Tibet. All governments, however, recognise PRC sovereignty over Tibet, and none has recognised the Dalai Lama's government in exile in India. The Dalai Lama is widely respected as a religious leader, and is received by foreign governments as such, but few observers of Tibetan affairs believe that he will ever rule again in Lhasa.

Evaluation of PRC rule

Tibetan exiles generally say that the number that have died in the Great Leap Forward, violence, or other unnatural causes since 1950 is approximately 1.2 million, which the Chinese Communist Party denies. According to Patrick French, a supporter of the Tibetan cause who was able to view the data and calculations, the estimate is not reliable because the Tibetans were not able to process the data well enough to produce a credible total. There were, however, many casualties, perhaps as many as 400,000. This figure is extrapolated from a calculation Warren W. Smith made from census reports of Tibet which show 200,000 "missing" from Tibet. Even The Black Book of Communism expresses doubt at the 1.2 million figure, but does note that according to Chinese census there was a population of 2.8 million in 1953, but only 2.5 million in 1964 in Tibet proper.

The government of Tibet in Exile also says that millions of Chinese immigrants to the TAR are diluting the Tibetans both culturally and through intermarriage. Exile groups say that despite recent attempts to restore the appearance of original Tibetan culture to attract tourism, the traditional Tibetan way of life is now irrevocably changed. It is also reported that when Hu Yaobang, the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, visited Lhasa in 1980 he was unhappy when he found out the region was behind neighbouring provinces. Reforms were instituted, and since then the central government's policy in Tibet has granted most religious freedoms. But monks and nuns are still sometimes imprisoned, and many Tibetans (mostly monks and nuns) continue to flee Tibet yearly. At the same time, many Tibetans view projects that the PRC claims to benefit Tibet, such as the China Western Development economic plan or the Qinghai-Tibet Railroad, as politically-motivated actions to consolidate central control over Tibet by facilitating militarization and Han Chinese migration while benefiting few Tibetans.

The government of the PRC says that the population of Tibet in 1737 was about 8 million, and that due to the backward rule of the local theocracy, there was rapid decrease in the next two hundred years and the population in 1959 was only about 1.19 million. Today, the population of Greater Tibet is 7.3 million, of which 5 million is ethnic Tibetan, according to the 2000 census. The increase is viewed as the result of the abolishment of the theocracy and introduction of a modern, higher standard of living. Based on the census numbers, the PRC also rejects claims that the Tibetans are being swamped by Han Chinese; instead the PRC says that the border for Greater Tibet drawn by the government of Tibet in Exile is so large that it incorporates regions such as Xining that are not traditionally Tibetan in the first place, hence exaggerating the number of non-Tibetans.

The government of the PRC also rejects claims that the lives of Tibetans have deteriorated, pointing to rights enjoyed by the Tibetan language in education and in courts and says that the lives of Tibetans have been improved immensely compared to the Dalai Lama's rule before 1950. Benefits that are commonly quoted include: the GDP of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) today is 30 times that before 1950; TAR has 22,500 km of highways, as opposed to 0 in 1950; all secular education in TAR was created after the revolution; TAR now has 25 scientific research institutes as opposed to 0 in 1950; infant mortality has dropped from 43% in 1950 to 0.661% in 2000; life expectancy has risen from 35.5 years in 1950 to 67 in 2000; the collection and publishing of the traditional Epic of King Gesar, which is the longest epic poem in the world and had only been handed down orally before; allocation of 300 million Renminbi since the 1980s to the maintenance and protection of Tibetan monasteries. [21] The Cultural Revolution and the cultural damage it wrought upon the entire PRC is generally condemned as a nationwide catastrophe, whose main instigators (in the PRC's view, the Gang of Four) have been brought to justice and whose reoccurrence is unthinkable in an increasingly modernized China. The China Western Development plan is viewed by the PRC as a massive, benevolent, and patriotic undertaking by the eastern coast to help the western parts of China, including Tibet, catch up in prosperity and living standards. At the same time, it is claimed that many of Dalai Lama's followers showed little interest in Tibetan culture and only a very low percentage of them capable of speaking Tibetan language; the inability and failure of the Dalai Lama to prevent wholesale Westernization among his followers has made many to question who really destroyed Tibetan culture.

See also

• History of China
• History of South Asia
• History of Ladakh

References

• Beckwith, Christopher I (1983). “The Revolt of 755 in Tibet” Contributions on Tibetan Language, History, and Culture. Ernst Steinkellner and Helmut Tauscher eds. Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde; Heft 10. Wien: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien, pp. 1-16. reprinted in: The History of Tibet. ed. Alex Mckay. London: Routledge Curzon, 2003: 273-285.

• Beckwith, Christopher I (1987). The Tibetan Empire in Central Asia. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Hilton, Isabel (1999). The Search for the Panchen Lama. New York and London: W. W. Norton and Company. ISBN 0-393-04969-8.
• Petech, Luciano (1988). "The Succession to the Tibetan Throne in 704-5." Orientalia Iosephi Tucci Memoriae Dicata, Serie Orientale Roma 41.3. pp. 1080-1087.
• Richardson, Hugh E. (1965). "How Old was Srong Brtsan Sgampo" Bulletin of Tibetology 2.1. pp. 5-8.
• Richardson, Hugh E. (1988) "The Succession to Lang Darma". Orientalia Iosephi Tucci Memoriae Dicata, Serie Orientale Roma 41.3. pp. 1221-1229
• Wang Jiawei (1997). The Historical Status of China's Tibet. China Intercontinental Press. ISBN 7-80113-304-8. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Wylie, Turnell V. (1977) "The First Mongol Conquest of Tibet Reinterpreted" Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 37.1: 103-133,
• Zuiho Yamaguchi (1996) “The Fiction of King Dar-ma’s persecution of Buddhism” De Dunhuang au Japon: Etudes chinoises et bouddhiques offertes à Michel Soymié. Genève : Librarie Droz S.A.

Further reading

• Goldstein, Melvyn C., with the help of Gelek Rimpche. A History of Modern Tibet, 1913-1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State, Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers (1993), hardcover, 898 pages, ISBN 8121505828; University of California edition (1991), trade paperback, ISBN 0520075900.
• Norbu, Thubten Jigme and Turnbull, Colin. 1968. Tibet: Its History, Religion and People. Reprint: Penguin Books, 1987.
• Shakya, Tsering, "The Dragon in the Land of Snows : A History of Modern Tibet Since 1947." Penguin, (2000) paperback, 608 pages, ISBN 0140196153
• Stein, R. A. 1962. Tibetan Civilization. First published in French. English translation by J. E. Stapelton Driver. Reprint: Stanford University Press (with minor revisions from 1977 Faber & Faber edition), 1995. ISBN 0-8047-0806-1 (hbk); ISBN 0-8047-0901-7 (sbk).
• Yeshe De Project. 1986. ANCIENT TIBET: Research Materials from The Yeshe De Project. Dharma Publishing. Berkeley. ISBN 0-89800-146-3

External links

• The Government of Tibet in Exile
• Friendly Feudalism: The Tibet Myth by Michael Parenti
• Tibetan Buddhist Texts Chronology