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Time To Reassess Tibet Policy
by A. Tom Grunfeld
The Progressive Response
(Editor's Note: As the debate in Congress over granting China permanent normal trading status heats up, the complexity of U.S.-China relations will be on display. Contributing to that complexity is Washington's ambiguous policy toward Tibet. A new FPIF policy brief, excerpted below, the examines the history and current status of the U.S. approach to Tibet.)
The flight of the 17th Karmapa Lama from Tibet to India in January 2000 catapulted Tibet back into the world headlines, creating an opportunity for both China and the U. S. to reassess their policies toward Tibet.
Tibet's status has been intertwined with China since the 7th century through marriages, wars, and treaties. Mongol conquests in the 13th century made Tibet part of a Mongol-ruled Chinese state, while four centuries later the ethnic Manchu Q'ing dynasty further incorporated Tibet into China. In 1912 the13th Dalai Lama's unilaterally declared independence in 1912 but two years later signed a treaty granting Chinese "suzerainty" and direct rule over "Inner Tibet" while "Outer Tibet" remained under Tibetan autonomy. When the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) reestablished strong central government in 1949, Tibet was regarded as politically "integral" with China but in fact so autonomous that Beijing insisted on a incorporation "treaty" to preempt any claims of independence. But the CCP refrained from stamping out feudalism and theocratic rule. Twice in the 1950s Mao Zedong assured the Dalai Lama that China would make no further inroads against de facto Tibetan autonomy. This policy, however, applied only to Outer Tibet or what was later called the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR). Other ethnic Tibetan areas, known as Amdo and Kham (Inner Tibet) underwent political transformation.
This process of integration sparked rebellion, and minor insurrections in Kham/Sichuan turned into open revolt by1956. Soon support came from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which as eager to destabilize the communist government. China's suppression of a 1959 revolt forced the Dalai Lama and 50-60,000 Tibetans into exile. Beijing then subjected the TAR to political and social integration, ending Lhasa's autonomous rule. During the Cultural Revolution the Red Guards, both Chinese and Tibetan, engaged in wholesale destruction of almost every religious building in Tibet, paralleling antireligious campaigns throughout China. From exile, the Dalai Lama directed refugee resettlement and guerrilla warfare-although he officially renounced all violence. CIA support encouraged insurgent Tibetans to continue their war for independence, but the CIA was more interested in harassing communist China than in Tibetan independence. Following the 1971 visit to Beijing by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, the U.S. cut off its support to the Tibetan resistance. The Tibetan rebellion of 15 years quickly dissipated; the Tibetans had been unable to create a sustainable, free-standing military force after 15 years.
By the late 1970s China began relaxing its grip on Tibet. In 1978 the Panchen Lama was released from detention, and he began championing the preservation of Tibetan culture. A new round of Dalai Lama-Beijing contacts resulted in several Tibetan-exile delegations visiting Tibet. After these talks faltered in the1980s, the Dalai Lama decided to promote his cause internationally, believing that increased foreign pressure generated by his "Tibet Lobby" would force Beijing to renew serious negotiations. Rising international attention and continued unrest in Tibet sparked a policy debate within China. The moderates argued for more freedom for Tibetan cultural practices and the return of the Dalai Lama, while the hardliners (many of them Tibetan governmental and party officials) urged ending ties to the Dalai Lama and repressing all expressions of Tibetan nationalism.
After the Panchen Lama's sudden death in January 1989, the Dalai Lama was invited for religious funerary ceremonies in Beijing. Even though he was assured that there would be an opportunity for direct high-level talks, the Dalai Lama declined the invitation after his advisers pointed out that the international campaign was giving his cause increasing prominence and objected to the continuing prohibition against his visiting Lhasa. The decision not to go to Beijing and renew direct negotiations was probably the gravest error of his political life. He did, however, agree with the Chinese leadership to accept the reincarnation of the 17th Karmapa in 1992, and there was the suggestion that the Dalai Lama could assist in searching for the 11th Panchen Lama. But tensions escalated again in 1995 when the Dalai Lama (without first consulting Beijing) announced a boy had been selected. The designee and his family were arrested, and Beijing enthroned its own candidate. Since then there has been no progress in Chinese-Dalai Lama relations.
U.S. policy has done little to help resolve the Tibet issue. It is a policy that ignores the complex history, is driven by domestic politics, and is inherently contradictory. While officially recognizing Tibet as part of China, the U.S. Congress and White House unofficially encourage the campaign for independence.
Problems with Current Tibet Policy
Washington in 1943 declared that "...the Government of the United States has borne in mind the fact that the Chinese Government has long claimed suzerainty over Tibet...This Government has at no time raised a question regarding ...these claims." In line with the policy of its Nationalist allies (Guomindang), the U.S. later officially recognized Chinese sovereignty over Tibet. This position remains U.S. policy today, and it is also the policy of China and Taiwan.
Not until the cold war did Tibet become of interest to the U.S. government, which initiated secret talks with Tibetan dissidents in 1950 on the premise that Tibetans were fighting communism not Chinese rule. Washington promised covert aid to Tibetan dissidents if the Dalai Lama would leave China and publicly denounce Beijing. At that time, the Dalai Lama refused to leave Tibet. The CIA threw its covert support to a burgeoning guerrilla movement. In 1959 the Dalai Lama fled Tibet, and he immediately began receiving an annual U. S. stipend of $180,000 for himself and another $1, 550,000 for his cause (which presumably ended in 1971).
In the late 1980s the Dalai Lama's Tibet Lobby found a receptive hearing with the U. S. Congress, whose members were angry at China over nuclear proliferation, trade imbalances, prison labor, and human rights. Hearings were held, amendments added to bills condemning "human rights violations" in Tibet and calling it an "occupied country." In September 1987, when the Dalai Lama was in the U.S. promoting the Tibet Lobby, the first demonstrations in three decades broke out in Lhasa. Continuing for several weeks, the protests were met with harsh police repression. Undoubtedly expressions of U. S. "support" helped spur on the demonstrators, as Tibetans wrongly interpreted congressional testimony and nonbinding congressional resolutions as evidence of a changing U.S. policy. But official U.S. policy remains unaltered. After 1971 U.S. interest in Tibet had waned as relations with China warmed. Mounting pressure from the Tibet Lobby in the 1980s, however, complicated the policy environment.
In keeping with its principles of its early alliance with the Nationalists/Taiwan and with the principles of its relations with Beijing, Washington had never recognized Tibetan independence (nor the Dalai Lama's "government-in-exile" despite its covert support). But the vociferous U.S. opposition to communist China combined with the rising popularity of the Dalai Lama's cause pressured the White House to open some space in its public diplomacy for the Tibetan issue, resulting in yet another irritant in Sino-U.S relations. Washington's failure to articulate a consistent and definitive policy has displeased all sides: anti-China politicians, the Tibet Lobby, and the Chinese. Moreover, Washington's ambivalence and equivocations have proved harmful to Tibetans living in Tibet.
During the 1980s, CCP moderates paved the way for increased usage of the Tibetan language, the rebuilding of religious buildings (with more in some regions now than before 1951), and encouragement of Tibetan culture. Officials in power were willing to solidify these policies with the Tibetan pontiff. However, their inability to consummate a deal with the Tibetan religious leadership, the continuing popular protests, and the escalating China-bashing in the U.S. strengthened the power of the CCP hardliners.
U.S. public diplomacy skirts the independence issue, focusing on criticism of human rights abuses. Yet recent concessions and overtures to the Tibet Lobby are seen as evidence by CCP hardline factions that Washington's ultimate goal is to fracture China. Such initiatives as the establishment of Radio Free Asia (RFA), the 1998 appointment of a Special Coordinator for Tibet (a State Department employee who works part-time on Tibet and whom China will never allow into Tibet or to play any role in Chinese-Tibetan affairs), and invitations to the Dalai Lama to the White House have served to strengthen the anti-Dalai Lama, anti-U. S. positions of the hardline CCP faction.
This faction has fostered increased repression in Tibet, outlawed pictures of the Dalai Lama, encouraged increased ethnic Chinese migration into Tibet, tightened security in monasteries, obstructed religious practices, and forced monks and Tibetan officials to undergo "patriotic" retraining. As a result, there has been rising animosity toward Chinese rule and increased expressions of Tibetan nationalism--including some terrorism such as bombs in Lhasa. Indeed, these anti-Tibetan policies precipitated the flight of the 17th Karmapa, a 14-year old boy who had previously expressed loyalty to the Chinese state.
Restrictions on Tibetan culture, especially religion, also led to the 1964 denunciation of Chinese rule by the Panchen Lama and his subsequent 14-year detention. Once more, repressive practices, which have been fueled in part by ill-considered U.S. practices, alienated a prominent cleric. In the offing, there remains the possibility that the CCP moderates can use this unfortunate development to illustrate the bankruptcy of the hardline approach.
Toward A New Tibet Policy
The departure of the Karmapa Lama should spur Washington to reevaluate the failures of its ambiguous policy approach. It is time-after a long history of CIA betrayal, congressional grandstanding, and White House pandering to China bashers-for the U.S. to implement policies that truly help the people inside Tibet.
Sadly the spiraling success of the international campaign for Tibet has led to a proportional deterioration of the cultural conditions for the people in the TAR through its bolstering of the authority of the hard-liners. Moreover, support from outside Tibet (especially Tibetan RFA broadcasts) persuades some Tibetans that the U.S. supports their cause and encourages them to continue their brave but futile struggles against Chinese rule.
Time is short. The Dalai Lama is 65; his death would rob Tibetans of the only person with sufficient authority to negotiate a deal with Beijing. In the absence of a negotiated solution, current Chinese policies are allowing a mass migration of sojourners into the TAR to the point where they may already outnumber the indigenous population in the urban areas where they congregate. The Dalai Lama, like his predecessor, is willing, as he declared in April 1999, to "use my moral authority with the Tibetan people so they renounce their separatist ambitions"... autonomy would be the "best guarantee that Tibet's culture will be preserved."
China, including the TAR, has undergone dramatic changes. Tibet has roads, schools, hospitals, a burgeoning middle class, Internet cafes, karaoke bars, discos, and some 100,000 tourists a year. Religion is widely practiced. There are thousands of Tibetan officials, CCP members, and military recruits in Tibet. Indeed, many of the most ardently anti-Dalai Lama officials are Tibetan. To be sure restrictions on religious practice continue and institutional religion has eroded badly, the average income and literacy rate are the lowest in China and animosity between ethnic groups is growing. There are as many as a thousand political prisoners, mostly clergy who peacefully demonstrated against Chinese rule. Clearly, the political conjuncture in Tibet is far more complex than the Tibet Lobby (and Chinese propaganda) portrays.
While condemning human rights abuses, the U.S. must also acknowledge the significant gains in personal freedoms for the vast majority of China's citizens. The Dalai Lama's public pronouncements have become more conciliatory recently; an indication he is reaching out to moderate officials who, while apparently not directing policy on Tibet, are still in the government. The U.S. must do the same: support the moderate elements in the Chinese government by portraying Tibet in a more realistic fashion, by inviting Tibetan officials in Lhasa to Washington, and by not pandering to the Tibet Lobby.
The events of the past decade have demonstrated that public diplomacy, international hoopla, and the involvement of the world's governments, especially the United States, have worsened conditions for the Tibetans in Tibet. More realistic policies can help bring about a peaceful resolution of the Tibet issue which is in the interests, and to the benefit, of both Tibetans and Chinese and, ultimately, the rest of the world.
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