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The 1959 Tibetan Rebellion: An Interpretation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Dawa Norbu
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Extract

Tibet in 1950 was an isolated, working theocracy, possibly unique among the various political systems of the modern world. She might earlier have been colonized by Britain had the prospect been economically attractive. Instead she was doomed as a result of conflicting British, Chinese and Russian imperialist interests in Central Asia and the manoeuvrings arising therefrom to a virtually complete isolation, reinforcing the natural mountain-bound isolation of her geography. Both the Anglo-Tibetan Convention of 1904 and the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 were basically aimed at making Tibet an area free from any struggle for spheres of influence and colonization. In so doing, they indirectly denied Tibet any alternative source of social change.

Type
Research Article
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 77 , March 1979 , pp. 74 - 93
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1979

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References

1. I use “theocracy” as the nearest western equivalent of the Buddhist society that existed in Tibet. Although Tibetologists and Tibetans are likely to object to the term, I use it as a political and social concept within the western political science. The conceptual framework for this analysis of the Tibetan revolt derives from the social systems theory of social change put forward by Johnson, Chalmers A. in his book Revolutionary Change (Boston: Little, Brown, 1966)Google Scholar.

2. See the full document in Sen, Chanakya (ed.), Tibet Disappears (New York: Asia Publishing House, 1960), p. 48Google Scholar.

3. When an English-type school was opened in Tibet as a first step towards modernization, it is said that Chinese bribed the abbots of Drepung, Sera and Ganden Monasteries in Lhasa to force the Tibetan Government to close down the school.

4. I have in mind books such as Seven Years in Tibet, by Heinrich Harrer; Tibet and Its History by H. E. Richardson, My Journey to Lhasa, by Alexander David-Neil, and well-known books by Sir Charles Bell, Professor Guiseppe Tucci, and George Patterson, all of whom visited Tibet on several occasions.

5. See the English translation in Tibetan Review, May–June, 1973, pp. 10–11. For a more cautious and scholarly treatment of the subject, see Snellgrove, D. L. and Richardson, H. E., A Cultural History of Tibet (New York: Praeger, 1968)Google Scholar.

6. See Suzuki's, Chusei article, “China's relations with Inner Asia,” in Fairbank, John F. (ed.), The Chinese World Order (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974), pp. 180–97Google Scholar.

7. Norbu, Dawa, “The Tibetan response to Chinese Liberation,” in Asian Affairs, Vol. 62 (10 1975), p. 266Google Scholar.

8. Wilson, Dick, The Long March 1935 (New York: Viking Press, 1971), p. 221Google Scholar.

9. Ibid. p. 221.

10. Moseley, George, “China's fresh approach to the national minority question,” The China Quarterly, No. 24 (10–12 1965), pp. 16–17CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11. See Takla's, T. N. interesting article, “Notes on some early Tibetan Communists,” Tibetan Review, 06–07 1969, pp. 7–9Google Scholar.

12. Quoted by Wilson, , The Long March 1935, p. 220Google Scholar.

13. Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. V (Peking, 1977), p. 64Google Scholar. I am grateful to my friend Jeremy Partial for translating this important document from Chinese.

14. Norbu, Dawa, Red Star Over Tibet (London: Collins, 1974), pp. 116–17Google Scholar. For the general policy toward national minorities as such, see Dreyer, June T., “Traditional minorities elites and the CPR elite engaged in minority nationalities work,” in Scalapino, Robert A. (ed.), Elites in the People's Republic of China (Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 1972), pp. 416–50Google Scholar.

15. See the full document in Sen, , Tibet Disappears, pp. 78–81Google Scholar.

16. See the most interesting revelation by a group of Guards, Red, “How the revolt in Tibet broke out,” Tibet 1950–1967 (Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1968), p. 690Google Scholar.

17. Norbu, , Red Star Over Tibet, p. 125Google Scholar.

18. The Chinese imaginative policy between 1951–59 is still little known to the world outside. I have attempted to show this policy in operation in my book. See Chaps. 6–9, Red Star Over Tibet.

19. Sinha, Nirmal C., “Seventeen-point agreement: vindication and liquidation of Tibet's independence,” Tibetan Review, 09 1974, p. 21Google Scholar.

20. Take for example Dergue which was halved into Chinese and Tibetan territories separated by the Drichu river. Juchen Thubten who was one of the chiefs at Dergue and who now lives at Dharmasala told me in an interview in 1976, “Once you have crossed the Drichu, you are in Tibetan territory and you can do anything you like: including kill Chinese and get away with that.” Thubten was sent twice to Lhasa in the mid-1950s to plead with the Dalai Lama and Tibetan Government that they persuade the Chinese to extend the same liberal policy to Kham as well. His missions were in vain.

21. DrSingh, Gopal (ed.), National Integration: Tibet Issue (published by the editor in New Delhi, 1964), p. 18Google Scholar.

22. Andrugtsang, Gompo Tashi, Four Rivers, Six Ranges (Dharmasala, India: Information and Publicity Office of HH The Dalai Lama, 1973), pp. 37–39Google Scholar.

23. For the Chinese accounts and views of the revolt, see Concerning the Question of Tibet (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1959)Google Scholar.

24. Patterson, George N., “China and Tibet: background to the revolt,” The China Quarterly, No. 1, 01–03 1960, p. 96CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25. The last piece of information is from The Guardian, 2 September 1954.

26. New York Times, 28 August 1954.

27. Strong, Anna Louise, When Serfs Stood Up in Tibet (Peking: New World Press 1960), pp. 65–66Google Scholar.

28. Tibet 1950–1967, p. 359. See also p. 381 of the same book.

29. Quoted by NCNA, Tibet 1950–1967, p. 368Google Scholar.

30. Peissel, Michel, Cavaliers of Kham (London: Heinemann, 1972), p. 67Google Scholar.

31. Ibid. p. 82.

32. Andrugtsang, , Four Rivers, p. 47Google Scholar.

33. I have heard numerous tales of ruthless Chinese military action in Eastern Tibet from Khambas in exile which indeed contrast starkly with what I have experienced in Western Tibet.

34. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 68Google Scholar.

35. Ibid. p. 90.

36. Ibid. p. 112.

37. Ibid. p. 109.

38. Andrugtsang, , Four Rivers, p. 55Google Scholar.

39. Ibid. p. 58.

40. Ibid. p. 62.

41. Ibid. p. 90; see also p. 88.

42. Ibid. p. 66.

43. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 96Google Scholar.

44. For the Dalai Lama's views, see his memoirs, My Land and My People (London: Panther Books, 1964)Google Scholar, in particular Chaps. 7 and 9.

45. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 90Google Scholar. For Patterson's, George view, see his Tibetan Revolt (London: Faber and Faber, 1960)Google Scholar.

46. In an interview with the author at Dharmasala in 1973.

47. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 100Google Scholar.

48. Patterson, , “China and Tibet,” p. 96Google Scholar.

49. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 101Google Scholar.

50. Ibid. p. 102.

51. Ibid. p. 114.

52. For detail, see Andrugtsang, Four Rivers, Chaps. 7–10.

53. Ibid. p. 95.

54. Barber, Noel, From the Land of Lost Content (London: Collins, 1969)Google Scholar.

55. Leoshe Thubtentarpa, who was most active in Sino-Tibetan politics in the 1950s and who visited China on several occasions, told me this in an interview at Dharmasala in July 1976.

56. Leoshe Thubtentarpa.

57. Barber, Noel, From the Land of Lost Content, p. 71Google Scholar.

58. Leoshe Thubtentarpa.

59. For personal reasons I would not like to quote this source.

60. It is important to note that the Tibetans were both anti-Chinese and anti-communist at the time of the revolt. Ordinarily, however, they tend to distinguish between Gya-mi Nyingpa (Old Chinese) and Gya-mi Sarpa (New Chinese, i.e. communist).

61. NCNA, Tibet 1950–1967, p. 348Google Scholar.

62. Ibid. p. 351.

63. Ibid. p. 366.

64. Revealing eye-witness accounts are to be found in Tibetan Review, March 1969, pp. 3–9.

65. Richardson, H. E., Tibet and Its History (London: Oxford University Press, 1962)Google Scholar.

66. Tibet's traditional cabinet.

67. Uyon Lhan-khang, “The Preparatory Committee for Tibet Autonomous Region,” office set up to gradually replace the Tibetan Government.

68. Literally, “Soldiers/Defenders of Faith,” e.g. Tibetan Army.

69. Tibet 1950–1967, p. 384.

70. Ibid. p. 352.

71. Ibid. p. 355.

72. Andrugtsang, , Four Rivers, pp. 52–53Google Scholar. The Dalai Lama's foreword, p. 6.

73. Tibet 1950–1967, p. 353.

74. New York Times, 19 September 1976.

75. Estimates of the crowds that gathered around the Dalai Lama's palace and led demonstrations against the Chinese in early March 1959, range between 10,000 to 30,000.

76. Andrugtsang, , Four Rivers, p. 48Google Scholar.

77. Wangyal, Phuntsog, Political Development in Tibet, 1950–1959. A thesis submitted to Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, 1974, p. 82Google Scholar.

78. Peissel, , Cavaliers of Kham, p. 78Google Scholar.

79. Most detailed report is one by Mullin, Chris in the Far Eastern Economic Review, Vol. 89, No. 39 (5 09 1975)Google Scholar.

80. Andrugtsang, Four Rivers, passim.

* I am grateful to Leo Rose, Lowell Dittmer and John Dolfin for their comments on my first draft, and also to the Ford Foundation for its grant.