China

Beijing and the Dalai Lama: Machiavellian Strategy or Driving Off a Cliff?

By Simon Elegant | October 29, 2008 | +

Beijing is apparently ignoring the Dalai Lama’s comments about giving up on making a breakthrough and Chinese officials said yesterday that the next round of talks between the two sides would go ahead as planned. This is in accordance with their apparent long-term game plan, to  wait until the 73 year old current Dalai Lama, with his unchallenged position among ordinary Tibetans, dies. Whoever suceeds him (and however they are chosenl cf the controversy about the picking of the Panchen Lama I mentioned a few posts back), the new Dalai Lama won’t have anything like the spiritual and political authority of the current incumbent. Beijing officials presumably calculate that, without a rallying point, the whole issue will as a consequence be much less of a thorn in their side and more amenable to the kind of slow attrition that was successful in inner Mongolia and is resumably behind their approach to Xinjiang. This on the surface would seem a sensible, if icy cold, strategy: play out the clock, make noises about negotiation but basically stall. As author Wang Lixiong points out in a recent blog, however, there’s a problem. He predicts that when the DL dies–and particularly if he’s still in exile and Beijing has continued to vilify him–it could spark a massive series of protests in Tibet that will make the March incident pale in comparison. The inimitable John Pomfret has translated the post on his blog here. Give it a read. It’s persuasive–and scary from a man who is one of the leading experts on Tibet (and who, as John points out, is more or less under house arrest along with his Tibetan wife Woeser, the writer and blogger).

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  • johnsmith9876

    One must separate the role of a religious leader and a leader for autononmy for Tibet. I can see Dalai remaining the religious leader and let a younger, more action oriented leader for Tibet autonomy. The succession of religious leader may be confusing (Don’t forget Dalai has the final say in how this is done.), but choosing a new leader for autonomy is quite straight forward, and probably out of the hands of Dalai.

    I suspect all the Chinese posters here will want to have a say in how and who to pick as Tibet’s leader for autonomy. Best of luck. I will nominate Wen Jiabo for the position.

  • johnsmith9876

    What does this story really tells you about China:
    http://wbnews.daynews.com.cn/news/sx/646831.html

    That the Chinese government is infiltrated by CIA ? The Chinese press are infiltrated by CIA ? The Chinese mines are infiltrated by CIA ? All of the above ?

    Is this a fake story about a fake government officials talking about fake journalists reporting on a fake mine accident ?

  • eecavazos

    Mr. Elegant,
    China really doesn’t have problem in the long term if you consider another trend upon which you often discuss but not in this posting. In addition to the “waiting it out”/time strategy also consider the impact of the population transfer of Han Chinese into Tibet. Time and population transformed Constantinople into Istanbul. There’s like 30 Greeks and the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Istanbul. They are not a threat to Turkey. Twenty years from now I wonder what new name the Chinese government will give the province of Tibet.

  • karibdis

    I disagree JohnSmith: the Dalai proposes a democratically elected government for tibet, in which he would have little authority. Creating a new political leader for tibet to work alongside the dalai as religious leader while campaigning for autonomy would probably just weaken the movement: where would the basis of their authority come from?? I doubt beijing would make any concessions if they did this anyway, in fact they would probably be alarmed by the appearance of a young and more action-orientated leader.
    Wen Jiabao is a good politician, but this choice would clearly not represent the wishes tibetans, but the wishes of bureaucrats in beijing and chinese nationalists. And the difficulties in tibet would continue…

  • karibdis

    eecavazos, china has already given a new name to tibet and loads of other parts of the country that they have taken from the local populations: tibet is called Xizang, and then there’s Xinjiang too. These are both chinese names.
    Tibet is a remote mountain kingdom, not an important middle-eastern city positioned to control a major shipping passage: the comparison doesn’t reveal much. Population flow will have a different impact in these places (Istanbul has always been a cosmopolitan city,tibet has certainly not been cosmo). personally I think flooding it with han chinese is a bad idea

  • mingming2

    it was sort of impressing that so many have been paying attention on this topic for so long time. But no matter how hard you guys jump up and down, things just don’t go the way you like to see.
    And abviously, what you like to see has nothing to do with the fortune of the Tibet people. it is just some despicable thing like making someone else to trip over so you can laugh and enjoy.

  • eecavazos

    Example of multiple name changes for a political purpose depending on the grip on the object so named: St. Petersburg, Petrograd (1914–1924), Leningrad (1924–1991).

  • ricelee22

    Heh. It’s persuasive AND scary (fearmongering)? It’s from a ‘leading expert’ on Tibet (who isn’t one these days) who’s UNDER house arrest (no personal perspective, gets all his information from others)? His wife is tibetan (personal bias)?

    What a great reliable source.

    The common people, ANYWHERE, does not burn down buildings. Not Iraqis, not Chinese, not Tibetans. The riots are merely manufactured by supporters of the government in exile, and when the Dalai Lama is dead, so will that spell the decline of the government in exile. Protests after the initial wave will die down, and disappear. Of course, unless the CIA wants to resurrect the movement again, but this is no longer the Cold War.

    I wonder when the Dalai Lama finally drop the act and comes to an agreement. The tibetan theocracy is long gone, and he is merely a relic.

  • johnsmith9876
  • freemindit

    People like Ricelee live in the paternalistic though iron grip of the CCP regime and cannot see the other face of the medal.
    The Tibetan theocracy has long gone, right!
    And HH Dalai Lama is a lively gift for everybody who believes in a human way of life where self determination is just one of the Human Rights Chart universally recognized (except for regimes like China, of course)
    The short minded Chinese leaders are just showing how stupidity could be the root of violence.

  • karibdis

    ricelee22

    Everyone is biased. I trust this guy more than I would any spokesperson in beijing.
    “The common people, ANYWHERE, does not burn down buildings” Yes they do – it is called a “riot”, though I think the chinese government prefers more subtle terms like “social unrest”. there is no evidence whatsoever that the riots were organised by the government in exile, so unless you have evidence, I suggest you refrain from rumour-mongering (talk about unreliable opinions……)

  • karibdis

    “And abviously, what you like to see has nothing to do with the fortune of the Tibet people. it is just some despicable thing like making someone else to trip over so you can laugh and enjoy”

    Such a generalisation would never be made by any reasonable thinker who had something of worth to contribute.
    Why is it that China wants to hold onto Tibet? These reasons no doubt have little to do with the fortunes of the tibetan people either…

  • PaPaPeng

    The DL never made any serious attempt to return to Tibet for while he appears to be conciliatory his negotiating position is fundamentally incompatible with China’s non negotiable position. The overarching fundamental is China is a single country and her borders inviolable. There shall only be one national government in China. This status is recognized by the UN and all the world’s states. To describe himself as “the government-in-exile in Dharamsala” and seek to negotiate with Beijing from that position is a non starter. That would imply Beijing’s recognition of Tibet as a country and the DL its head of government with a status equal in protocol to China’s President Hu Jintao. Surely “Having served the Tibetan people for 68 years as their spiritual leader” and having negotiated over those decades with China the DL would be fully cognizant with the finer points in protocol even a neophyte would have caught. At best DL could have sought to be recognized as a Province and negotiate from that position. But this introduces even more complications as there is already a Tibet Autonomous Region Government and it would be ridiculous to expect it to be dissolved to make way for the DL’s team. Likewise there are already well established and independent competing Lama theocracies among the monasteries. They are not inclined to just step aside for the DL’s lama entourage.

    With the demise of the CIA backed campaign for Tibet Independence in the 90s the DL recast his campaign as “has sought autonomy for Tibet, which is described as a middle ground between Tibet’s current status under the People’s Republic of China, and full independence.” This too is in variance with his claim of “Having served the Tibetan people …. as their spiritual leader” for what he sought up to the October 25 announcement remains political power. Furthermore the DL claims authority over ethnic Tibetan populations and, by implication, large territories in Xingjiang and Gansu that were never part of Tibet. This underlies his political claim of there are 6 million Tibetans in a Greater Tibet rather than just over 2 million in Tibet proper.

    Should the DL keep his word to retire “Stepping aside on the political front would allow a younger generation of Tibetans, ….., to carry the torch of responsibility for what happens next.” then the Tibet issue is dead. The younger ethnic Tibetan exiles have no religious authority. This leaves only Tibetan Independence as their unifying cause. As non citizens of the country(ies) they take refuge in they cannot engage in hostile activities against another friendly country. Even as citizens of a country such as the USA there are laws against plotting rebellion against another country. In either case these activists risk being classified as terrorists. As most of the younger generation of ethnic Tibetans were born outside China-Tibet they have no say in internal Chinese affairs. The Tibet issue dies with the DL.

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