Why china captured tibet

They could easily have escaped. In Sakya no one was directly or physically involved with the revolt, but the Chinese were paranoiac about the nationalist movement and spared neither time nor effort in tracing out the remotest connections with the revolt. Tibetan nationalist activities were called counterrevolutionary as well, and nationalist sympathies became a most serious crime. If a poor peasant was found guilty of having connections with rebels, he was a first-class political criminal and treated harshly.

In Sakya four peasant leaders tried to organize a peaceful demonstration in support of our governor, who was respected for his sense of justice and concern for the people.

We people of Sakya wanted to plead before the Chinese and persuade them not to mistreat the governor. The pleading was to be done in the traditional Tibetan style with a khadar, a ceremonial scarf.

The four leaders got a severe public flogging and were imprisoned. If Tibetan leaders had been able to publicize incidents like this to the people, they could have set Tibet ablaze with revolt.

Soon after the mass arrest, the entire town of Sakya, in common with the rest of Tibet, was divided into groups of ten families called Mutual Aid Teams, and I was able to watch the Chinese organizational skill and zeal. Each team had its chairman and secretary, who ensured and enforced group efficiency. Through these organizations the Chinese made us work or sleep, sing or cry, as the party wanted. Such people used their positions to pay off old scores.

As lower middle peasants, our family did not get anything. My oldest sister, who was classified as poor peasant, received two old silk shirts, a pair of ornate old boots worn by some senior lamas on festive occasions, a huge ant-eaten wooden box, two tables, one wooden saddle, and a brocade chuba.

No valuables, with which the rich houses abounded, were distributed; they were stored away in one place. The poor peasants were not satisfied. By the end of April our life had acquired a new pattern; it fell into a dull two-stemmed routine, from which no one could escape.

Meetings and work. Work and meetings…. The Chinese anti-Buddhist activities and preachings, which were part of the ideological or indoctrination meetings, were most keenly resented by all sections of Sakya.

When we saw our most venerated lamas carrying human excrement, mixing it with water, and sprinkling it over a newly made Chinese vegetable garden, many of us shed tears. That was part of their lao-dun hard labor. During thamzing artificially created class struggle lamas were accused and sometimes beaten by native progressives under Chinese supervision.

It was as if some strict Tibetan parents had told their son that the girl he loved was their enemy but that he could marry her anyway. Out of nearly five hundred monks in the Great Sakya Monastery, only thirty-six remained. The thirty-six were mostly aged and became objects of ridicule. They all were required to live in the Great Monastery.

One hundred seven small monasteries stood vacant, without a soul to look after them. Marriage was openly encouraged, and those monks who married were applauded and congratulated. We could not invite lamas to perform our annual family rituals. The attacks on Buddhism were one of the main items of our ideological remolding. The substance and objectives of all meetings and indoctrination were to create a new cosmology, not dissimilar to our old conceptions: horrors of hell, i.

In there were two meetings daily: during lunch break a discussion at our team level, after work in the evening a mass meeting at town level, and once a week a mass meeting at the district level. But mere attendance was not enough.

At the weekly district-level meeting we had thamzing. The Chinese comrades attempted to create class struggle. The Chinese government demanded that representatives of Tibet arrive in Beijing by September 16, , but Tibetan officials ignored the demand. Tibetan officials requested military assistance from India. The Dalai Lama returned to Lhasa on 17 August The U.

Khamba tribesmen rebelled against the Chinese government in eastern Tibet beginning in August The Dalai Lama departed from Lhasa on March 17, Tibetan rebels launched attacks against Chinese government officials and troops on March 19, , and Chinese troops launched a counter-offensive against the Tibetans on March 20, Chinese government troops captured Lhasa on March 25, , resulting in the deaths of some 2, Tibetan rebels. The Chinese government dissolved the Tibetan government headed by the Dalai Lama on March 28, , and the Panchen Lama assumed control of the Tibetan government on April 5, The Dalai Lama and some 80 supporters fled into exile in India on March 31, Some 87, Tibetans and 2, Chinese government troops were killed, and some , Tibetans fled as refugees to India, Nepal, and Bhutan during the conflict.

Meanwhile Tibet itself is rapidly changing, as increasing numbers of Han Chinese arrive in search of work. During Tibet's early history it was an independent and often powerful state, but from the 13th century, when it submitted to Mongol rule, until modern times, it has endured long periods of either Chinese control, Chinese influence, or effective autonomy.

In British Colonel Francis Younghusband led a mission to seize Lhasa and attempt to exclude other foreign powers' influence over Tibet. But in Britain and Russia agreed that both parties would deal with Tibet only through China, and China enforced what it saw as its claim on Tibet through a military invasion in It withdrew in the midst of a Chinese revolution in , and to all practical purposes Tibet operated as an independent nation from then until the early s.

This was to change dramatically in , when communist Mao Zedong proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China and threatened Tibet with 'liberation'. China led a military assault on Tibet in October , and in April Tibet's leaders said they were strong-armed into signing a treaty, known as the 'Seventeen Point Agreement', which gave China control over Tibet's external affairs and allowed Chinese military occupation, in return for pledging to safeguard Tibet's political system.

There was widespread open rebellion against Chinese rule within Tibet by , which tipped over into a full uprising in March Tibetans say that thousands died during the occupation and uprising, but China disputes this.

On the night of 17 March the Dalai Lama fled to northern India. Some 80, Tibetans followed over the next few months. The Chinese government went on to establish the Tibetan Autonomous Region TAR in , and in Tibet was subjected to China's Cultural Revolution, which destroyed a large number of its monasteries and cultural artefacts.

Since the s, Tibet has enjoyed mixed fortunes. People's freedom to practise their religion has been restored, though monks and nuns still often face persecution.

But large-scale Han Chinese immigration, Tibetans say, threatens their unique culture. It has not been a country since and no country has ever recognised Tibet as an independent state. At times in its long past, Tibet has influenced and been influenced by various foreign powers, including Britain and the Mongols, as well as China.

Tibet was not ruled by the Chinese government prior to the invasion. It signed international treaties and maintained diplomatic relations with neighbouring countries. From a legal point of view Tibet remains an independent state under illegal occupation, a fact that China wishes it could whitewash from history. Read more on our page Is Tibet a country? From to China peacefully liberated and democratically reformed Tibet, ending the old feudal serfdom where brutality was rife; a hell on earth with the backwards masses enslaved by landlords and priests.

This culminated in Serf Emancipation Day in March when the Tibetan government was declared illegal. In , the newly established Communist regime in China invaded Tibet, which was rich in natural resources and had a strategically important border with India.

With 40, Chinese troops in its country, the Tibetan government was forced to sign the "Seventeen Point Agreement" which recognised China's rule in return for promises to protect Tibet's political system and Tibetan Buddhism.

Resistance culminated on the 10th of March , when , Tibetans surrounded the Potala Palace to offer the Dalai Lama protection. This date is commemorated as National Uprising Day by Tibetans and supporters. In , many states that are today stable democracies were undemocratic and did not respect human rights.

The 14th Dalai Lama was a teenager when his country was invaded and was never able to govern Tibet independently. In exile, he has won the Nobel Peace Prize and has entirely democratised the exiled Tibetan government. In contrast, the Chinese government continues to have no democratic authority. China claims that its vision of a brutal past justifies its occupation.