China's Liberation of Tibet: A Fairytale

Article written for
Harvard South Asia Journal

Click

In the last half century, Tibet has been mystified and politicized in a way that keep most people—non-Tibetans and Tibetans—perplexed as to what happened in 1950, when Tibet was invaded by Mao Tse-tung’s People’s Liberation Army. There are dramatically conflicting accounts. Who should one believe? The propagandists of Beijing? The Dalai Lama’s beleaguered Government-In-Exile in Dharamsala? Adding to the confusion is the resilient myth of Tibet as Shangri-La—a kingdom peopled by enlightened pacifists and protected from the woes of the outside world by the Himalayan mountainscape—a misrepresentation perpetuated by Western filmmakers and well wishers to this day...

Hollywood got one thing right:  Tibet’s isolation. Even after World War II, Tibet was a blank space on the map. In Washington, the State Department had precious little to go on other than the fact that, geographically, Tibet served as a convenient buffer zone separating the Goliaths of Asia: China to the east, USSR to the north, the Muslim nations to the west and India to the south. It was Tibet’s inviolability and apparent neutrality that Western nations postulated was the country’s most valuable characteristic: a dismissive assessment.

Likewise, Tibetans took their age-old isolation for granted. The impenetrable boundaries that gave Tibet its nickname, “The Forbidden Kingdom”, had allowed the country to develop a unique culture unsullied by Western cynicism or technological advancements. It also fostered an ultra-conservative ruling class deeply mistrustful of any departure from the status quo—a xenophobia that would eventually come back to haunt it and hasten Tibet’s demise.

Tibet was mediaeval. And there were leaders within the Lhasan power base who complained of it. Long overdue for societal and military improvements, the previous 13th Dalai Lama had unsuccessfully launched numerous progressive programs—including secular schools and the framework for a twentieth century army—only to be thwarted by the cabinet ministers, (Kashag), members of the aristocracy and the high abbots of the three mega-monasteries casting their collective shadow over the Vale of Lhasa. Prior to his death, the 13th Dalai Lama predicted a future for Tibet in which nearly everything would work against it, “from without and from within”.  True to his prophesy, Mao Tse-tung and his communist army invaded Tibet in 1950 while the current, 14th Dalai Lama was a mere teenager with no experience in warfare and no advisors who had any expertise in foreign policy. Overnight, Tibet was hurled into the alien wrath of the twentieth century. The nation would never be the same.

The question that begs to be answered is: How do you take over a country without incurring the ire of the international community? How did Mao Tse-tung manage to justify his blatant act of aggression against a foreign land to the rest of the world?

Mao claimed that Tibet was an ancient and indivisible part of the Celestial Empire, that Tibet ached to return to the so-called “motherland”, that the downtrodden masses, enslaved by the aristocrats and lamas of Tibet, were begging Mao to march in and free them from their oppressors. And the message to the international community was adamantine: Tibet was China. Foreigners would do well to keep their noses out of Chinese internal affairs.

Never mind that Tibet had its own government, had established long-standing treaties and trade agreements with other foreign countries; that Tibet had a unique language, perhaps of Burmese origin, but in no way connected to any Chinese dialect. Never mind that Tibet had its own currency, its own postal service, its own culture, it own brand of Buddhism and was, on every level separate from the nation of Han China—whether those Hans be Nationalists like the previous regime of Chiang Kai-shek, or Mao Tse-Tung’s Communists. Mao also failed to mention that Tibet had enormous reserves of gold, copper, lead, zinc, and millions of acres of virgin timber and other natural resources coveted and desperately needed by post-World War II China. Oil, borax and uranium would later be discovered and robustly pursued by the communist occupation, a raping of Tibet’s natural resources that continues to this day.

The question of Tibet’s independence, however, was a special challenge to Mao. Unlike the tens of millions of Chinese who really did respond to the communist ideas and slogans—Power to the People! Down with the foreign imperialists! Religion is the opium of the masses!  etc.—Tibet, consisting of one of the most religious groups of people on earth, loved their lamas and regarded their devotion to Buddhism as the fundamental element of Tibetan nationalism. There was never any question of them regarding themselves as Chinese. Nor would they have recognized an imperialist if they tripped over one. “Who are these foreign imperialists?” Tibetans scratched their heads and asked one another. In 1950, when China invaded Tibet, there were eight foreigners in the entire country.

Nevertheless, Mao charged in to “protect” the Tibetans from the foreign imperialists.
The international community did nothing.

It was the tribes in Eastern Tibet who first felt the brunt of the Chinese power and brutality disguised as “reforms”. These tribes fell into, roughly, three groups: the Khampas of southeast Tibet, and the Amdoans and Goloks of northeastern Tibet. Combined, the three groups counted for two-thirds of ethnic Tibet’s population. And yet, because of the great distance from Tibet’s capital, these groups had never depended on Lhasa’s central government to come to their aid—particularly when the Chinese chose to make the occasional military incursion inside Tibet’s eastern border.

Isolation within isolation: Toughness was an ancient and essential ingredient for survival in Eastern Tibet and, as a result, the Khampas, Amdoans and Goloks were the most feared warriors in Central Asia. They were known for their large stature, their rugged beauty and, above all, their ferocity. Khampas were dead-eyed marksmen. Amdoans were incomparable horsemen and hunters. Goloks, when fighting, were not in the habit of taking prisoners. And there was also this: The warrior code of conduct while killing an enemy was the same as while prostrating to a statue of Buddha: Do it with absolute conviction and devotion.

And no one was more devoted to the Dalai Lama than the warrior tribes of Eastern Tibet.
Mao was no fool. From 1950 to 1955, Chinese troops had strict orders by Mao not to interfere with Eastern Tibet’s infrastructure. He understood that the local monasteries were the ancient and essential hubs of all Tibetan society and could not be easily sidelined, let alone destroyed. One out of every four males in Tibet was a monk. All of the schools were at the monasteries. The printing presses, art, music, communication and social order rose out of the monastic system. Perhaps even more important, Tibet’s sense of nationalism stemmed from the monasteries’ pivotal role in society. Consequently, Mao directed his troops to be outwardly respectful to the robed population. He told them to exude a helpful attitude. This worked well in the first few years. For the most part, he managed to deflect his true intensions. Introducing medical clinics into Tibet, for instance, and dispensing antibiotics and other modern medicines to the locals was a particularly successful ploy. Technological improvements might be distrusted, but they were also admired and appreciated.
Mao was convinced that, with a little patience, the Tibetans would become grateful; would dutifully absorb his programs, his reforms, his requisite sacrifices and, ultimately, dismiss Buddhism as an antiquated and unacceptable faith in the modern “motherland”.  Mao’s game plan proved overly optimistic.

By late 1954, when it became clear that Tibetan loyalty to Tibetan Buddhism was non-negotiable, the communists’ smiles and courtesies and acts of generosity morphed into clinched fists. Mao’s honeymoon with the Tibetans was over.

The scales fell from the Tibetans’ eyes as well. When it became obvious that Mao-Tse-tung intended to disarm their men, to tax peasant families by taking away their precious grain, to force them to work in labor camps for little, then no money; to humiliate, then physically torture their lamas and, finally, horrifically, ban Buddhism altogether, the Tibetans in the Eastern provinces rose in armed protest.

The People’s Liberation Army’s reaction to the freedom fighters was as swift as it was atrocious. Wives, daughters, and nuns were raped—in many cases, repeatedly. Celibate monks were forced to have intercourse. In one case, the Chinese turned a monastery into a horse stable, brought in prostitutes and demanded at gunpoint that the monks have sex with them. When the monks refused, two lamas were publicly crucified. When yet another monk protested, the Chinese chopped off his arm above the elbow. “Buddha,” they laughed, “would give him back his arm.”

All across the country, Tibetans were dismembered, vivisected, beheaded, burned, scalded to death, dragged to death, thrown from airplanes—murdered and tortured in every way. Parents were shot in the head by their own traumatized children. Other children were dragged away from their homes—many mere infants—and relocated to state-run schools and orphanages, while their parents were doomed to death labor camps. Sacred images were desecrated. Buddhist texts were used as toilet paper. Monasteries were blown to bits. And all along, the communists inquired of their victims: “Where’s your Buddha now?”

Monks took off their robes and picked up guns.

Organized resistance became widespread and more organized under the remarkable guidance of Gompo Tashi Andrugtsang, one of Tibet’s great heroes. Gompo Tashi was a wealthy Khampa trader-merchant from the Lithang area in Eastern Tibet. He brought together thousands of men and created Chushi-Gangdruk, an army of freedom fighters that would, for the first time, engage the Chinese enemy in systematic attacks, as well as raids on their well-stocked garrisons. The Chushi-Gangdruk would play havoc with the Chinese troops for the next several years.

Gompo Tashi was also well connected with the elite in the Central Government and, more important, was good friends with the Dalai Lama’s two older brothers, Gyalo Thundop and Taktser Rinpoche. It was Gyalo Thundop and Taktser Rinpoche who initiated contact with the CIA, requesting military assistance.

Which prompts the question: To what extent did the CIA help the Tibetan resistance?
As far back as 1950, the CIA had monitored (as best they could) the unrest in Tibet. By April of 1950, between 30,000 and 40,000 PLA troops had entered the far eastern territories of Tibet and occupied the commercially important trading centers of Jyekundo, Kanze, Derge and Lithang. By October, they had captured the capital of Eastern Tibet, Chamdo, and the militarily strategic town of Riwoche. On September 6, 1951, 3000 troops “triumphantly” entered Lhasa in Central Tibet. A mere four months later, the PLA-occupied capital had an additional 17,000 troops, making a total of 20,000 Chinese troops, effectively doubling the population of Lhasa and creating near-famine conditions for the city’s natives. During this time frame, the reliability of the CIA’s intelligence was, at best, patchy. But one thing was quite clear: Helping Tibetans fight the communist Chinese fit in perfectly with America’s Cold War commitments. Not helping the Tibetans became increasingly insupportable. By 1956, Washington had reliable sources reporting that tens of thousands of Tibetans were now fighting Chinese in the eastern provinces of Kham, Amdo and Golok.

Still, because of various diplomatic and bureaucratic barriers, the Agency was not allowed to get involved until 1957, at which time the State Department green-lighted a trial training program. Gyalo Thundop, (by that time living in India), selected six top Khampa warriors to be exfiltrated to the island of Saipan where a CIA Tibetan Task Force was hastily created and headed by Roger E. McCarthy. Taktser Rinpoche also flew to Saipan to act as the CIA’s translator.

Training included Morse code, RS-1 crystal-operated radios, map and compass reading, small arms including 60-mm mortar and 57-mm recoilless rifles, Molotov cocktails, booby traps, sabotage techniques, offensive and defensive ambushes, parachuting and other skills useful for freedom fighters. According to McCarthy, “The Tibetans distinguished themselves from other nationalities that I had worked with. There was their obvious high spirit, dedication, self-discipline, and degree of self-confidence. The six trainees’ faith and trust in us grew and so did the friendships between us. We cared for them and they more than reciprocated.”

The primary operational goal was to create Tibetan teams that could be parachuted back into Tibet. Once back on the ground, they would train fellow countrymen, as well as prepare drop zones for additional arms and supplies flown in by the CIA. The initial group proved successful. Eventually, McCarthy created a special training facility for Tibetan freedom fighters—top secret—at Camp Hale, Colorado, not far from present-day Vail ski slopes.

In the meantime, back in Tibet, the Chinese had their hands filled with the Chushi-Gangdruk. Resistance fighters were still engaged in combat in every district of Kham, Amdo and Golok. They wore no official uniform other than their traditional chubas.  For the most part, they lived in their saddles, raiding, besieging, running, and hiding. They set up their magars (resistant camps) beside lonely monasteries or villages overlooking strategic trails. Many women followed the rebels, but, by that time, many others had already been killed, abducted, or simply left behind, their fate unknown.
Uncertainty was rampant on both sides. Chinese loathed being stationed in Eastern Tibet. Every turn in the trail represented a potential and very lethal ambush. Nevertheless, by the beginning of 1958, the Chinese had committed eight PLA divisions and at least 150,000 men in Eastern Tibet alone.

Even worse for the communists, the uprising had now spread to Central Tibet. The vast area south of Lhasa was called Lhoka. The topography was varied: rugged mountains, narrow gorges, forests, fertile valleys, alpine lakes, as well as wide-ranging tracts, barren and uninhabited by man. Gompo Tashi’s men—some 20,000 to 30,000 rebels by June 1958—had joined forces and were now in complete control of Lhoka—all the way to the Indian border. The success of their many engagements with the enemy was gaining momentum. They were also moving closer to Lhasa—this in spite of being outarmed by the Chinese. The reason for this was, in part, because they were beginning to better equip themselves by raiding Chinese garrisons and capturing guns and ammunition from fallen PLA troops. Gompo Tashi personally contributed to the effort by buying Russian-made guns of both short and long range. From India, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Pakistan—and even China—he was able to purchase additional rifles and pistols. Gompo Tashi described the ever-growing Chushi-Gangdruk as “a confluence of rivers.” By the end of 1958, the freedom fighters of Lhoka had increased to 80,000 men.

And the rebel victories were nothing short of spectacular. In the Battle of Nyimo River, for instance, Gompo Tashi and his men had turned a potential disaster into triumph. The PLA, numbering well into the thousands, surprised the Chushi-Gangdruk. Armed with cannons, automatic weapons, and grenades, they kept up a constant fusillade of gunfire and shelling. Realizing that to remain where they were would be fatal, but not having the option to retreat, Gompo Tashi decided to simply hack his way through the Chinese ranks. Later, in his autobiography, he recounted:

As the buglers in our camp sounded the signal to attack, I led seventy horses on to the field. Galloping at full speed, we charged the enemy like wild animals, fighting them hand to hand. The Chinese were unable to resist the onslaught and withdrew to a nearby village. We pursued them and battled in and around the village until they retreated further and took shelter in the houses.
Most of them had taken refuge in two large houses that contained an office and some telegraph equipment. We shot down every door and window in these houses and eventually had to burn them, as this was the only way to destroy the Chinese who were hiding inside…I believe at least 700 Chinese were killed in this battle and many more were seriously wounded.

Time and again, the psychological advantage of the Chushi-Gangdruk prevailed in spite of the numerical odds against them. At the Battle of Jhang Yangpa Ching, with nearly 10,000 PLA troops in the immediate area, Gompo Tashi simply terrified his way into victory. He and his men played a priceless card: They had nothing to lose.

By the beginning of 1959, the Chushi-Gangdruk would be within thirty miles of Lhasa.
Meanwhile, the generals stationed in Lhasa suspected that the Chushi-Gangdruk’s activities were being orchestrated from within the upper stories of the Potala Palace. The Chinese issued a public warning in Lhasa: Anyone helping the resistance would be “summarily executed slowly and publicly.”
Anyone. The edict did not exclude the Dalai Lama, an emanation of Chenrezig, the Buddha of Compassion. Not surprisingly, the threat backfired and further hardened the resolve of Tibetans to unite against the Han invaders. Lhasa, now occupied by 40,000 Chinese troops, became a ticking bomb.

Much has been written about the ensuing 1959 uprising in Lhasa and the Dalai Lama’s escape into India. What is less known is the significant role the Tibetan resistance played in making that escape come true. Without Gompo Tashi Andrugtsang’s 80,000 strong Chushi-Gangdruk—an army that controlled the southern route from Lhasa to India—the Dalai Lama never would have reached the safety of the subcontinent.

Unfortunately, because of the sheer numbers of Chinese troops, the resistance was eventually compelled to regroup outside Tibet proper and set up camp in the forlorn Mustang region of Nepal. Chinese troops kept pouring in from Mainland China. New roads, bridges and airports were built in southern Tibet by the communists, thereby making it increasingly difficult for the rebels to conduct effective incursions. Morale dropped. Warriors began to head south in search of their families who, like the Dalai Lama and his family, had fled Tibet and regrouped in makeshift Nepalese and Indian refugee camps.

Finally, in the early 1970s, the penultimate blow was delivered when President Nixon, smitten with the notion of rapprochement with China, sent Henry Kissinger to Beijing to conduct secret talks with Mao Tse-tung. Mao made it clear that the CIA would have to discontinue support of the Mustang resistance before talks could move forward. Almost overnight, Washington’s aid to the freedom fighters was cut off.

1974: Knowing that the end was near, General Wangdu, (nephew of Gompo Tashi, one of the first six CIA trainees and now the leader of the Mustang resistance), made one final heroic effort to get vital intelligence out of Nepal and into India before laying down his arms. But the traitorous Baba Gen Yeshe, a disgraced Tibetan leader jealous of General Wangdu’s leadership conspired with the king of Nepal, (who was facing pressure from Beijing to oust the rebels from his borders). In a well-orchestrated effort, General Wangdu was ambushed and murdered by snipers at Tinker’s Pass, less than an hour ride from the Indian border. His bullet-ridden body was put on public display in the center of Kathmandu until the locals could no longer tolerate the corpse’s stench.
Tibetan armed resistance was over.

The tragic story of Tibetan Buddhists taking up arms to defend their nation, their religion, their culture, and above all, their Dalai Lama, may sit uneasily next to the popular Shangri-La image of Tibet, but the myth of a non-violent Tibetan people and, even more important, the non-violent takeover of Tibet by the Chinese has been advanced by the communist propaganda machine and is still very much working for the Chinese propaganda machine today. That it is why it is so important to remember the extent to which there was fierce resistance in Tibet: to help dispel the fantasy China has spun about their bloody takeover. 1.2 million Tibetans lost their lives because of the takeover. To assert that the Tibetans invited the Chinese to invade their country is a shameless fabrication and re-writing of history that, in spite of its absurdity, still thrives and remains largely unchallenged sixty years after the fact.