Of course the Dalai Lama historically was the God-King of a theocratic feudalistic mountain Shangri-la lording over skeletal serfs and indentured monks set off in monastic solitude to serve his every want and need. But that was in the past. Hey he didn't know any better in his previous incarnations. But with all those CIA subsidies that have sustained him over the years, he can still see the light at the end of the tunnel and envision an enlightened theocracy for his imagined rule over "Greater Tibet." Meanwhile, his US mentors still relish the notion of a splintered Chinese Empire reduced to rump status by the spinning off of its recalcitrant frontier regions.
But you say those evil Chinese invaded and are still invading Tibet and taking their land out from under their feet. Well, Tibetans are found all over China, because they are just as Chinese as other ethnic groups. China is a multi-national country that has affirmative action programs for its minority people and freedom of movement for all Chinese to settle anywhere in their own country. Sound familiar?
Flashback to 1875. Let's relive our past in light of our concern for the Tibetan present. OK if you live west of the Mississippi pack your bags and go home, for that matter any person of European, African or Asian ancestry should return to their respective home continents. Its 1875 and we have for years actively settled the area west of the Mississippi with ethnic Europeans. And now we are laying new rail links to make further settlement easier and faster. At some point, the majority of the entire US population may consist of ethnic Europeans loyal to Washington. If this happens, there will never be a free America. At least according to the apologists for the Dali Lama if they are to be consistent in their beliefs.
In actual fact, the US could care less about the Tibetan people, they are just pawns in the great game of Real Politique between East and West, and now between China and India. India lurks in the shadows as it now sees China as its main rival for economic and political hegemony in South Asia. The West, particularly the US, would love to see the dismemberment of China as it becomes more and more of an economic and political competitor. If Tibet were to obtain independence, then the northwestern Chinese region of Xinjiang, traditionally inhabited by non-Han Turkic Muslims, would be next in line, leading to a situation similar to the breakup of the Soviet Union. That was the fond dream of western imperialism in 1989, when China was threatened with internal disintegration that was thwarted by the Chinese government’s unwavering response to the Tiananmen provocation.
Let there be no mistake, the call for Tibetan independence, the cultist Falun Gong movement, human rights campaigns and support for the arming of Taiwan, are all part and parcel of US attempts to destabilize, dismember and ultimately overthrow Chinese sovereignty leaving it as a rump state like Russia. China of course will have none of this and they would be incompetent fools if they acquiesced to these anti-China imprecations.
China is concerned about retaining Tibet as an integral part of the Chinese nation state primarily because of it strategic geo-political position. Throughout the 1950s and 60s first British and then US intelligence agencies recruited the Dalai Lama and his entourage to serve as a fifth column to probe China's sensitive southern flank. A western dominated Tibet would serve as a dagger directed at the heart of Chinese nationhood. Pro-independence Tibetans are no sweet innocents in all of this. They also have imperial ambitions. They believe in a "Greater Tibet" which includes not only Tibet proper but also the Chinese province of Qinghai, and portions of Yunnan, Gansu and Sichuan where there are outposts of Tibetan people.
China is, however, a self-avowed multinational country with provisions made for the autonomy of its national minorities. The Chinese constitution guarantees its minorities protection for their national identities, cultural traditions, and language as part of the family of nations that make up the People’s Republic of China. If these rights are not fully recognized and implemented it is the duty of the Chinese people of all ethnicities to see that they are. That is an internal problem for the Chinese people to solve without outside intervention, just as the denial of democratic rights to minorities in the US has been and still is a problem for the US people, not the Chinese, to solve.
The Chinese people take the principled stand of non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations. Would that we followed their lead and retreated from our interventions in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Latin America and other regions of the world were we meddle in muddied waters to enforce our economic and political hegemony.
So if we are not prepared to return New Mexico, Arizona and California to the Mexicans, lands that we conquered and whose deeds we stole (and yes they should return their land in turn to the Hopi and other native people who had a spiritual civilization on a par with Tibetans) we should hold our tongues. Remember, we came and displaced the original inhabitants of the US. So go back east you men, both young and old, over the great waters, back to the continents from whence you came, and take your wives, mistresses and kids with you.
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