Anna Louise Strong Reference Archive
In Peking they said that the rebels kidnapped the Dalai Lama and took him “in duress” to India. In India they said the Dalai Lama fled from the Chinese and came to India of his own free will. The Dalai Lama himself said opposite things on different occasions, under different influences. Let us not commit ourselves for the moment. Let us begin with facts on which everyone agrees.
The Dalai Lama left Lhasa on the night of March 17, 1959, in the company — willing, unwilling or partly willing — of the leading rebels. They withdrew to the south, towards the Indian border, to an area known as Nanchang and remained there for several days, till the outcome of the battle in Lhasa was known. When the rebels’ defeat was clear, the Dalai Lama’s party moved rapidly towards India, whose frontier they crossed on March 31.
The world press buzzed with wild stories during the period when the Dalai Lama was absent from contact with newsmen. The more sensational claimed that the Chinese were staging “a man-hunt for the god-king” with 50,000 troops assisted by planes. The fury somewhat faded when the party entered India and gave no detailed accounts of pursuers except for some observation planes. A suggestion that the “escape was a miracle” accomplished by the merits of His Holiness also withered when it appeared that the travellers had made the journey with normal speed, and when Peking announced his arrival by normal news-item on April 2, a day before Nehru revealed it to the Indian parliament. There was a brief embarrassment as India wondered in what ungodly manner Peking got the news, and hinted at Communist spies. For clearly Peking seemed to be saying: “We know his whereabouts; if you want him, he is yours.”
Those of us who followed events from Peking noticed a bit of accurate timing, that seemed to indicate a fairly continuous knowledge of the Dalai Lama’s movements, possibly from those observation planes. When the military order to put down the rebellion was issued March 20, it made no political attack on the local government of Tibet. It might still have been possible, when the Lhasa rebellion had been quelled March 23, for the Dalai’s party to return, disavow connection with rebellion and state they had only taken the Dalai out of the fighting, and then make peace with Peking. When they chose to proceed to India, Peking dissolved the local government of Tibet by order of the State Council on March 28, just three days before a majority of said government would have been in India, a government-in-exile, possibly issuing decrees from a foreign land.
Peking did this in a manner which preserved the Dalai Lama’s position as head of government in Tibet, while getting rid of all his rebel ministers. The Preparatory Committee for the Tibetan Autonomous Region was instructed to take over the functions of local government. This was a committee formed in 1956, amid much pomp and celebration, with the Dalai Lama as Chairman, the Panchen Erdeni as First Vice-Chairman, and Apei, one of the two loyal kaloons, as Secretary-General. Its function was to form a new, unified Tibet somewhat larger than the previous Tibet, to combine the lands of the Dalai Lama, those of the Panchen Erdeni, the northwestern Ari district and the recently contested Chamdo Area. The committee had fifty-five members of whom fifty were Tibetans, giving a wide representation of all the areas. It was therefore in a position to create a new, unified and larger Tibet under the Dalai Lama’s chairmanship. Due to the opposition of the kasha, whose rule the new Autonomous Region would supersede, the work had not advanced.
When therefore the order of the State Council on March 28 dissolved the local government of Tibet but directed the Preparatory Committee to take over its functions and asked the Panchen Erdeni, already Vice-Chairman, to become Acting Chairman “pending the Dalai Lama’s absence under duress,” all formalities of a continuing government were preserved, with the Dalai Lama still as titular head, even in absentia, and the Panchen Erdeni “acting chairman” in his absence. If the Dalai Lama chose to break free from the rebels and could do it, the road was open for his return to a functioning government of which he still was chief. The kasha would, however, be gone.
Peking went even further in keeping for the Dalai Lama a path of return. On April 18 the National People’s Congress, the supreme organ of state power, convened in Peking. The Dalai Lama was not only a member of this Congress as a deputy from Tibet, but had been elected by it as a vice-chairman of its Standing Committee, the continuing state power of China. On the day when the Congress opened, a statement was issued in Tezpur, India, and distributed by an Indian diplomatic official, which purported to come from the Dalai Lama. It was a thoroughgoing attack on China and on the Peking government, and was precisely timed to take the world headlines away from Premier Chou En-lai’s report to the Congress on the general state of the nation. Friends of the Dalai Lama in Peking, especially the Tibetan deputies, like Apei and the Panchen Erdeni, angrily branded the Tezpur statement a “forgery,” and intimated that it had been written by the Indian official or by some of the rebels under Indian advice.
On this assumption, the National People’s Congress re-elected the Dalai Lama as one of the vice-chairmen of the Standing Committee, the expressed view being that he was absent “under duress.” The way was thus still kept open, if the Dalai Lama broke with the rebels, for him to return not only as chairman of the new local government in Tibet but also as a vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of China.
Whatever olive branches were thus held out to the Dalai Lama, no concessions were made by Peking to suggestions that came from India, that Tibet should be negotiated in a conference on Indian soil. Peking was adamant on this and did not even answer. However deftly they were worded by Nehru, such suggestions violated a basic principle on which all Chinese agree, including Chiang Kai-shek’s regime on Taiwan, that Tibet is a part of China, not subject to interference by a foreign power. If the Dalai Lama had complaints to make, he could still make them as the chairman of the government of Tibet, or as a vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of China’s Congress. He could not make them through a foreign power.
So matters stood for three months until June 20. On that day the Dalai Lama gave a press conference in Mussoorie, India, in which was handed out a prepared statement attacking China, the Chinese and the Peking government even more strongly than the Tezpur statement had done. It denounced specifically every act of Peking from 1950 to the present, demanded Tibetan independence and even a “Greater Tibet” with boundaries so ancient and vague that they might be interpreted to comprise a fifth to a fourth part of China. Peking took no official notice of this attack but the press of the world commented that “the Dalai Lama has chosen to slam the door against return.”
Before discussing the Dalai Lama’s June 20 statement, let us examine the conditions under which he left Lhasa, as shown by the three letters he sent to General Tan Kuan-san and by the testimony of his attendants and bodyguards who remained behind. For this is the raw material of history, which will be long discussed and variously interpreted. It is also of interest to psychologists, for it shows a young man who was from babyhood conditioned to accept the rules of his ministers and his hierarchy while also accepting worship from the people, when he is caught in a clash of forces that do not respond to his will.
On March 10, as we saw in the previous chapter, the Dalai Lama was awaited at a morning theatrical performance at the Military Command. When he did not arrive, word came that he was held in his palace by armed men who were “killing progressives.” We have already followed events as they developed in the city of Lhasa, from the first appearance of armed men on horseback displaying the corpse of a leading progressive, to the final rout of the rebels. Let us now trace what happened with the Dalai Lama himself.
When the Dalai Lama did not keep his appointment, which he himself had made a month earlier, General Tan Kuan-san, acting representative in Lhasa of the Central Government and political commissar of the military area, sent a note to the Dalai Lama as follows:
Respected Dalai Lama,
It is very good indeed that you wanted to come to the Military Area Command. You are heartily welcome. Since you have been put to very great difficulties due to intrigues and provocations of the reactionaries, it may be advisable that you do not come for the time being. Salutations and best regards,
Tan Kuan-san.
The letter was given to Living Buddha Jaltsolin, reader of the Dalai Lama, who was then conveyed to his own home by an army car. He there took horse and rode to Norbu Lingka, the large walled park in which were many palaces, which was the Dalai Lama’s summer residence. He found the outer gate to the park closed and guarded by the first regiment of the Tibetan Army. After waiting an hour and a half Jaltsolin was permitted to enter at five o’clock. He found many armed men circulating inside the Norbu Lingka, but he made his way to the Dalai Lama, whom he found “in a room on the left of the court room.”
The Dalai Lama read the letter and then said to Jaltsolin: “They (the rebels) say it is for my safety but actually they endanger me.” The Dalai Lama asked Jaltsolin to return to the Military Area Command, “if he had the courage,” and report to General Tan the conditions surrounding the Dalai Lama. He expressed grief over the killing of Kanchung Soanamchiatso, the man whose corpse had been exhibited on a horse.
Jaltsolin was detained by the rebels in Norbu Lingka and was unable to leave for a fortnight, until the rebels’ defeat. In the intervening days he tried to see the Dalai Lama again but was unable to speak with him. “After March 10,” reported Jaltsolin later, “the Dalai Lama could not move freely even inside the Norbu Lingka. Armed rebels kept guard outside his palace. Within the yellow walls was the first regiment of the Tibetan Army; outside were the Khampa people. The door of the palace was closed.”
He saw the Dalai Lama once again and from a distance. It was on March 12. “He sat on a high throne, his head lowered, one hand on his temple, very worried and his face had become darker. There were more than twenty people around him.” . . . (Jaltsolin listed some of these.) “Some, seeing the Dalai Lama in such sorrow and poor health, feared he might die. They said that at all costs the Dalai Lama must live and that everyone should obey him. But a lama named Yiehsi Dongchu said it was all right for the Dalai Lama to live but not exactly right to obey him. A lama in a yellow robe carried a pistol. There was a lot of clamor. The Dalai Lama waved his hand and sighed deeply.”
Jaltsolin himself was frequently threatened during his days within Norbu Lingka. On one occasion the rebel leader Kundelin Chasa sent for him and warned him: “You are friendly with the Hans. We suspect you. Cut off your relations with them.” On March 19, two days after the Dalai Lama left, three rebels entered Jaltsolin’s room and ordered him to leave Lhasa with them. When Jaltsolin told them that the Dalai Lama had given him a task to do in Lhasa, they left him alone.
Jaltsolin’s account of the Dalai Lama’s confinement by the rebels is confirmed by many others. Lozong Dorje, a clerical official who attended the rebel meeting March 10 in the Scripture Reading Hall at Norbu Lingka at which Tibetan independence was declared, later reported that this same meeting decided that the Dalai Lama “should not be allowed to move beyond the upper and lower halls of Tatun Monastery” and that guards were stationed to enforce this. “From that moment,” said Lozong, “the Dalai Lama lost all freedom of movement.” Similar testimony came from Padma Choinpel, one of the Dalai Lama’s bodyguards.
Documents captured after the rebels were driven from Lhasa, also testify to the situation in the palace. A document entitled: “Opinions of the Big Three Monasteries” dated March 11 and signed by twenty-three people, stated that a meeting held in Norbu Lingka on March 10 under the Grand Secretary of the kasha had declared Tibet’s independence. The Dalai Lama became very angry and declared that no more meetings should be held in Norbu Lingka. “In the humble opinion of the Big Three Monasteries, though the Dalai Lama became angry when the ecclesiastics and laymen prevented his going out, it was in fact for the good of His Holiness. . . . To hold meetings in the Norbu Lingka may beget doubts about the Dalai Lama’s name. . . . It is, however, harmful to move the meetings elsewhere so the meetings can still be held in the original place.” The “Opinions of the Big Three” also declared that “the Dalai Lama should be instructed not to attend any meetings with the Hans. From now on no joint meetings of Tibetans and Hans should be held, such as the Preparatory Committee.” At the same time it was decided to order the “Oracle” that, in doing “heavenly divination,” the “whole history of the race, the religion, the written and spoken language must be bent to the course favorable to an independent state.”
Similar statements are found in another document discovered in rebel headquarters, the “Opinions of Nangma Khanchen Kanchung,” which means all officials of the fourth rank. The Dalai Lama and Panchen Erdeni being the only persons of first rank, the other Living Buddhas the second, and the cabinet ministers the third, this means officials just below the rank of cabinet minister. Here also it was stated that the Dalai Lama “became angry” but whether this was at the rebellion or at the interference with his personal movements and his scripture reading hall, is not clear. In any case, the officials decided that “it is not good to move the meetings elsewhere as they must seem to be under the Dalai Lama’s support.”
It was in this situation that the Dalai Lama, unable to send messages through Jaltsolin, sent three letters to General Tan through Apei, who was still a kaloon, and known to be working with Peking. Apei told me that he himself could not enter Norbu Lingka, “and if I had been able to get in I would never have got out alive,” he said. But lamas and Living Buddhas in the personal service of the Dalai Lama kept in touch with Apei and thus the letters were exchanged between the Dalai Lama and General Tan. The Dalai Lama’s first letter was sent March 11, in reply to the letter which General Tan had sent by Jaltsolin on March 10. Since it was short, I give it in full.
Dear Comrade Political Commissar Tan,
I intended to go to the Military Area Command to see the theatrical performance yesterday but I was unable to do so, due to obstruction by people, ecclesiastical and secular, who were instigated by a few bad elements and who did not know the facts. This has put me to indescribable shame. I am greatly upset and worried and at a loss what to do. When your letter appeared before me, I at once became overjoyed. You do not mind at all.
Reactionary, evil elements are carrying out activities endangering me, under pretext of protecting my safety. I am taking measures to calm things down. In a few days when the situation becomes stable, I will certainly meet you. If you have any internal directives for me, please tell me frankly through this messenger,
Dalai Lama, written by my own hand.
The “messenger” to whom the Dalai Lama referred was Apei, Apei himself told me later that he recognized the Dalai Lama’s handwriting at once. Later the Dalai Lama in his first talk with Nehru confirmed that the letters were written by him.
General Tan, on receiving the Dalai Lama’s letter, sent a reply on the same day, March 11. In it he informed the Dalai Lama that “the reactionaries are now so audacious as to have openly and arrogantly carried out military provocations.” He mentions machine-guns and fortifications set up by the rebels “commanding the highway of national defense,” a highway linking Lhasa with the rest of China. He reports that he has sent letters to all the kaloons about this, holding them responsible unless the fortifications “which endanger national security” are at once removed. He asks for the Dalai Lama’s views on this and ends: “Salutations and best regards, Tan Kuan-san.”
To this the Dalai Lama replied with his second letter, dated the following day, March 12. He declared:
The unlawful actions of the reactionary clique break my heart. Yesterday I told the kasha to order the immediate dissolution of the illegal “people’s conference” and the immediate withdrawal of the reactionaries who arrogantly moved into the Norbu Lingka under pretext of protecting my safety and have seriously estranged the relations between the Central Government and the local government. I am making every possible effort to deal with them. . . .
The Dalai Lama notes that “a few shots” were fired that morning by men of the Tibetan Army near the Chinghai-Tibet Highway, but that “fortunately no serious disturbance occurred.” He ends: “As to the questions in your letter, I am planning to persuade my subordinates and give them your instructions. Please tell me frankly any instructions you have for me.”
No letters were exchanged on the 13th or 14th. We know from the testimony later given by Jaltsolin, that on the 12th the Dalai was sitting in much distress in a gathering of twenty or more rebels. If this was his attempt to “give instruction,” we know from the “Opinions of the Big Three Monasteries” that he was being firmly disobeyed. On the 14th another meeting was held in the Norbu Lingka of which we have reports from Padma Choinpel, the bodyguard, and from Thubta Tenba, a clerical official of the fourth rank who attended the meeting.
The fullest account was given by Thubta Tenba who, after the suppression of the rebellion, decided to tell what he knew. “On March 14,” he stated, “the kaloons, local government personnel, rebels and representatives of the Big Three Monasteries received orders to go and hear a speech by the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama told them that it was he himself who made the date for March 10 at the performance. He said: ‘You have created disturbance, killed people, caused bloodshed. All this has saddened me.’ He said that the ‘Sikang garrison troops’ (the Khampas) are not necessary. He said, ‘The troops from Sikang fire inside the Norbu Lingka. There is hiss of bullets both in front and behind my living quarters. My life is now in the balance.’”
According to Thubta Tenba, the Dalai Lama raised at this meeting the question of going to India and said that he did not want to go. His words, as reported, were: “Some people think I had better go to India. At one time I went to Yatung. I also went to India year before last. It is impossible for me to live there. All I wish is to live in my own land and enjoy the effect of the cause.”
General Tan wrote again to the Dalai Lama on March 15, stating that “the traitorous activities . . . have grown into intolerable proportions.” He notes the Dalai Lama’s statement that he was trying to handle the situation and says: “We welcome this correct attitude on your part.” He adds a significant warning and an equally significant invitation:
We are very much concerned about your present position and safety. If you think it necessary and possible to extricate yourself from the present dangerous position of being abducted by the traitors, we cordially welcome you and your entourage to come and stay for a brief period in the Military Area Command. We are willing to assume full responsibility for your safety. As to what is the best course to follow, it is entirely for you to decide.
General Tan then conveys the information that the National People’s Congress has decided to hold its session on April 17. He ends: “Salutations and best regards, Tan Kuan-san.”
This was an invitation to break with the rebels decisively. The escape might have been difficult. In any event, the Dalai Lama did not try. He replied to General Tan on the 16, expressing thanks for the general’s concern for his safety. He then gave his interpretation of the meeting in the palace on the 14th and his future hopes.
I made a speech to more than seventy representatives of the government officials, instructing them from various angles, calling on them to consider both present and long term interests and to calm down or my life would be in danger. After these reproaches, the condition took a slight turn for the better. Though conditions in here and outside are still difficult to deal with, I am trying skilfully to make a demarkation line between the progressive people and those opposing the revolution within the government officials. A few days from now when there are enough forces that I can trust, I shall make my way secretly to the Military Area Command. When that time comes, I shall first send you a letter. I request you to adopt reliable measures. What are your views? Please write me often,
Dalai, March sixteenth.
This was the last communication received from the Dalai Lama in Lhasa. On the following day, March 17, he left Lhasa in the evening, in company with the rebel leaders. Two persons later reported that final period as it appeared, not to the Dalai Lama but to his mother. The first was one of the Dalai Lama’s messengers, who told of the mother’s distress when people asked how to deal with the rebels’ demands for food and fodder and how she replied: “Give whatever they ask. The Dalai has no power now. It is lucky if they leave us our lives.” The second report is from a servant of the Dalai Lama’s younger brother, who states that just before the Dalai Lama left, his mother was very pale and said to this servant: “There will be war now in Lhasa. I am afraid of gun-fire. The Dalai has no more freedom of movement. If we don’t come back, you can return to Daipung Monastery.”
Such are the reports of the last days of the Dalai Lama in Lhasa. A month later, when the Dalai Lama entered India, he stated that he came of his own free will. It was also stated that he had not expected to leave until the afternoon of the 17th, but that two or three shells were fired that afternoon towards Norbu Lingka which fell into a pond.
There is testimony from scores of people in Lhasa that no shells whatever were fired by the People’s Liberation Army until March 20. Several people who were in Lhasa throughout that week told me that while random rifle shots from rebels occurred often in all directions, they heard no loud sounds of any kind that afternoon from the direction of Norbu Lingka. No direct evidence thus exists as to what actual or imagined noises or other pressure, induced the Dalai Lama’s departure. It is known, however, that his departure on the 17th was predicted in India on March 2 in an article in the Statesman and this was the day when he actually left. The coincidence hardly seems to be by chance.
From the evidence of the Dalai Lama’s letters and the testimony of his helpers, one may deduce that the Dalai Lama was in considerable distress in that last week in Lhasa and showed anger. Whether he was angry at the rebellion or only at personal inconveniences from the unruly acts of his followers, especially of the Khampas, is not clear. It appears also that the rebels saw in the Dalai Lama an important tool for their plans, which must be preserved. But little veneration seemed shown for his wishes and his words. Was he “in duress,” or was he a conscious participant, even a leader, in rebellion? It is possible that he was both.
In India the environment of the top Tibetan rebels remained around the Dalai, supplemented now by new influences, by Nehru, by the group Peking calls “Indian expansionists,” by the Dalai’s own elder brothers, one of whom lives in New York, and is assumed, from his words and deeds, to be acting under Washington, another of whom lived in Taiwan until he came to India, and is assumed to have been employed by the Kuomintang. It is among these new surroundings that the Dalai Lama gave his press conference on June 20, and handed out a long statement, which, though he refused to discuss its details and though it was doubtless prepared, in whole or in part, by advisers, must, since given out in his presence, be taken as his own.
The Dalai Lama declares that prior to 1950 Tibet was “virtually independent,” with “all rights of sovereignty both internal and external,” that the entrance of Chinese troops in 1950 was therefore “a flagrant act of aggression”; that the 1951 Agreement was between “two independent and sovereign states,” and his government had not willingly accepted it but had signed “at the point of the bayonet”; that the Chinese, who imposed it, had themselves violated all of its terms; had “undermined the Dalai Lama’s authority,” and “sown dissension among his people,” and “plundered the property of individuals and monasteries.”
After this sweeping accusation, the Dalai Lama demands “investigation by an international commission,” says he will never return to Tibet until he gets “the rights and powers” which Tibet had “prior to 1950.” He states that he will not deal directly with Peking, since he does not trust Peking to keep its word, but will only deal through a third power, presumably India. He demands not only independence for the present Tibet but for “Greater Tibet including the provinces of Amdo and Khan.”
I looked on maps for Amdo and Khan and could not find them till I came to a map of a previous century and even there the borders weren’t precise. They clearly included large chunks of present-day Szechwan, Yunnan, Kansu, the already abolished Sikang and nearly all of Chinghai, perhaps even the Tsaidam Basin where China’s greatest oil strike lies. Tibetans indeed live in all these provinces, to a total of 1,600,000, which is more than those living in Tibet. But in these other provinces live many more millions of other nationalities, both Hans and Mongols and Huis and still others, who through seven centuries have settled these areas and developed them since the days of Kublai Khan.
The Chinese made no direct reply to the June 20 statement; they had said earlier, at the time of the so-called Tezpur statement, all that they apparently cared to say. The Peking papers had found in their morgues the statements made by the Dalai Lama in the past eight years on anniversaries of the 1951 Agreement, or on the National Day of China, in articles and speeches. They published these side by side with the statement from Tezpur. This was one of the reasons they called it a forgery. Certainly the statements did not sound as if from the same man. I have here no room for a tenth of the quotations, but I shall give a part.
Where the Dalai Lama now claims a former “independent sovereignty” for Tibet, he wrote less than a year earlier, for October 1, 1958: “The Tibetan nationality living in Tibet is one of nationalities in China which have a long history. The Tibetan people have enjoyed ample rights of freedom and equality.” On March 9, 1955, he told the State Council: “The Tibetan nationality is one of the five nationalities of the motherland. . . . These ties go back a thousand years.”
Where now he claims that the 1951 Agreement was “imposed at the point of the bayonet” and “at once violated by the Chinese themselves,” he wired to Mao Tse-tung in October 1951 that it was “concluded on a friendly basis,” and that “the Tibetan local government and the monks and people are giving it unanimous support.” Year after year he praised the Agreement on its anniversary in words like these, sent in 1954 by wire to Mao Tse-tung: “In the past three years the units of the People’s Liberation Army . . . have correctly carried out the policies of equality of nationalities and freedom of religious belief.” Or these, in his message to the army on the same date: “The army units in Tibet have respected religious practise, customs and habits with total fidelity,” that “in the three years the People’s Liberation Army has never done anything that runs counter to the will of the Tibetan people, ecclesiastical and secular,” that “the Tibetan people ardently love the armed forces.” Statements like these have appeared from the Dalai Lama year after year and many times a year. Now he issues in India a statement that completely contradicts all of them.
I discussed with a Peking friend the world press comment that “the Dalai Lama has slammed the door of return.” He agreed that the Dalai Lama’s return seemed increasingly unlikely, but not yet entirely impossible, since the Dalai had not yet, he said, taken the final step.
The Chinese are slow in coming to final judgments. I have heard many comments about the Dalai Lama in the past three months in Peking. Some have said: “He is a willing puppet of the most reactionary serf-owners.” Others: “He has done some good actions. Before he was yet of age, he broke with his pro-British regent and sent Apei to Peking.” I have heard diverse views of those last letters to General Tan, whether they were honest outpourings of a youth who thought he could handle the forces of which he was a puppet, or whether they were written in consultation with the rebels to deceive General Tan. . . . But now for a month nobody discusses the Dalai Lama. They discuss the reports of the Panchen Erdeni and Apei and the progress of reform in Tibet. And all they say of the Dalai is: “Do the Tibetans really want him?” or: “With every lying attack and every contradiction, he becomes to the Tibetans less of a god.”
One of China’s top lamas, who fully supported Peking’s order dissolving Tibet’s local government, was asked: “What then do you think of the Dalai Lama?”
He replied without hesitation: “I think both the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Erdeni very holy. But they are holy only as long as they serve the people.”
Because of the wide belief abroad that Peking’s army tried desperately to stop him and hold him in Lhasa, I asked Apei directly: “Did you make any attempt to keep the Dalai Lama in Lhasa or to keep him from reaching India?” Apei, as Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the People’s Liberation Army forces in Tibet and as the man who carried the Dalai Lama’s last letters, is in a position to know.
“None,” Apei replied flatly. “We knew that the rebels planned to kidnap him though we did not know the date. We knew on the morning of the 18th by the conditions around Norbu Lingka, that he had gone. We could have stopped it. There are only five roads out of Lhasa and on four of them we had guards automatically, on one to guard a bridge, on two to guard power-plants and on the fourth a barracks. It would have been simple to send orders to the guards on four roads and put a patrol on the fifth. But we could not have stopped the rebels with the Dalai Lama without armed clash, and this might have endangered the Dalai Lama. We made no such attempt.”
I did not ask Apei who made that decision. It could only have come from Peking.
Tibet and its 1,200,000 people on the roof of the world are now the story: I recall what I was told on good authority, but I give it without guarantee. When the Dalai Lama was in Yatung in 1950, and his ministers were discussing, together with agents of many foreign countries, whether he should return to Lhasa or go to India to launch a holy war, it was said to have been the British, long experienced in such matters, who advised that he stay in Tibet, when the Americans were prepared to finance and equip him in war. And one of the reasons the British gave was this: “The Dalai Lama is like a snow man that melts when the snow goes. In Lhasa he has power but outside Tibet he will melt.” I personally think the British said it, it is like their cold shrewdness. Whether they did or not, it is true.