Independent Tibet – The Facts

Tibetan postage stamps and envelope with New Jersey address

Spencer Chapman, visiting Lhasa in 1936, declared that, “the postal and telegraph system is most efficient.” [63] The same system continued for some years after 1950. The Czech filmmaker Vladimir Cis (working for the Chinese Communist government) had a letter from his family in Prague delivered to him in the wilderness of Tibet by a postal-runner in 1954. [64]

A telegraph line from India to Lhasa was completed in 1923, along with a basic telephone service. Both were open for public use. The event was commemorated in a publication of the Royal Geographical Society, London. [65]

The Tibetan capital was electrified in 1927. The work of installing both the hydroelectric plant and the distribution system was undertaken near “single-handedly” [66] by a young Tibetan engineer, Ringang. All these projects were initiated and paid for by the Tibetan government.

Radio Lhasa was launched in 1948 and broadcasted news in Tibetan, English and Chinese. [67]

WITNESSES TO INDEPENDENT TIBET

The fact that Tibet was a peaceful, independent country is attested to by the writings of many impartial western observers who not only visited pre-invasion Tibet, but even lived there for considerable periods of time – as the titles of some of their memoirs seem to proudly proclaim: Twenty Years in Tibet by David McDonald [68], Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer [69], and even Eight Years in Tibet, the biography of Peter Aufschnieter. [70]

Richardson at a Lhasa garden party

The premier scholar on Tibet, Hugh Richardson, lived for nine years in Tibet, and his many writings [71] reveal a country that was functioning, orderly, peaceful and with a long history of political independence and cultural achievement. He later wrote, “The British government, the only government among Western countries to have had treaty relations with Tibet, sold the Tibetans down the river…” Richardson also acknowledged that he was “profoundly ashamed” [72] at the British government’s refusal to recognize Tibet ’s historically independent status.”

Sir Charles Bell

Another great scholar and diplomat, Charles Bell, regarded as the “architect of Britain ’s Tibet policy,” was convinced that Britain and America ’s refusal to recognize Tibetan independence (but which they sometimes tacitly acknowledged when it was to their advantage) was largely dictated by their desire “to increase their commercial profits in China.” [73]

It is almost certain that none of the official propagandists who demonize Tibet in Chinese publications had witnessed life in old Tibet. In fact, none of Beijing ’s Tibet propagandists in the West (Michael Parenti, Tom Grunfeld, Barry Sautman, Melvin Goldstein et al) [74] had visited Tibet before 1980. The first two misrepresent old Tibet by selectively quoting English journalists and officials (L. A. Waddell, Percival Landon, Edmund Candler, Captain W.F.T. O’Connor) who accompanied the British invasion force of 1904, and who sought to justify that violent imperialist venture into Tibet by demonizing Tibetan society and government.

Dr. Shen with Tibetan Foreign Secretary, Surkhang Dzasa

The only high-ranking Chinese official with scholarly credentials who spent any length of time in old Tibet was Dr. Shen Tsung-lien, representative of the Republic of China in Lhasa (1944-1949). In his book Tibet and the Tibetans, Dr. Shen writes of a nation clearly distinct from China, and one that “…had enjoyed full independence since 1911.” He writes truthfully of a hierarchical, conservative society “fossilized many centuries back” but whose people were orderly, peaceable and hospitable – but also “notorious litigants,” adding that “few peoples in the world are such eloquent pleaders.” Shen also mentions “Appeals may be addressed to any office to which the disputants belong, or even to the Dalai Lama or his regent.” [75]

Jamyang Norbu

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[1] In 1642, the Fifth Dalai Lama issued the Rilung Tsatsik (ri klung rtsa tshig) generally translated as the Mountain Valley Edict. Another source describes it as a Decree for the Protection of Animals and the Environment. Since then, this edict was re-issued annually till 1958. Following the New Year Festivities, copies of the edict were distributed nationwide, and were displayed and read out to the assembled public by district officials. In order that its message suitably awe and instruct the document itself was physically impressive: about 3 feet wide and 6 or 7 feet in length, richly decorated with auspicious symbols and artwork around the border, and with the seal of the Dalai Lama at the bottom. French, Rebecca Redwood. The Golden Yoke, p 208, 209 & 213.

[2] According to the scholar, Tashi Tsering (director of the Amnye Machen Institute) there are references to “ Mountain Valley ” edicts being issued during the Rimpung dynasty and the Tsangpa kings.

[3] Bell, Charles. Tibet Past and Present. London: Oxford University Press, 1924. See index: “Capital punishment abolished in Tibet, 142, 143, 236.”

Byron, Robert. First Russia then Tibet. London: Macmillan & Co., 1933. pg 204: “Capital punishment was now abolished.”

McGovern, William. To Lhasa in Disguise. New York: Century Co., 1924. pg 388- 389.

Kingdon-Ward, Frank. In the Land of The Blue Poppies. New York: Modern Library, 2003. pg 22.

Winnington, Alan. Tibet : The Record of a Journey. London: Lawrence & Wishart Ltd., 1957. pg 99.