Beware of Fantasy

by Charley Reese

Coffee sippers who think it might be a good idea to free Tibet from China are about 58 years too late. China is not going to free Tibet, and Western encouragement of Tibetan resistance will only get people killed needlessly.

Tibet was part of China for centuries. In 1913, when China seemed to be falling apart, the British Empire encouraged Tibet to declare its independence. It did, and that lasted until 1950, when, at the end of the Chinese civil war, China invaded and reclaimed the area. By then, the impotent British Empire was in no position to help anyone even if it had been so inclined. America chose to do nothing.

If you are not willing to make your way to the Tibetan plateau and face Chinese guns and prisons, then you certainly should not sit around some coffee shop and urge Tibetans to do so. Tibet is a strategic area of China, and the Chinese government is not going to give it up or grant it independence or even autonomy. To paraphrase a famous outlaw, it is enough that we know that China will do what it has to do.

As for us, we should do nothing. Tibet is part of China, and what happens there is an internal affair of China. The rest of the world has no right to interfere, and other than bloviating for a while, I seriously doubt that it will. Unfortunately, in this age of global communications even bloviating can cause bad things to happen to people.

Boycotting the Olympics is a foolish idea by a tiny minority of fanatics. The Olympics have nothing to do with Tibet, just as they had nothing to do with the Russian invasion of Afghanistan. Boycotting the games would be a cruel blow to athletes who have been sweating and training for four years. It would accomplish nothing. It would further politicize the games, which should be encouraged to return to their amateur status.

China was awarded the Summer Games in a fair international competition and has spent a lot of money getting ready for them. Any attempt to spoil the games will do a great disservice to the athletes, the Chinese government and the Chinese people. It will do nothing positive and will only harden attitudes and end up making the world even more dangerous than it already is.

Americans in particular should keep in mind that we are currently engaged in mismanaging two occupations of two countries that we illegally invaded. Neither enterprise is going well. Neither is our economy. In short, we have enough on our own plate without trying to steal a bite off of China’s plate. We should make sure that Afghanistan and Iran are the last wheezes of the sick American Empire and shut it down and return to our republic.

I don’t know why some Americans seem to have trouble realizing that the days of the European empires are over. Part of the problem is that we have way too many vocational intellectuals and way too few real intellects. A vocational intellectual is someone who makes a living writing or talking. Such people tend to live inside their heads. Delusions of grandeur and fantasies about the real world are constant occupational hazards for such people.

No country in the world has to do what we tell it to do. Certainly that’s the case with the big powers like China, Russia, Japan and India. As you can see every day in your morning paper, even a little country like Iraq can cause us more trouble than it’s worth. It’s a crime against humanity that our sons and daughters are dying in the desert dust while fat politicians cavort about in Washington. Don’t encourage Tibetans to die in some futile fantasy about independence. They are not independent. They are part of China, and part of China they will stay.

March 29, 2008

Charley Reese [send him mail] has been a journalist for 49 years.

© 2008 by King Features Syndicate, Inc.

Tibet police: Victim list fabricated

(China Daily – Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-04-07 06:52

People whose names were included on a list of riot victims given by the Dalai clique are still alive, an investigation by Lhasa police has found.

The Dalai clique’s “government-in-exile” on March 25 released the “names and details of 40 identified people” alleged to have died in the recent riots. However, the Lhasa police bureau found five of the people are still alive or never existed. The other 35 people, whom the clique merely mentioned the birthplaces or residences of as “Lhasa, Tibet” or “Aba, Sichuan province”, were impossible to locate, the police said.

The Dalai clique announced the death of 31-year-old Lobsang Tsepel in Sera Monastery. However, the police investigation found the monk, 36, was still in the monastery.

The investigation found there were 12 people whose names include Ngodup at Tibet University, and all of them were alive and still working there. The Dalai clique had said a 28-year-old by that name had been killed in the unrest.

Also, Lobsang Doma, of the Garu Nunnery, was age 39 and alive – not 23 and dead, as the Dalai clique had claimed.

There was nobody named Rigzin Choenyi in the Shugseb Nunnery, while the nunnery has two people whose names included only the Rigzin part, and both were alive.

Also, there was nobody named Ngawang Thekchen in Taklung Drak Monastery, the investigation found.

Torch relay

The Tibet autonomous region’s government held a meeting on Saturday to prepare for the Olympic torch relay’s leg across the “roof of the world”.

Tibet’s Party chief Zhang Qingli said at the meeting social order in Lhasa and other parts of Tibet has been restored after the March 14 riots organized by the Dalai clique.

However, Zhang warned grave challenges are still ahead, as the Dalai clique is plotting new sabotage activities.

He urged all relevant departments to spare no efforts in preparing for the relay to guard against any possible incidents.

The Beijing Olympic flame’s global relay officially started from Beijing’s Tian’anmen Square on April 1.

And this year, the Olympic torch would for the first time be taken to the peak of Mount Qomolangma (Everest).

Arrest warrants

A local procuratorate on Saturday issued arrest warrants for 16 people allegedly involved in a March 15 riot in Dagze county, Lhasa.

“The evidence we’ve found has identified these people as suspects in cases of arson and endangering public security,” Dagze procurator Ma Yongqing said. The suspects were all illiterate or semi-literate Deqing town residents and were largely ignorant of the law, Ma said.