Tibet: An Outline History

Tibet’s earliest origins are shrouded in vivid myth; according to legend the Tibetan people are the descendants of an unlikely union between a monkey and a female demon. Less fancifully, it is considered that their progenitors may be the Qiang people mentioned in Chinese records around 200BC. It is not until the 7th century however, that Tibetans appear as a distinct ethnicity and their recorded history begins. At this time their image in the region was that of the Huns in Europe.

In 607 the 31st king of the Yarlung Empire conquered many of the surrounding small princedoms, raised an army of 100,000 and became a force to be reckoned with. His son Songtsen Gampo (620-49) extended the Tibetan empire to the frontiers of northern India, established diplomatic relations with the Tang court by marrying a Chinese princess and introduced the Tibetan script. He also allied himself with the cause of Buddhism, broaching for the first time the concept of a temporal king whose authority was divinely sanctioned. Following his death, relations with China deteriorated to the point where the Tibetan army sacked the Chinese capital, Chang’an in 763.

Religious leaders were wary of the usurpation of the divine mantle by worldly leaders and 9th century struggles over succession to the throne once again divided Tibet. Although political authority languished, Buddhism flourished. Missionaries arrived from India, monasteries were founded and Tibetan lamas allied themselves with local nobility to create a viable political-religious power complex. Religious power was so strong that when the Mongols stormed the region in 1240, their leader declared himself ‘patron’ of the lama at Sakya, assuming effective political control of Tibet, but claiming to be beholden to the lama’s spiritual authority. During the Yuan dynasty the Sakya lamas ruled the whole of Tibet as puppets of the Mongol emperor. When the Ming dynasty overthrew Mongol rule in 1368 a now united Tibet regained its independence and the development of Buddhism redoubled its pace as, under the influence of India and Nepal, monasteries, stupas and the beginnings of Tibetan Buddhist art appeared across the land.

In the early 15th century a saintly scholar known as Tsongkhapa, disillusioned by the infighting and mysticism that characterized the Sakyas, founded a new sect, the Gelukpa, which emphasized scholarly philosophy and monastic discipline. The Gelukpa posed a real threat to the established authorities as, after Tsongkhapa’s death, its popularity grew and the still-powerful Mongol leaders recognized the head of the Gelukpa, the Dalai Lama, as the ultimate spiritual head of Tibetan Buddhism. With the assistance of Mongol troops the Gelukpa and the Dalai Lama assumed the religious supremacy they retain to this day.

In the 18th century a series of succession disputes led the Dzungar Mongols from northern Xinjiang to invade. In 1717 the Qing, loathe to see any increase in Mongol power, invaded to evict the Mongols. Welcomed by the Tibetans, the Chinese established a small garrison, which remained for the next 200 years representing loose Chinese ‘suzerainty’. Tibetans were left to deal with their internal affairs, but China occasionally stepped in to stop civil unrest and to repel a Gurkha invasion from Nepal.

As the strength of the Qing waned and that of the British in India grew, sparks began to fly. Tibet, like China, was closed to western trade. In 1903 Francis Younghusband led an expedition (invasion), routing the Tibetan army, demanding indemnities and causing the 13th Dalai Lama to flee to Mongolia. The British then backtracked, acknowledging Chinese sovereignty. Emboldened by this declaration and looking desperately for a victory that would grant them some legitimacy at home, the dying Qing dynasty brutally ‘pacified’ Tibetan areas in Sichuan and Qinghai, sending the 13th Dalai Lama once more into exile, this time to India.

In 1911, following the Chinese Revolution ending Qing rule, the Tibetans declared complete independence and expelled all Chinese residents. Over the next 40 years, whilst China was embroiled in internal turmoil and the West was busy with its world wars, Tibet enjoyed complete sovereignty, but not internal harmony. The Panchen Lama refused to pay taxes to Lhasa and fled to China, a conservative aristocracy rejected attempts at reform and modernization and the country remained a pious, but impoverished theocracy.

Following WWII Chiang Kai-Shek declared Tibet a province of Nationalist China. The victorious allied powers did not protest. After the Communist victory the PLA routed a small, poorly equipped Tibetan army. The 14th Dalai Lama’s appeal to the United Nations was rebuffed. Tibet was forced to sign a treaty granting Tibet cultural and religious autonomy, but acknowledging Chinese control over international and military affairs. While the CCP largely ignored Tibet proper it went about the business of collectivizing west Sichuan and Qinghai. Tibetans in these regions chafed against economic reforms and rebelled in the mid 50s. The rebellion was quickly squashed by the PLA, but the rebels retreated to Lhasa and continued a guerilla war in southern Tibet, covertly supplied by a CIA eager to strike a blow at their communist foes. In 1959 a gathering of Sichuan Tibetans near the Norbulinka turned into a mass rebellion resulting in the Dalai Lama’s flight into India and brutal reprisals by the PLA.

The CCP responded by declaring martial law, and set out to rule the region with an iron fist. It liquidated the traditional ruling classes, replacing them with Beijing appointed officials and communist Tibetans. From 1959 Tibet was subject to the same turbulent economic reforms and political movements as the rest of China. After the rise of Deng Xiaoping in 1979 officials acknowledged past mistakes in Tibet. Monasteries were rebuilt, religious practice permitted provided it stayed out of politics and the economy stabilized. Liberalizations in the 1980s led Tibetans to clamor for even greater political freedom, culminating in mass demonstrations in Lhasa in the late 80s and into the 90s, which were harshly suppressed.