Tibet

Well well well even the most hard working researchers do not see the whole view at once. I have an article written by Michael Parenti. It looks as if it is well reserched but I will have to look into it. I did not really know about Tibetan life style and the history of it. Now I got this Article. Hmmmm...I am not quite sure that I shall hate the Chinese for Tibet. But what I found about this article is that most of the reseached articles by Michael Parenti are anti CIA and US. So I have to go deeper to find out about the Tibetan issue.

"In 1995, the News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina, carried a frontpage color photograph of the Dalai Lama being embraced by the reactionary Republican senator Jesse Helms, under the headline “Buddhist Captivates Hero of Religious Right.”45 In April 1999, along with Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul II, and the first George Bush, the Dalai Lama called upon the British government to release Augusto Pinochet, the former fascist dictator of Chile and a longtime CIA client who was visiting England. The Dalai Lama urged that Pinochet not be forced to go to Spain where he was wanted to stand trial for crimes against humanity."

You live and learn. Dalai Lama CIA asset?

"Since the first Dalai Lama appeared, his successors have been the effective leaders of one of the five religious schools of Tibet, the Gelug.1 Starting in 1642, the Dalai Lamas were also the political rulers of the central provinces of the huge area now called Tibet. This gave the Dalai Lamas a mix of religious and political authority that has been difficult for historians to sort out. Were the Dalai Lamas the recognized religious leaders of Tibet? And is the current Dalai Lama the religious leader of all Tibetans today? His supporters say yes. But many Tibetans disagree. They hold that the four religious schools outside of the Dalai Lama’s own Gelug governed themselves autonomously back in Tibet—and that they continue to run their own affairs today, without reference to the authority of the Dalai Lama."

Reincarnating Lamas

Basically we know that untill 1911 the Tibet was under Chinese patronage. But after the Chinese revolution in 1911, the British in India used Tibet as a buffer zone against Cina and Russia. Soon after Mao's peasant armies took power in Beijing in 1949, the Chinese army seized Tibet and in 1951 it was formally incorporated into China.

This is the Sino-Tibetan Agreement, Agreement on Measures for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet, [17-Point Agreement of May 23, 1951

(1) The Tibetan people shall unite and drive out imperialist aggressive forces from Tibet; the Tibetan people shall return to the big family of the Motherlans- the People's Republic of China.

(2) The local governemtn of Tibet shall actively assist the PLA to enter Tibet and consolidate the national defences.

(3) In accoradnce with the policy towards nationalities laid own in the Common Programme of the CPPCC, the Tibetan people have the right of exercising national regional autonomy under the unified leadership of the CPG.

(4) The central authorities will not alter the exisiting political system in Tibet. The central authorities also will not alter the established status, functions and powers of the Dalai Lama. Officials of various ranks shall hold office as usual.

(5) The established status, functions and powers of the Panchen Ngoerhtehni shall be maintained.

(6) By the established status, functions and powers of the Dalai Lama and of the Panchen Ngoerhtehni are meant the status, functions and powers of the thirteenth Dalai Lama and of the ninth Panchen Ngoerhtehni when they were in friendly and amicable relations with each other. The policy of freedom and religious belief laid down in the Common Programme of the CPPCC shall be carried out. The religious beliefs, customs and habits of the Tibetan people shall be respected and lama monasteries shall be protected. The central authorities will not effect a change in the income of the monasteries.

(8) Tibetan troops shall be reorganized step by step into the PLA and become a part of the national defence forces of the CPR.

(9) The spoken and written language and school education of the Tibetan nationality shall be developed step by step in accordance with the actual conditions in Tibet.

(10) Tibetan agriculture, livestock-raising, industry and commerce shall be developed step by step and the people's livelihood shall be improved step by step in accordance with the actual conditions in Tibet.

(11) In matters related to various reforms in Tibet, the will be no compulsion on the part of the central authorities. the local government of Tibet should carry out reforms of its own accord, and, when the people raise demands for reform, they shall be settled by means of consultation with the leading personnel of Tibet.

(12) In so far as former pro-imperialist and pro-Kuomintang officials resolutely sever relations with imperialism and the Kuomintang do not engage in sabotage or resistance, they may continue to hold office irrespective of their past.

(13) The PLA entering Tibet shall abide by all the above-mentioned policies and shall also be fair in all buying and selling and shall not arbitrarily take a needle or thread from the people.

(14) The CPG shall have centralized handling of all external affairs of the area of Tibet; and there will be peaceful co-existence with neighbouring countries and establishment and development of fair commercial and trading relations with them on the basis of equality, mutual benefit and mutual respect for territory and sovereignty.

(15) In order to ensure the implementation of this agreement, the CPG shall set up a Military and Administrative Committee and a Military Area HQ in Tibet and- apart from the personnel sent there by the CPG- shall absorb as manylocal Tibetan personnel as possible to take part in the work. Local personnel taking part in the Military and Administrative Committee may include patriotic elements from the local government of Tibet, various district and various principal monasteries; the name-list shall be set forth after consultation between the representatives designated by the CPG and various quarters concerned and shall be submitted to the CPG for appointment.

(16) Funds needed by the Military and Administrative Committee, the Military Area HQ and the PLA entering Tibet shall be provided by the CPG. The local government of Tibet should assist the PLA in the purchase and transport of food, fodder and other daily necessities.

(17) This agreement shall come into force immediately after signature and seals are affixed to it.

Signed and sealed by delegates of the CPG with full powers:

Chief Delegate- Li Wei-Han (Chairman of the Commission of Nationalities Affairs)
Delegates- Chang Ching-wu, Chang Kuo-hua, Sun Chih-yuan

Delegates with full powers of the local government of Tibet:
Chief Delegate- Kaloon Ngabou Ngawang Jigme (Ngabo Shape)
Delegates- Dazasak Khemey Soanm Wangdi, Khentrung Thupten Tenthar, Kenchung Thupten Lekmuun, Rimshi Samposey Tenzin Thundup.

Peking, 23rd May, 1951.


But Chinese did not understand the Tibetan way of life and had lots of problems in Tibet; and the West used it to create more problems for Chinese in the World forum. After the Chinese take over in 1950 the CIA trained guarillas to sabotage the Chinese rule. Now the CIA exploits are leaking out as the former employees of CIA started boasting about the work they carried out as far back as 1956. While the Dalai Lama, keen to preserve his image as a man of peace, claims not to have been directly involved, his elder brother Gyalo Thondup was at the centre of the operations. According to the magazine's report: “Gyalo Thondup now says he didn't inform his exalted sibling about all of his intelligence connections at the time: ‘This was a very dirty business'.”

The Newsweek article explained: “Beginning in 1958, American operatives trained about 300 Tibetans at Camp Hale in Colorado. The trainees were schooled in spy photography and sabotage, Morse Code and minelaying. Between 1957 and 1960, the CIA dropped more than 400 tonnes of cargo to the resistance. Yet nine out 10 guerrillas who fought in Tibet were killed by the Chinese or committed suicide to evade capture, according to an article by aerospace historian William Leary in the Smithsonian's Air & Space Magazine.”

In 1959 Dalai Lama fled Tibet with the aid of CIA snd started a government-in-exile in Napal. “By the mid-60s,” Newsweek explained, “the Tibet operation was costing Washington $1.7 million a year, according to intelligence documents. That included $500,000 subsidy to support 2,100 guerrillas based in Nepal and $180,000 worth of ‘subsidy to the Dalai Lama'.”

US made up with the Chinese after China is allowed to take a seat in UN in 1971. 1972 US President Nixon visits China. US cuts down financing Dali Lama's exiled government and the funds dry up. The Newsweek article quoted the rather bitter remarks of the Dalai Lama: “They [the CIA] gave the impression that once I arrived in India, great support would come from the United States. It's a sad, sad story... The US help was very, very limited.” By 1974, the Dalai Lama was forced to publicly call for an end to armed resistance in Tibet.

Even though the US seems to have stopped the support for Free Tibet movement; right wing people in both parties still have connections and funding. Tibet and Taiwan is the hobbyhorse of these people who are using them for their own ends.

At the same time we should not forget that prior to 1950 the Tibet was ruled by a theocracy rooted in the backward semi-feudal practices of the past. Things were hard for the majority of the Tibetan population, except the rich Lamas including Dalai.

"For instance, Mary Craig in her book Tears of Blood—A Cry for Tibet, with a foreword by the Dalai Lama, provides the following grim picture: “In this strange theocracy administered from Lhasa, all land belonged to the state. Much of this had been granted in the form of hereditary manorial estates to aristocratic families or important monasteries. The government retained a few holdings for its own use, but most of the remaining arable land was leased in strips to small-holding peasants.

“It was a mediaeval feudal society and whether he worked on government property, the monastic estates or on the lands held by the two hundred or so great aristocratic families, the Tibetan peasant was undeniably owned by his master. He had to render a certain amount of compulsory labour in exchange for his own bit of land; and give up the greater portion of his crops to his landlord, keeping the barest minimum necessity for himself and his family. The landlord not only had the right to exact whatever rents he wished, but could also impose cruel punishments for failure to conform. Capital punishment and limb amputation were quite common in some regions.”

Having painted this picture, Craig in the next breath tells us: “Life for the ordinary Tibetan was harsh, but it was not the unmitigated hell claimed by Chinese propaganda... Generally speaking, the Tibetans were not aware of being downtrodden or exploited, and their enormous zest for life was undimmed by desire for a freedom they had never known... Despite the yawning divide in terms of money and material possessions, there was so little resentment of the rich by the poor that in all Tibet's history there had seldom been a popular uprising.”

They had food, shelter and clothes—what more could they want? At any rate, they didn't rebel so they must have been content. All of this reeks of the same appalling indifference and contempt towards the plight of the oppressed as was exhibited by the high lamas themselves and could no doubt be found—with the appropriate changes—among the justifications trotted out by the apologists of, for example, the British Raj in India or Czarist Russia."

There are three main characters in Tibetan system of rule Dalai Lama, Panchen Lama, and Karmapa Lama. They are all Tulkus. Tulku is a Tibetan Buddhist Lama who keeps on been reborn to take the place of the one who died. According to the Tibetan custum the Tulku inherits the wealth of the dead lama. But he is from a different family but of the same school of Buddhism.

The first recognized tulku of this kind within the Vajrayana traditions was the Karmapa, the head of the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism; precisely, the first to be recognized as a re-manifestation was the second Karmapa, Karma Pakshi (1024-1283) first Karmapa was Düsum Khyenpa (1110-1193). The Karmapa is now in his 17th incarnation. The wealth of this school is immense.

“If the boy-lama was sent to secure the spiritually vital Black Crown and be installed at Kagyu's Rumtek headquarters, his presence in India could aid Chinese designs both on Sikkim and the Tibetan exile community. He who controls Rumtek also controls the school's $1.2 billion worldwide wealth and commands influence over many Buddhists living in the strategically sensitive Indian Himalayan arc from Arunchal Pradesh to Ladakh. What undergirds India's concerns is the fact that China on its maps still shows Arunchal Pradesh as its territory, Sikkim as independent, and Jammu and Kashmir (other than the parts it occupies) as disputed.”

Blimey that is lots of loot init. No wonder all these super powers want a peice of action on it. See the little kingdoms involved. Now I can understand a bit of the conspiracies involved by the various powers.

Present Dali Lama in the Gelugpa (Dge-lugs-pa) School of Tibetan Buddhism (the school which controlled Tibet from the 16th century until the Communist takeover) was already there in 1950. We all know of him. He is the incarnation of Gendun Drup (1391 – 1474), who was not known as Dalai Lama, First who become known as Dalai Lama was actually the third incarnation Sonam Gyatso, until he was dubbed "Dalai Lama" as an adult, after which he applied the title posthumously to his predecessors and declared himself the 3rd Dalai Lama. It was Lobsang Gyatso (1617–1682), the 5th Dalai Lama, who established the Dalai Lamas as Tibet's predominant political power. After that the Dalai Lama ruled the country and was powerful enough to stop the reincarnation of Shamarpa (red hat) who was the second in command to Karmapa in 1792. This ban remained in place until 1952 when DL lost power. Well the Karma Kagyu school has said they kept on finding Shamarpa reincarnations secretly all these years. Man this is getting complicated init. So many bloody high class lamas. So in 1981 the senior regent Shamarpa Kunzig Shamar Rinpoche fell out with DL and the rest of the regents who were to select the next Karmapa Lama.

"According to an article in the New York Times, “On August 2, 1993, a second brawl broke out, far worse than the first. Versions of what occurred are as different as inner peace and outer space. What is certain is that the split within the monastery's walls had become irreparable. Dozens of monks slept in the woods that night—or in a hospital or in jail.” Monks loyal to the Dalai Lama continue to control the valuable monastery"

Conduct unbecoming of a senior monk of Buddhism. It is all to do with money. Buddha never had any. So why?

So without Shamar, Ogyen Trinley Dorje has been recognized by Situ Rinpoche and Gyaltsab Rinpoche. In July 1992, both asked the Office of the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala to confirm their recognition. The 14th Dalai Lama confirmed the recognition of Ogyen Trinley Dorje. The head of the Sakya school, H.H. Sakya Trizin and the head of the Nyingma school at that time, H.H. Mindroling Trichen Rinpoche also recognised Ogyen Trinley Dorje as the reincarnation of the 16th Karmapa and composed long-life prayers for him.[3] The government of the People's Republic of China has also accepted him.

But The first born Karmapa, Trinley Thaye Dorje, has been recognized by H.H. Shamar Rinpoche - the senior Kagyu official below the Karmapas themselves.

On top of all these happenings, Dawa Sangpo Dorje, who was born in Mangan in north Sikkim in 1977 (before the death of the 16th Karmapa) and subsequently resided in Damthang in South Sikkim. As recently as December 2003 he requested the opportunity to prove his "supernatural power" to the Dalai Lama.

So now we have three Karmapas residing and doing religious rituals. But the all the moneys involved is cotrolled by a fund Karmapa Charitable Trust.

The Panchen Lama was appointed by 5th DL to honour his Tutor Lobsang Chökyi Gyalsten head of Tashilhunpo Monastery and exclusively reserved the title Panchen for him,[2] and this title has continued to be given to his successors and, posthumously, to his predecessors starting with Khedrup Je. Panchen means great scholar. There is a problem about who is the Panchen lama? Chinese arrested Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the youngest political prisoner ever recorded, in 1995. Qoigyijabu who has been put there as PL by the Chinese and the Tibetan Government in Exile does not recognize him. Now it is getting a bit more easier to understand all these init. But Chinese are trying to simplify it further by getting rd of all these bullshit and put just numbers on them. Ha ha ha

Check wikipedia for most of the stuff above.

And From: "The flight of the Karmapa Lama from Tibet"





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