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发表于 2008-4-11 05:11
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Tibetan progress since the 1949 revolution
The obstacles of poverty, illiteracy, isolation and deeply superstitious beliefs made it difficult to bring even minimal development to Tibet.
Farmer Nuosang in his newly-built
house. By 2010, new housing will
have been constructed for 80
percent of farmers’ households.
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The Chinese government, which has a long experience in handling the issues confronting national minority peoples in a multi-national state, has also dealt with the problem of chauvinism and racism emanating from the Han population as well as the government.
Members of the Han nationality living or stationed in Tibet exhibited chauvinism in their relations with the Tibetans at times. Ignorant of the Tibetan language, culture and religion—the latter deeply permeated into all facets of life—the cadre had to be intensively trained at the initiative of the Communist Party leadership.
In "The Making of Modern Tibet," A. Tom Grunfeld writes: "They were taught to respect local customs and etiquette, never to defile temples and holy sites, and to never criticize the Dalai Lama or religious practice. They were told not to bring up communism and class struggle. They arrived carrying whatever provisions they could, and paid for everything they purchased. They paid wages to the Tibetans who worked for them and practiced egalitarianism among themselves to set an example." (10)
Although not all statistics compare to those in the more developed areas of China, progress made during the last 50 years has revolutionized life for Tibetans.
Infant mortality has dropped from 430 deaths per 1,000 births, to a range of 6.61 to 24.5 per 1,000 in 2002. Where only 2 percent of school-age children in the 1950s were in school, today the figure is 85.8 percent; however, there is still a need to increase secondary-level educational levels. The region’s 6,348 hospital beds and 8,948 medical personnel exceed China’s national per-capita average. (11)
Before the revolution, the masses had no elections or political life. In 1965, the First People’s Congress of Tibet was held, which led to the founding of the Tibetan Autonomous Region and the Regional People’s Government. There are 70,000 elected representatives on all levels of government in the TAR.
Beijing is intensifying its development programs in Tibet, with substantial investments in housing, medical care, infrastructure and restoration of cultural sites.
The Ninth People’s Congress of the TAR put forth a housing plan for farmers and herders—the backbone of Tibet’s economy—that will build 52,000 housing units in 2008. By 2010, new housing will have been constructed for 80 percent of farmers’ households. (China Radio International, March 22)
In 2006, the annual income of farmers and herders grew 13.1 percent, the fourth double-digit growth in as many years.
Tourism has increased greatly, especially with the construction of two main railroad lines from central China—the world’s highest in elevation. Four million tourists traveled to Tibet in 2007, up 60 percent from 2006, adding substantially to the region’s income.
Tibetan exiles and the CIA
In the late 1950s and 1960s, the CIA trained hundreds of counterrevolutionary exiles in sabotage and terrorism. This took place on bases from Saipan to Virginia, including the main center of Tibetan operations: Camp Hale, in the Colorado Rocky Mountains.
U.S. intelligence documents, which were released in the late 1990s, document the close relationship between the CIA, the Tibetan exile movement and the Dalai Lama personally: "[F]or much of the 1960s, the CIA provided the Tibetan exile movement with $1.7 million a year for operations against China, including an annual subsidy of $180,000 for the Dalai Lama." (12)
Imperialist support for the Tibetan "independence" movement is reminiscent of their support for Cuban counterrevolutionary forces that fled to exile in Miami after the island’s 1959 liberation from U.S. neo-colonial rule.
Soon after Fulgencio Batista’s overthrow, the CIA trained several thousand Cuban reactionaries in bombings, assassination and other terror tactics in the name of "freedom" and "democracy." The terrorist project, codenamed JM WAVE, became the largest operation in the CIA’s history.
Cuban extremist exiles in Miami claim to speak for Cubans who live in Cuba as they work to destroy the social gains that the vast majority of Cubans support. Similarly, the Tibetan reactionary opposition exiled in Dharamsala fights to overturn the social gains of Tibetans living in Tibet. China has made it clear that it will defend its territorial integrity.
Tibetan right-wing groups could not exist without U.S. and European financing or the support of organizations such as Reporters Without Borders and Human Rights Watch. Actor Richard Gere, chair of the International Campaign for Tibet, has given a high profile to the issue.
Today’s Tibetan "independence" movement
In 1989, a U.S.-influenced public campaign to elevate the Dalai Lama as leader of a Tibetan government-in-exile began to accelerate and continues to the present. The Dalai Lama was granted the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. As a prelude to the present unfolding events, George W. Bush awarded him the Congressional Gold Medal in October 2007 despite protests from China.
The Dalai Lama claims to seek dialogue with China for discussions on autonomy, but that would only be the first step toward an eventual breaking away from China.
Tibetan counterrevolutionary forces lay claim not only to the 470,000-square-mile territory of the TAR, but also to much of four surrounding provinces that would triple the TAR’s political territory to 1.5 million square miles.
There are new formations in the Tibetan right-wing opposition movement, such as the Tibetan Youth Congress. These younger activists demand immediate separation from China, while the Dalai Lama claims to be only for autonomy. These are only minor tactical differences in what amounts to an internationally financed and coordinated counterrevolutionary campaign.
The method of operation, financing and putsch-style mobilizations are very similar to other U.S. plots targeting governments for overthrow.
The recent riots in Tibet, reminiscent of the "color revolutions" that took place in former socialist states like Yugoslavia (2000), Georgia (2003 Rose Revolution), Ukraine (2004 Revolution) and Kyrgyzstan (2005 Tulip Revolution), bear the markings of a CIA-directed offensive.
Attacks on 17 Chinese embassies and consulates—as well as on the Olympics ceremonies in Greece—is more evidence of a high level of central coordination and planning.
Tibetan "self-determination" under the present circumstances
In the current epoch, it is not possible to speak of independence in an abstract sense. Since the triumph of the first socialist revolution in Russia in 1917 and the subsequent development of a socialist camp—including China—imperialist influence has not permitted any state or nationality to remain neutral.
Every national struggle today contains within itself a class struggle. Tibet is not simply a nationality united by religion, culture and history. There are two classes deep in struggle.
One of these classes is the former ruling landlord class, which never gave up its dream to reconquer its privilege. It is backed by U.S. imperialism, whose ultimate objective is breaking up China.
The other is the vast majority of Tibetans, who—despite the shortcomings and mistakes of the central government—have greatly benefited from the Chinese Revolution, which ended feudalism not only for Tibetans but for all of China’s peoples.
If the Tibetan separatists succeed, Tibet will become a vassal state under the control of the United States. Washington will have dealt a major blow to China and taken one more step toward the full overturn of the Chinese Revolution. For Tibet, this would not be "independence" at all, but a return to feudal and neocolonial servitude.
It might seem hard to stand up in the United States against the maturing campaign against China. The corporate media blitz of disinformation and well-crafted propaganda is designed to delegitimize China while building credibility and sympathy for those favored by imperialism. This is all the more reason for progressive people and opponents of imperialism not to buckle under the pressure.
Bush, the Pentagon and the Democratic Party leadership would prefer nothing more than U.S. students forming "Free Tibet" committees and protesting against China’s fictitious "cultural genocide" in Tibet while Washington continues its very real war and occupation of Iraq. The death of one million Iraqis does qualify as real genocide.
The people of China, including the Tibetans, cannot be assisted by imperialist sanctions, covert operations and military intervention.
Notes:
1. Washington Post, September 22, 1991. Cited in William Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower (2000), 180.
2. A. Tom Grunfeld, The Making of Modern Tibet (Armonk, New York; London, England: M.E. Sharep, Inc., 1996), 16.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid, 21.
5. "Tibet’s March Toward Modernization," Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, November 2001, Beijing.
6. Ibid.
7. Grunfeld, 258.
8. Ibid, 121.
9. Anna Louise Strong, When Serfs Stood Up in Tibet (Peking: New World Press, 1965), 45. Cited in Grunfeld, 112.
10. Grunfeld, 61.
11. "Tibet’s March Toward Modernization."
12. J. Mann, "CIA Funded Covert Tibet Exile Campaign in 1960s," The Age (Melbourne, September 16, 1998). Cited in "‘Democratic Imperialism:’ Tibet, China, and the National Endowment for Democracy," Michael Barker (Global Research, August 13, 2007).
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