By Ugyen Gyalpo
The latest brutal fist fights on the gates of the roof the world and the killings of twenty brave Indian soldiers by the Chinese Troops has led the harshest Indian summer simmer to a boiling point already crippled under the weight of the coronavirus.
Under the cover of pandemic that crippled India, the unruly quest of China’s expansionism towards the borders of Chinese occupied Tibet, has cost scores of casualties in the frosty border area of Ladakh in over 45 years. This was no surprise to many political pundits and to be honest, I wasn’t surprised either. This was a conspiracy long time in the making, stemming from the follies of the Indian politicians of the early fifties, to not intervene in the naked Chinese occupations of Tibet, that destroyed a natural peaceful two thousand years old buffer zone. Long story short, the price of Nehru’s blunder in sacrificing Tibet on the altar of geopolitical cacophony, is the price India is heavily paying to this day.
India today is not the India that faced a major war with China in 1962. Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai was one step backwards and two steps ahead to stab in the back of the Indians by the Chinese. Things have changed now and India can actually walk shoulder to shoulder now. They must respond with same ferocity as they did with Pakistanis.
The only way China can be stopped is the language of force they use. India has paid a huge price for its freedom. From the revolt of 1857 to 1947 and to over two hundred years of colonialism and thousands of deaths and sacrifices. Don’t let a Communist Party that is only seventy years old encroach upon the sanctity of India’s freedom. I urge Modi to rise up with that flaming courage and live up to the size of his broad chest. If you let China pass today, they will take a kilometer today and in ten years, in their long game of war stratagem, they will swallow the whole of Ladakh before you would even realize. I am a Tibetan and I know how this vicious dragon operates. India’s military might, air powerhouse, and advancement in nuclear warheads, is sure to put China on the defensive.
At this critical juncture, China can’t risk a war with India. They have too much at stake and too much to lose. In this Coronavirus world that has upended everything, China is cornered in the global court of accountability and the world is up and against this evil regime. China’s economy is at a free fall and the worst since thirty years of their miraculous rise with the escalating trade war with the US that is now fast slipping into a new Cold War. India must respond and respond well this time. Bigger and more decisive than the 1962 war. I am not a war monger, but I am worried for India and this is the only language besides mandarin that Chinese can understand. The language of bullets and bombs.
Modi is yet to prove his invincible courage in dealing with China’s bullies and lies and that will be something to look out for. He knows just too well the story of Tibet, the refugee of the stolen country that still takes shelter in his land.
I think it will be extremely important for our Sikyong to proactively engage with the Indians like I saw him do these days juggling his time from one interview to the next. But at the same time, I am also aware as to how far he can go about leading the anti-China front, since the CTA policies, framed way before he was elected, will work against him to limit his condemnation of the Chinese openly. Which is a huge shame in itself that you see the murderer of your mother prey upon other and you chose to remain silent. But I have noticed his conscience in some instances get better of the straitjacketed policy as far as belting his condemnation for China.
Our own host country, who has given the ultimate refuge, in the face of their own people being drowned in poverty, is under attack by our own nemesis. We should at all cost get engaged, and offer the utmost morale boost for the Indians. Any show of compromise in supporting the Indians in these war times, on the fear of juxtaposing our appeasement policy towards China, will be a total miscalculation and a long thorn of displeasure in the minds of our indebted host for a long time.
This moment here is a calling to support and stand up for our “Gurus”, as His Holiness always refers to India. We “Chelas” led by the CTA, should just as well seize this intense moment to hit the nails on China when it’s on the anvil of judgement and it is molten hot.
The momentous shift in the US policy towards Tibet will set a precedence for India and Tibet sympathizers to follow suit to declare Tibet as an independent country and that will be a precursor as to which direction the CTA will chose to engage with China going forward. Will the coming amended version of the Bill that will be laid on the floor of the senate that recognizes not just TAR but all of Tibet as an independent country blow a strong wind of change into our directionless movement. Only time that is fast fleeting will tell.
(Views expressed are his own)
The author is a blogger at ‘The Roar of the Snow Lion’. He is a Tibetan living in Woodside, New York.
3 Responses
How easy it is to call for war between India and China from the comfort and safety of America.
Dorje Wumao, you worry too much. How can there be an actual war between India and China when no one dies on one side?
These are indeed troubling times for China. The CCP, under Xi, keeps miscalculating, be it with USA, India, Australia, Taiwan, HK, etc. How safe is Xi’s position, really? There must be internal struggles taking place within the Chinese Communist Party. As an example, even something as minor as this situation would lead to squabbles. If USA actually goes through and revokes the special, preferential trade status that HK enjoys, many of the elite politburo members who hide their money there, could lose billions and billions. These families will no longer be able to convert their Chinese funny-money into greenbacks. Anyway, I agree, a wind of change could be most efficacious.