True Colors

Despite the best efforts of the Chinese government (more precisely, the Chinese Communist Party that controls the government) to portray its control over Tibet as secure and stable, sometimes its true colors show through. Sometimes we see that over fifty years into the occupation, Tibet’s Chinese rulers remain insecure and afraid.

This happened recently on May 18, when the top Communist official in Tibet, the hard-line Zhang Qingli, gave a speech to Party members reported in the Chinese-language Tibet Daily:

We must have a more vigorous will to fight, a more tenacious style and do a more solid job of uniting and leading the region’s various ethnic groups and throwing ourselves into the struggle against splittism… From beginning to end… we must deepen patriotic education at temples, comprehensively expose and denounce the Dalai Lama clique’s political reactionary nature and religious hypocrisy.

What is most interesting is how vehemently Comrade Zhang urges “a more vigorous will to fight.” Fundamentally, he is admitting that China hasn’t been able to erase Tibetans’ desire for independence, even after decades of repression, coercion, and terror. He implicitly recognizes that Tibetans don’t see themselves as “united” with and “patriotic” toward China, and that given a choice they would opt for self-rule (“splittism”). To see how much the independence issue colors China’s paranoia in Tibet, ask ourselves: would the Party boss in Jiangsu Province ever feel the need for a similar rant?

Displaying a paranoia that the world is out to get him, he accused the Dalai Lama of:

ganging up with Taiwan independence forces, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, democracy movements, and the Falun Gong in an attempt to establish an alliance aimed at splitting the motherland.

(Remember, to a Party official, “democracy movement” is a terrible slur.) Now come on Comrade Zhang, how can you claim it is the eminently moderate and conciliatory stance of His Holiness the Dalai Lama that is the problem? As you implicitly acknowledge, your fundamental problem is that you’ve failed to crush Tibetans’ desire for independence. Why are you blaming anyone but your own government for the problems in Tibet? If you had succeeded there, no conspiracies could threaten your rule in Tibet.

But China knows it has no legitimacy in Tibet, which is why Comrade Zhang even feels afraid of … Students for a Free Tibet! That’s right, he must have been talking about SFT’s well-publicized action on Mount Everest when he claimed:

The Dalai clique has stepped up efforts to infiltrate (China’s) domestic territory and has schemed to move the center of its separatist activities into domestic territory.

Why is Comrade Zhang hopping mad about SFT’s Everest action? Because nonviolent direct action is an especially powerful way for oppressed peoples and their supporters to use their moral strength to overcome the superior coercive force of their oppressor. Five activists with a video camera could only be a threat if China’s rule over Tibet is shaky and illegitimate to begin with.

Trying to end on a bright note, Comrade Zhang asserted that:

The fundamental objective of international hostiles forces … is to change Tibet’s (political) colour… The (mandate of) heaven in Tibet will never change. The Dalai Lama clique’s pipe dream (of independence) will never prevail… the country’s rivers and mountains will remain red.

To a Communist audience, the comic irony of Comrade Zhang’s pledge that Tibet’s rivers will flow red is probably lost — a pity. I also wonder if it was a translation error or whether Comrade Zhang made a Freudian slip in referring to Tibet as a “country” instead of an “inalienable part of the great Chinese motherland.” Nevertheless, we can applaud Comrade Zhang for his plucky optimism in clinging to the belief that China can somehow eventually convince Tibetans that having one’s country stolen isn’t so bad after all. Meanwhile, Comrade, if you’re afraid of five activists with a video camera, your superiors in Beijing have a lot more to worry about leading up to the Beijing Olympics.



No Responsesto “True Colors”

1. Tibet Will Be Free -- True Colors « Digital Dharma says:

   May 28, 2007 at 9:54 am

   [...] What is most interesting is how vehemently Comrade Zhang urges “a more vigorous will to fight.” Fundamentally, he is admitting that China hasn’t been able to erase Tibetans’ desire for independence, even after decades of repression, coercion, and terror…  Tibet Will Be Free » Blog Archive » True Colors [...]
2. Tibet Will Be Free » Blog Archive » Meanwhile in Tibet, Repression says:

   August 3, 2007 at 9:54 am

   [...] As Lhadon tests China’s claims of openness in Beijing, China is showing its true colors in Tibet. There, Chinese forces have arrested scores of Tibetans in eastern Tibet, and heavily increased surveillance in the capital, Lhasa. [...]