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The twisting saga of Tibet-Taiwan
relations
By Tsering Namgyal
DHARAMSALA, India - Perhaps one of the most
interesting celebrations to follow the awarding of the
Nobel Peace Prize to the Dalai Lama in 1988 was held in
Taipei.
It was organized by a group the name of
which I do not recall, but it was made up exclusively of
old nationalists who firmly believed that Tibetans were
just one Chinese minority. During the tea party, the
Taiwanese speakers called the Tibetan leader "the first
person in 5,000 years Chinese history" to have won the
honored award - much to the consternation of the
Tibetans present. For me, that modest Taipei gathering
at once epitomized and encapsulated the dilemma of
Sino-Tibetan ties.
Understanding the history of
Taiwan's relations with Tibet is difficult without
knowing the background of the relations between Tibet
and the Republic of China (ROC) before it lost its civil
war against the communists. After its defeat on the
mainland, the Nationalist government led by Chiang
Kai-shek retreated to the island of Taiwan.
With
the Nationalist government came hundreds of thousands of
officials, scholars, professionals, and doctors in
perhaps one of the biggest one-time mass resettlements
of elites in history. They did not come empty-handed,
either. Chiang and his army entourage brought along
shiploads of gold and other Chinese treasures, including
the National Palace Museum, which has since been
reinstated and rebuilt in the outskirts of Taipei.
The museum now houses the biggest collection of
Chinese antiques in the world, including an eye-popping
repertoire of rare and priceless Tibetan artifacts. Just
as the Tibetan exiles rebuilt their cultural trappings,
notably monasteries, in India, the Nationalist
government too went on a frenzy of reconstruction, aimed
at re-creating their own lost China on the island of
Taiwan. It is not for nothing that Taiwan is often known
by the Taiwanese themselves as the bao dao or
"the Treasure Island".
Beaten by the Communists
on the vast and diverse mainland China, the Nationalists
ruled the island with a vengeance. To calm internal
dissent, they were - for good reason - particularly
merciless in their crackdown on the educated Taiwanese.
As one would expect, the government spent billions on
the military aimed at defending a potential invasion
from the Communists. To create a formidable army, the
government, given Taiwan's small population, had no
choice but to set up a two-year mandatory military
service for all males.
But Chiang and his ruling
Kuomintang (KMT) never felt at home on Taiwan. It was
too small for the outsized ego of the Generalissimo and
his followers. In an eerie resemblance to the Tibetan
condition, Chiang and his mainland counterparts saw
returning to China as their ultimate goal. For Chiang
and his KMT government - once the ruler of the whole of
China - Taiwan was just a case study in exile, a model
to be replicated on the mainland, when it eventually
fulfills its dream of reclaiming its lost empire.
Members representing all of China's provinces,
including Tibet and Mongolia, sat in Taiwan's National
Assembly and Legislative Yuan. On the international
stage, the Nationalist government, the Republic of China
(ROC), not the People's Republic, represented the whole
of China. Those were indeed glorious days for the ROC -
until Taiwan lost its seat in the United Nations in
1969. That was followed by the United States under the
administration of Jimmy Carter switching its diplomatic
ties to Beijing in 1979, a move that dealt the
Nationalist government the biggest blow since its defeat
on the mainland.
The persistent threat of
Chinese invasion was a blessing in disguise for Taiwan's
development. It whipped a sense of paranoia both among
the rulers and the ruled, releasing a collective
national energy that sowed the seeds of one of the
greatest economic growth stories ever witnessed in
history. Fresh in the memory of the Nationalist
government officials was the experience of a fatal
economic mismanagement on the mainland. "It's the
economy, stupid," seems to be the moral that remained
entrenched in the minds of the leaders since.
Not surprisingly, the totalitarian government on
Taiwan led by Chiang Kai-shek developed an unusually
pliant ear for the experts and advisors, especially
economists. The result was a benign environment of low
interest rates, low inflation and steady exchange rates
- a policy mix that may be every economists' dream. "The
Taiwan Miracle", as it was dubbed by Nobel laureate
Simon Kuznets, may sound like run-of-the-mill government
propaganda. But the pace of the economic growth, the
rapid creation of the wealth, the transition of the
economy and the resultant lifting of the living
standards were nothing short of magical. As a result, in
a matter of only four decades, Taiwan metamorphosed from
an island of rice farmers, much poorer than the
Philippines, into Asia's Silicon Valley. The moniker was
well deserved: for the island has become the
eighth-largest exporting economy in the world, with the
third-largest foreign-exchange reserves, and the
manufacturer of nearly half of the world's
personal-computer (PC)-related products. A High-Tech
Island, indeed.
While Taiwan developed by leaps
and bounds, Tibetan exiles languished in exile on the
Indian subcontinent. Both were victims of the grand
Maoist design, but following diametrically different
paths. Circumstances kept Tibetan exiles and the
Taiwanese apart. While Tibetans sought independence,
Taipei, which claimed to be China's sole legitimate
government, considered Tibet an inalienable part of the
country.
Taiwan's KMT government, however, did
have intermittent ties with select Tibetans, mainly
through the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission
(MTAC), the office responsible for overseeing affairs of
Tibet and Mongolia. But the exile government, for
obvious reasons, blacklisted these personalities in
exile - who have been receiving clandestine monetary
support from Taiwan. Tibetans visiting Taiwan are
declared personae non gratae by the Tibetan
government in exile.
There were some Tibetans in
Taiwan too. Perhaps one of the first Tibetans to have
come to Taipei was Chama Samphel, who came to Taiwan
from India. He arrived in Taipei on September 18, 1959.
The KMT government gave him a red-carpet welcome and
decided to confer him the position of lieutenant general
in the ROC Army. The KMT government raised a total of
NT$550,000 in the name of the "Support Committee for the
Liberation of the International Minorities". The
proceeds went to the purchase of two buildings in
Tienmu, in suburban Taipei, to be used as the
headquarters of the "Taiwan Branch of the Tibetan
Resistance Movement" and residence of the exiled
general.
Historical documents show that the
Taiwan government also established a training center in
Tamsui - a beach town about 20 kilometers from Taipei -
for Tibetan fighters, nearly 30 of whom had been flown
into Taiwan from India. It was around that time that the
US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) also flew Tibetan
fighters into the United States and Saipan Islands for
training. Research done by Peggy Chen, who did her
Master of Arts thesis on the Tibetans in Taiwan, shows
that there are still about 10 of them living in Taipei.
Some have returned to India and many others have
returned to Tibet.
The KMT government also
received two Tibetan Rinpoches, Mingyur Rinpoche of the
Sakya Sect, and Gelek Rinpoche of the Gelugpa Sect, who
still teach and stay in Taiwan. The number of Tibetans,
particularly Buddhist monks, in Taiwan increased in
later years. The increasing democratization of Taiwan
and the irreversible trend toward nativization of the
domestic politics - and its own independence - rendered
its claim of Tibet and Mongolia as its own provinces
increasingly fictitious. As a result, even the KMT
itself underwent radical reforms.
The election
of the native Lee Teng-hui, trained in Japan and the US
as an agricultural economist, as the Taiwanese president
delivered the final nail in the coffin of Nationalist
megalomania. Lee had not even been to mainland China and
hence the understandable difficulty for him to accept
the notion that he was the leader of the whole of China,
let alone Tibet and Mongolia. Lee speaks better Japanese
than Mandarin.
Over the years, Lee, a devout
Christian, established himself as something more than a
political leader. He wore his intellect lightly and
often spoke in the rustic Taiwanese dialect, despite his
distinguished track record both in academe and the
administration. While he commingled comfortably with the
business leaders and tycoons who served as the backbone
of the KMT's rule, he was equally comfortable drinking
tea with Taiwanese farmers and discussing agribusiness.
Not unobtrusive for a leader of his stature, he often
voiced for "spiritual reforms" on the island. On several
occasions, he publicly expressed his admiration for the
Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama. As it happened, Lee
invited the Dalai Lama to Taiwan as early as 1993. Lee
Teng-hui is not an exception. Taiwanese have always held
the Tibetan leader in high regard.
The thorny
MTAC issue
In 1997, Taiwan under Lee Teng-hui
opened a new chapter in its relations with the Tibetan
government. The ROC government approved the invitation
by the Chinese Buddhist Association of the ROC of the
Dalai Lama to Taiwan. The Tibetan leader visited Taiwan
in March 1997, stepping across the erstwhile
controversial line and legitimizing - once and for all -
any Tibetan contacts with the Republic of China
government on Taiwan. The visit was a tremendous
success. Local media were pregnant with expectation.
Even before the Dalai Lama's actual arrival, the Tibetan
leader already beamed at the readers from the front
pages of the Taiwanese newspapers.
After his
arrival, the Tibetan leader hit it off instantly with
the Taiwanese public. Hundreds of people, including
Tibetan monks and nuns, lined up to greet him and his
entourage. Almost all the major television stations
carried his schedule live, from his arrival at the
airport in the southern port city of Kaoshiung to his
religious talks to the thousands of public, many of
whom, on one occasion, sat imperviously in the rain to
listen to him. A uniquely Taiwanese moment, which the
Dalai Lama was to recall later - on none other than
CNN's Larry King Live - as having left a deep
impression on him. In Taipei, Lee Teng-hui met the Dalai
Lama as scheduled at the presidential palace. The
presidential aides, watching the Dalai Lama's tremendous
success with the Taiwanese public, made eleventh-hour
changes to the protocol, upgrading the venue of the
meeting from the previously planned Taipei Guest House
to the presidential palace. The Dalai Lama, the Tibetan
leader, and Lee Teng-hui, the Taiwanese president,
walked hand-in-hand. Both glowing in animated smiles,
the photos of that particular juncture looked as if they
have been somehow deliberately doctored to infuriate the
officials in Beijing.
During his visit, the
Dalai Lama was characteristically conciliatory. He
repeatedly intoned that "the past is past", suggesting
that a thaw might be possible. The visit represented a
breakthrough in the relations between Taipei and the
Tibetan government-in-exile. The Dalai Lama has long
also abandoned his demand of independence for the
Himalayan region, opting instead for "genuine autonomy
and self-rule" as stipulated in the five-point peace
plan he presented to the European Parliament in 1988.
In March 1995, the Dalai Lama reiterated his
position when he said that in the past he had
"deliberately restrained" himself from emphasizing the
historical and legal status of Tibet. "Theoretically
speaking," he said, "it is not impossible that the 6
million Tibetans could benefit from joining the 1
billion Chinese of their own free will, if a
relationship based on equality, mutual benefit and
mutual respect could be established."
Indeed, it
had been the consistent position of the Dalai Lama and
of the Tibetan government-in-exile since 1979, when
direct contacts were established with the Chinese
leadership in Beijing as the first concrete step toward
realizing this objective. That year, the Chinese
government invited Gyalo Thondup - the Mandarin-speaking
elder brother of the Dalai Lama and also a member of his
entourage in Taiwan - for talks. Deng Xiaoping, who
completed his consolidation of power in Beijing that
year, told Gyalo Thondup that the new Chinese leadership
was willing to discuss all the issues relating to Tibet
except the question of independence. The exiled Tibetan
leadership, in response, sent a number of fact-finding
delegations to Tibet through Beijing. The delegations
then made specific suggestions to Beijing for improving
conditions in Tibet.
Several offers of
assistance, such as sending volunteer teachers from
among the Tibetans in exile, were made as the Tibetan
leadership believed they would not only help improve
conditions in Tibet but also be important
confidence-building measures that would help develop a
meaningful dialogue with Beijing. On March 23, 1981, the
Dalai Lama wrote to Deng expressing his pleasure at
politburo member "Hu Yaobang's efforts to make every
possible attempt to right the wrongs by frankly
admitting to the past mistakes after his visit to
Lhasa".
China should have been pleased by the
Dalai Lama's suggestion that "we must improve the
relationship between China and Tibet as well as between
Tibetans in Tibet and outside Tibet". But despite the
apparent pragmatism of the spiritual leader's "Middle
Way" approach, the Chinese were unwilling to discuss
anything substantial with the Dalai Lama.
Bewildered by the string of new developments,
many Tibetans, however, were disappointed with the Dalai
Lama's trip to Taiwan. They were not to be blamed
because they did not quite comprehend the unprecedented
events unfolding in Taiwan. Taiwan had changed and hence
it was for the Dalai Lama too to respond pragmatically
to the Taiwanese evolution. Some activist groups saw the
Dalai Lama's trip as too conciliatory toward a regime
that had a history of creating dissension among the
Tibetan community. Such differences of opinion are
understandable in a democracy. The Tibetan leader has
attempted to run his government-in-exile as a democracy,
complete with a cabinet and a legislature comprising
representatives from all of Tibet's different regions
and religious sects.
In 1994, for instance, some
members of the MTAC signed a joint declaration with
Chushi Gangdruk, a Tibetan guerrilla organization that
had fought the communists. The declaration said Taiwan
would declare, after the reunification of China, Tibet
an autonomous region and recognize the Dalai Lama as its
leader.
The resultant furor within the Tibetan
community can partly be attributed to the importance and
influence of Chushi Gangdruk as an organization. It is,
by no means, a maverick group of misfits.
Chushi
Gangdruk, which means "Four Rivers and Six Ranges", of
Eastern Tibet, or the Kham region, was initially founded
in 1958 by a Khampa leader, the great Andruk Gonpo Tashi
of Lithang. When the communist Chinese government
ordered its People's Liberation Army (PLA) to march into
Tibet in 1949, the people of Tibet's eastern region were
the first to experience the threat of the Chinese
invasion. Strong and sturdily built, they were natural
fighters. They could not tolerate the brutal Chinese
atrocities and rose up in arms against them. They fought
pitched battles under the command and banner of local
chieftains. Their battle against the Chinese helped
facilitate the Dalai Lama's escape from the Chinese in
1959.
To be fair, the contents of declaration
did not call for a major change in the policy of the
Tibetan government in exile. But the fact that the MTAC,
as an official Taiwanese body, had the temerity to
engage in such negotiations - and that too concerning
the position of the Dalai Lama and the sovereignty of
Tibet - with the organizations within the Tibetan exile
did unsettle Tibetan sentiments.
The signing of
the agreement led to a major division within the
guerrilla organization Chushi Gangdruk. A new Chushi
Gangdruk, which was formed by the members loyal to the
Dalai Lama and the Tibetan exile government, was formed
in Dharamsala later that year. On October 15, the Chushi
Gangdruk meeting in Dharamsala sent a letter to Lee
Teng-hui condemning Taiwan government's nefarious
activities in Tibetan community.
"We are keenly
aware that the so-called Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs
Commission of your government has been engaged in covert
activities in [the] Tibetan community since our exile in
1959. It has been creating sectarian discord, regional
disunity, tension amongst the Tibetan community of three
provinces of Tibet. More than that, it has been inciting
misunderstanding and mistrust between Tibetan government
under the leadership of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and
sections of Tibetan community with the sole aim of
weakening the Tibetan struggle for independence from the
People's Republic of China. The Tibetan government have
withstood all these devious schemes and sinister plots."
The letter went on: "We thought that your
government understood the uselessness of spending every
year millions of dollars of the taxpayers of your
country on such criminal activities, which only helped
fill the coffers of a few people in the MTAC and a
handful of disgruntled Tibetans. We took encouragement
from your own invitation last year to His Holiness the
Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan and your positive statement
on Tibet. There were also signs of improvement in
relations between governments of your country and ours.
But your government showed its true color this year when
some people of your country, mainly from the MTAC, and a
few disgruntled members of our association entered into
a so-called agreement on the basic issue relating to
Tibetan sovereignty. We condemn this so-called agreement
and declare it null and void. We assure that we will
[leave] no stone unturned to foil any or every design
that you may still harbor against the Tibetans. We are
sworn to do this and our loyalty to His Holiness the
Dalai Lama and our government is unshakable."
Meanwhile, Dharamsala formed a committee to
investigate the activities of the MTAC. The committee
consists of four current and two former members of the
Assembly of Tibetan People's Deputies.
The reports
about the signing of that declaration, especially as
reported in the Taiwanese media, did not help MTAC's
controversial image in Taiwan. Taiwanese have long
questioned the role of MTAC. The Democratic Progressive
Party (DPP), Taiwan's largest opposition party and a
supporter of independence for the island, had for a
quite a few years advocated the abolition of the MTAC
and vowed to do away with it should the party come to
power.
On that first visit, the Dalai Lama met
with key DPP leaders and told them that the MTAC had
"spoiled your [Taiwan's] reputation among the Tibetans".
Coming out of the meeting, the DPP leaders made no
secret of their admiration for the Tibetan leader. Asked
by journalists how she felt about the Dalai Lama, DPP's
diva parliamentarian Sisy Chen responded that even she
might consider taking up monastic vows if all the
Tibetan monks were so "cool".
Understandably,
the DPP and Tibetan exile government had long shared
mutual sympathies. Kelsang Gyaltsen, the Dalai Lama's
personal assistant, reckoned that the DPP was interested
in resolving the Tibetan issue, particularly the issue
of the MTAC. "This is quite a long and complicated
problem - even the previous KMT government knows that
the Tibetans are quite troubled by the MTAC," he said.
"But it is quite difficult to solve the problem
overnight. The DPP government also fully understands the
situation and is very interested in resolving the
predicament."
In a show of support for Tibetan
independence, for example, the DPP ordered its offices
all over the world to hoist the Tibetan national flag
throughout the Dalai Lama's stay in Taiwan. Much to the
dismay of those on Taiwan who favored reunification with
the mainland, a large Tibetan flag flew over Taipei city
headquarters during the Tibetan leader's visit. For
mayor Chen Shui-bian, Tibetan flags turned out to be
propitious, for he was soon to become the next president
of the ROC.
Neither Tibetans nor Taiwanese had
previously thought that there would be such a level of
chemistry between the two sides. Many believed the DPP's
support for the Tibetan cause may simply be a pretext
for presenting its own case for Taiwan's independence.
The Tibetan issue had gained much more
international sympathy than Taiwanese independence
movement. The Dalai Lama's visit to Taiwan brought the
issue of Tibetan autonomy to the fore in Taiwan, and
highlighted both areas' aspirations on a global stage.
Both faced a common adversary, China, and a common
predicament - international isolation. His first visit
to Taiwan served as a major turning point between the
two sides. In a matter of few months after the trip, the
His Holiness the Dalai Lama Religious and Cultural
Foundation was established in Taipei. The Dalai Lama's
office served as sign of normalizing ties between the
two sides, thus bringing into question the role of MTAC.
The exile government was no great fan of the MTAC,
especially the way with which it collaborated with the
political groups within the exile government.
The matter of independence
The Dalai
Lama's relations with Taiwan, however, have not been
smooth, as the Tibetan leader tried to balance his
concerns for Taiwan with his negotiations with Beijing
(for the welfare of the Tibetans in Tibet). His second
trip to Taiwan was canceled after indications that a
possible thaw might be in the offing with Beijing.
"Although I have another invitation to visit
Taiwan, I have postponed it indefinitely, as I give lot
of importance to developing an understanding with
Beijing," he told Time magazine in July 1998. In the
interview, the Dalai Lama also said Taiwan should
improve ties with China without sacrificing its
democracy and autonomy. "Both for its economy and
defense, Taiwan needs to have very close links with
mainland China. But what is important is that they
should protect their liberty and democracy," he said.
The new development with Beijing was triggered
partly after US president Bill Clinton's visit to
Beijing. Chinese president Jiang Zemin told Clinton that
the door for negotiations with the Dalai Lama was open
as long as he recognized Tibet as an inalienable part of
China. To the chagrin of many Tibetan sympathizers, not
to speak of the Tibetan exile government, Jiang added a
new condition, which was to recognize Taiwan as a part
of China, officially linking Taiwan with the Tibetan
dilemma. By doing so, Beijing, also for the first time
ever, linked China's two major remaining flashpoints
together as if, as one Taipei commentator aptly put it,
it wanted to kill two birds with one stone.
But
the situation changed further with the election of the
DPP's Chen Shui-bian as the president of Taiwan. Chen
reportedly invited the Tibetan spiritual leader to
attend his inaugural celebrations on May 20, 2000 - a
move that many Tibet sympathizers saw as well deserved.
The Tibetan government-in-exile was unabashedly pleased
at the outcome of Taiwan's presidential election. Chen's
triumph, the de facto prime minister of the Tibetan
exile government, Sonam Tobgyal, told the Liberty Times,
has dealt a "blow" to the Beijing regime. The Tibetan
government, he said, would be willing to send
representatives to attend the inaugural celebrations.
Many saw Chen's victory a cause for celebration
not only for the Taiwanese, but for all the other
victims of Chinese repression. It also dealt a blow to
the growing Chinese hegemony, especially within the
Asia-Pacific region, where China's growing influence
have been a constant source of concern. Highly impressed
by Taiwan, especially given the large and growing
population of the Buddhists on the island, the Dalai
Lama paid another visit in April 2001, further enraging
the Chinese. Chen met with the Dalai Lama twice during
his stay in Taiwan and discussed the areas of
cooperation between the two sides. In rhetorical
brilliance that has not flagged since the first trip,
China once again called the visit the "summit of the
splittists".
China's provocation did not
diminish the DPP's sympathy for the Tibetans. As a
result, a much larger organization, aimed at promoting
ties between the two sides, Tibet-Taiwan Exchange
Foundation, was established this February, in what many
observers saw as the DPP government's intention to
officially recognize Tibet as an independent state. In
his speech at the inaugural ceremony, which was attended
by representatives from the Tibetan exile government,
Chen said that the Republic of China on Taiwan will no
longer regarded the Tibetans as "people from the
mainland China". Chen's speech, however euphemistically,
recognized Tibet as an independent state.
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