Meanwhile, the Dalai Lama himself had fared less well. Arriving in Delhi by train earlier that evening, he had been hijacked by the Chinese ambassador. Without informing his Indian counterparts, the ambassador met the Dalai Lama at the train station and escorted him to his own car, which drove directly to the Chinese embassy. Meanwhile the rest of the Tibetan entourage took their seats in cars provided by the Indian government. The Tibetans arrived back at Hyderabad House, where they were quartered, aghast to find that they had mislaid their precious cargo. Only after frantic telephoning was the Dalai Lama finally located and retrieved from the Chinese embassy, where he had already had the first of what was to be several meetings with Zhou Enlai. It was a stunning diplomatic coup on the part of the Chinese.
These encounters with Zhou surrounded a critical meeting with Nehru at which the Precious Protector sought to determine the prime minister’s attitude toward a formal request for asylum. The Indian leader made clear his determination not to make any commitments that would harm India’s relationship with China. Indeed, so fully was his mind made up that he barely attended to what the Precious Protector had to say: “At first he listened and nodded politely. But . . . after a while he appeared to lose concentration as if he were about to [fall asleep].” The Dalai Lama explained that he had done all in his power to make the relationship with China work, but that he was now beginning to think it might be better to remain in India rather than return to Tibet. This evidently brought Nehru to his senses. He understood what the Tibetan was saying, he assured him, “but you must realise . . . that India cannot support you.” His advice was rather that the Dalai Lama should hold the Chinese to the terms of the Seventeen Point Agreement and speak out forcefully when they failed to do so.
At his subsequent meetings with Zhou, the Dalai Lama gave no indication that he was considering applying for political asylum. Indeed, the (Chinese) transcripts of the meetings have him dutifully speaking in the first-person plural when referring to Chinese government policy in Tibet. Yet it is clear also that the Chinese premier was well aware that the Tibetan leader had been making inquiries. He cautioned the Dalai Lama that, if he stayed in India, he would be in political exile. “At first when you say something bad against us as strongly as possible, you will get some money. The second and third time, when you do not have much to say against us, you will get small sums of money, and in the end they will not have money to give you.”
The opposing voices of the Nechung oracle and the Chinese premier were deeply unsettling, and when he left Delhi a few days later in the company of the Panchen Lama for a month-long tour of the country, the Dalai Lama was still in a quandary.
His schedule over the next few weeks consisted of visits to various important Buddhist pilgrimage sites, interspersed with sightseeing trips to several cities including Bombay, Calcutta, Bangalore, and Mysore. These visits to places connected with the founder of Buddhism had a profound impact on the Dalai Lama—none more so than at Vulture Peak in northeastern India, where the Buddha is believed to have preached the Mahayana, or Great Vehicle, for the first time. Here—possibly in prophetic anticipation of the thousands of monks he was himself to ordain over subsequent decades—the Dalai Lama enjoyed a vision during meditation of hosts of monks reciting the Wisdom Mantra: “Om Ga-te Ga-te, Paraga-te, Bodhi Svaha.”
The visits to India’s industrial centers were of less interest. In news footage shot during this part of the visit, we see the Dalai Lama being shown around an industrial engineering project. He adjusts repeatedly an obviously uncomfortable workman’s safety helmet, and it is clear he is not enjoying the experience. Trijang Rinpoché, too, was completely underwhelmed. The factories with their swirling rivers of molten lead reminded him only of the “hell realms.”
Doubtless the Indians’ intentions were to show the Tibetans that China had nothing on them in terms of material progress, but what impressed the Dalai Lama most was the enthusiasm of the people for their young democracy. The viewer of the contemporary footage is struck by the self-confidence of the crowds that attended the Precious Protector’s every public appearance. (Pilgrims could travel at half price on the railways.) On each arrival, the Dalai Lama is garlanded and presented with bouquets of flowers as the press fight for photographs and crowds cheer. In contrast, faithful Tibetans stand meekly patient in hope of catching a glimpse of the Precious One. Yet it is also instructive to look at the demeanor of the Dalai Lama himself. The pressure he felt himself under is palpable. At the Dehra Dun Military Academy he sits, evidently somewhat reluctantly, next to a copiously beribboned general, doubtless comparing the military might on display with what he had seen in China. As the presidential steam train lent to him for his journey draws slowly away from the station, he can be seen smiling and waving somewhat awkwardly in unfamiliar Western style. Following a visit to the Taj Mahal, he takes his place uncertainly behind Nehru on an elephant’s back. At the Air Force Academy he follows a more obviously eager Panchen Lama in taking a turn sitting in a training aircraft. In Calcutta he is taken to watch—without very much enthusiasm—the horseracing at the anachronistically named Royal Calcutta Turf Club. It is a relief to see him riding a miniature train with a delight exceeded only by that of the Panchen Lama, who altogether forgets the dignity of his office, veritably whooping with joy. One has a sense that here is a young man embattled, overburdened even, yet also someone determined to do his best whatever the circumstances.
The India trip ended, as it had begun, in Kalimpong. The Dalai Lama took up residence in the very same house as that occupied by the Great Thirteenth in 1911, following his own flight to exile in India when the Chinese sent an army into Lhasa. As it had long been, the town was a nest of spies (to use Nehru’s own words). To add to its febrile atmosphere was the presence of hundreds of refugees, mainly from Kham, desperate for the Dalai Lama to call them to arms. Prominent among these refugees was Gyalo Thondup, who had by now come to terms with John Hoskins, the twenty-nine-year-old head of the CIA’s Far East Division. America was by now very interested in Tibet as a way to cause trouble for the Chinese Communists. Hoskins, who was based at America’s Calcutta consulate, did not have a very favorable first impression of GT. “There was a lot of submissiveness rather than dynamism,” he noted. Yet in spite of this poor initial impression, Washington decided the CIA should support the training, equipping, and insertion of an initial eight (later reduced to six) Tibetan agents. Hoskins gave Gyalo Thondup the task of recruiting the men, and he in turn involved his elder brother, Jigme Norbu. The six recruits were all Khampas, of whom four were ex-monks, one of these former ecclesiastics an especially fiery character by the name of Wangdu, who in his youth had shot a man dead for that age-old crime of “disrespect.” The agency’s estimation of GT changed over time. When eventually the CIA program came to an end, its then operations director requested that Gyalo Thondup “please arrange for your next incarnation to be Prime Minister of a country where we can do more to help you!,” noting that he had been extraordinarily successful in obtaining both material and political support from the United States.
It is certain that by now the Dalai Lama knew something of the CIA’s interest in supporting a resistance movement in Tibet. But Washington had not been unequivocal in championing the Tibetan cause, having failed in recent communications to make clear that it would back a resolution at the United Nations calling for Tibetan independence. Nor was it certain that the United States would recognize a Tibetan government in exile. Had Washington’s assurances been more explicit, it seems possible the Dalai Lama would have ignored the majority of his advisers, who favored returning, risked Nehru’s ire, and formally requested asylum. But in the absence of such assurances, the Tibetan leader remained uncertain.
While still considering his options, the Dalai Lama met with several senior government officials who had come from Lhasa ostensibly to escort him on the last leg of his journey back home. In fact, their purpose in coming was to brief the Precious Protector on the contin
uing deterioration of relations with the Chinese and to implore him to seek asylum.
Inevitably the matter was put, once more, to the oracles—this time not only that of Nechung but also that of Gadong, another highly regarded source of spiritual counsel. When both declared in favor of a return to Tibet, those opposed were appalled. It was well known that Nechung’s earlier advice had been to stay in India. Many were doubtful of the new result. Yet when questioned on this very point, Nechung replied that he knew that he would not have been believed if he had spoken in favor of return any earlier. He had therefore adopted “skillful” means. This is the practice whereby a teacher adapts his discourse to the capacity of his audience.
In order to verify that the deities had been interpreted correctly, their pronouncements were also made the subject of a mo*—a dough ball divination—in front of the thangka of the Glorious Goddess by the Dalai Lama himself, but with the same result. This caused further dismay among those pressing for him to remain. “When men become desperate they consult the gods,” declared one minister. “When the gods become desperate, they tell lies.”
This divination finally decided the matter. Yet although the Dalai Lama was now committed to returning, it was, he announced, with several important provisos. One was that, from now on, taking Nehru’s advice, he and the Kashag would vigorously protest any Chinese measures they deemed unacceptable. Another was that, henceforth, the people—that is, the representatives of the Tibetan People’s Association—would be consulted. But most important, some officials would remain behind in India with responsibility for maintaining links with the Indian State Department as well as the American officials with whom the Dalai Lama’s brothers were in contact. And in order to facilitate this, a secret codebook was drawn up and distributed among select members of both the government and the stay-behind party.
But while the Dalai Lama had made up his mind to return, those wishing him to remain had other ideas and immediately set about formulating audacious plans to prevent him from going.
Despite the Precious Protector trying to persuade the Panchen Lama to accompany him to Sikkim, the younger man elected to return directly to Tibet from Calcutta. On his return, he was greeted effusively by the PLA’s General Fan Ming. Instead of staying in the capital as planned, however, the Panchen Lama left suddenly for his headquarters at Shigatse. It seems that he had become aware of credible evidence of a scheme to assassinate him. And the putative assassins were not Chinese but Tibetan.
This is astonishing. Most Tibetans could not conceive of such an idea. But given lingering doubts as to the Pachen Lama’s authenticity—for a long time, it will be recalled, there were two official candidates—and the serious ill-feeling toward him for his staunchly pro-Chinese stance, the existence of such a plot seems not implausible. Presumably the thought was that if the Panchen Lama was killed, the Dalai Lama would be forced to change his mind and stay in India out of fear for his own safety.
Another scheme called for simultaneous attacks on the Chinese to be carried out in Lhasa and Dromo. Orders were dispatched to the leadership of Tibet’s burgeoning resistance movement to foment rebellion in alliance with the recently revived bodyguard regiment. Unfortunately for the plotters, the bodyguard resisted, and the plan came to nothing. Meanwhile, heavy snowfall blocked the Nathu Pass. For two more weeks the Dalai Lama remained in Sikkim. When eventually his party was able to cross the pass, it felt, as Trijang Rinpoché put it, like “being returned to prison.”
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“Don’t sell the Dalai Lama for silver dollars!”: Lhasa, 1957–1959
The Dalai Lama’s first stop on his return to Tibet was Dromo. There, taking Nehru’s advice to be more assertive, he told Chinese officials that, rather than focus on any good that had been done, it was important now to discuss openly the failings of the Communist Party’s intervention in Tibet. For their part, the Chinese convened a meeting of the Tibet Work Committee. This was the organization that actually implemented Chinese government policy in Tibet. Remarkably, it was decreed that the majority of party cadres then working the country should be returned to China, with only a small percentage remaining. Similarly, many locally recruited (that is, Tibetan) cadres were to lose their positions while the various offices of the Preparatory Committee were either to close or to be greatly reduced in size. It seemed that Chairman Mao was determined to make good on Zhou Enlai’s promises to the Dalai Lama. But while the directives were plain, the reality on the ground was very different. The numbers of Chinese actually withdrawn were far fewer than the central government called for. And though reform in central Tibet could wait, there was to be no letup in Kham and Amdo.
There was further bad news for the Dalai Lama when, moving on from Dromo, he went to pay a visit to the Panchen Lama at the junior man’s headquarters at Tashilhunpo. It quickly became clear that the Panchen Lama’s circle had a message for him. Instead of offering the Dalai Lama accommodation within the monastery itself, they had made arrangements for him to stay within the great fort. But then rumors of a far greater insult reached the Dalai Lama’s ears: that the Tashilhunpo monks were performing the ritual for dispersing evil spirits, the implication being that he himself was the evil spirit. Credence was lent to this rumor when news came that an important Rinpoché close to the Dalai Lama had died suddenly—suggesting that the ritual had only narrowly missed its target.
Insult piling on insult, when he went to teach within Tashilhunpo itself, he found that only “torn and inferior” furnishings had been put out for his use, and the throne he was seated on was old and shabby and set up “in a dilapidated room” that was filled not with the Tashilhunpo monastic community but only with monks from neighboring monasteries. Arrangements had been made for the Tashilhunpo monks to receive their grain ration that same day, so that any who sought an audience with the Dalai Lama would miss out. It was, in the Dalai Lama’s view, “a very bad show.” Taken in isolation, this deliberate snubbing of the Dalai Lama would seem gratuitous. In the context of the rumored attempt on the life of the Panchen Lama, it becomes more understandable. As a result, relations between the two sees fell to a low unknown since the time of their predecessors.
Returning to Lhasa, the Dalai Lama reassumed his position as chairman of the Preparatory Committee for the Autonomous Region of Tibet, but thanks to Mao delaying the implementation of reform, his duties were not onerous. He could thus turn his attention to what was, from his perspective, the most important matter at hand, the Geshe Lharampa examinations marking the end of his formal education. These were now scheduled to take place during the Monlam celebrations two years hence.
A moment of respite that occurred in the meantime was his visit to Ling Rinpoché’s hermitage at Gerpa. So thoroughly destroyed in the 1960s that today it is scarcely possible to discern where the building stood, then it was large enough to accommodate a sizable community of monks. At a long-life puja* performed for the Dalai Lama’s benefit, the Precious Tutor spoke movingly of how Chenresig, Boddhisattva of Compassion, had worked tirelessly to help sentient beings free themselves from the wretchedness of samsara. Years later, the Dalai Lama recalled how, “with tears filling my eyes, I prayed that I would indeed, as my root [principal] lama was so fervently wishing, live a long life and accomplish great things for living beings and the Buddha’s teachings.”
During the summer of that year, 1957, two major events occurred that would have far-reaching consequences. The first concerned the dedication of a “golden throne” to the Dalai Lama. The second, related event was the infiltration of the first CIA-trained agents back into Tibet.
The “golden throne” was an initiative of a wealthy Khampa trader named Gonpo Tashi Andrugtsang, who, at the time of the previous year’s Kalachakra initiation, had thrown his weight behind a project to make a symbolic offering to the Dalai Lama of a jewel-studded golden throne as a gift from the people of eastern Tibet. The work of forty-nine goldsmiths, nineteen engravers, five silversmiths, six painte
rs, eight tailors (who worked the brocade), six carpenters, three blacksmiths, and three welders, and containing more than 1,500 ounces of gold—worth something like $2 million in today’s money, to say nothing of the value of the lapis, coral, turquoise, and other precious stones—it was almost certainly the most valuable single gift to any Dalai Lama from the laity. Yet while the throne, unprecedented in its extravagance, was an important expression of (mainly) Khampa devotion, its deeper significance lay in the network of communities and individuals the project drew together: it was, in fact, a cover for the recruitment of a rebel army, the Volunteer Force for the Protection of the Dharma, known as Chushi Gangdruk. To begin with, the majority of those it recruited were Khampas, with Amdowas making up the second-largest grouping; it was these who had so far borne the brunt of Chinese “reform.” And though the Khampas in particular were traditionally hostile to the Lhasa government, there was not a man among them who would not sooner die than see the Dalai Lama harmed. Of the relationships established between the rebels and Lhasa officialdom at this time, none were more momentous than those with the Lord Chamberlain and with Trijang Rinpoché (whose monastery was in Kham). It was he who became the army’s de facto spiritual mentor.
The Dalai Lama Page 20
