China must specify the game and define the rules.
For decades Chinese government has been trying to defend itself against foreign accusations that it invaded Tibet, slaughtered millions of Tibetans, destroyed the Tibetan culture, and imposed control and punishment over the Tibetans. The root cause of this is because the 14th Dalai Lama has been recognized by the foreigners as the “rightful” spiritual and temporal leader of Tibet and as such is being used by the foreigners as a focal point to rally those who are anti-Chinese to demonize China. At the same time, the Chinese government has silently acknowledged the leadership rights of the Dalai Lama thus giving him the aura of authority to continue his role as the rightful leader of Tibet fighting for the independence of his Tibet and the freedom of his Tibetan people. Therefore, the solution of establishing peace and security in Tibet and solidify China’s sovereign right over Tibet is to remove the perceived role of spiritual and temporal leadership of the 14th Dalai Lama.
Before I explain how this could be done, let me give a brief history of the Dalai Lama. The term lama means teacher or guru. Dalai means ocean in Mongolian. Therefore, the name Dalai Lama means Ocean Teacher or Teacher with Ocean-Deep Wisdom. Dalai Lama is a position first conferred on a Tibetan monk by a Mongolian Khan. When a Dalai Lama died, he is supposed to reincarnate into a man while most people will come back as whatever they deserve to be such as pig or flea depending on the life he lived. The reincarnated boy has the right to succeed to the position of Dalai Lama. In other words, since the Dalai Lama obviously is in reality nothing more than a man and subject to death by old age and other causes, he obviously cannot live forever. To get around this mortal defect the spirit comes back repeatedly by being reborn again and again and succeed to the position of Dalai Lama each time for de facto immortality. A sort of human version of the phoenix.
The trick, of course, is to find the right boy who is the true reincarnation of the recently demised Dalai Lama because unlike the phoenix, the new baby does not pop up out of the death bed of the old Dalai Lama. And apparently whatever deity is in charge of reincarnation isn’t obliging enough to rebirth the new Dalai Lama next door and with a bright star shining over his head. So the new Dalai Lama had to be searched for literally throughout the whole world. And expectedly there were contending claims by different pretenders to the position of Dalai Lama.
In feudal Europe, the election of the pope was subject to political influence and there was a time when there were actually three popes who excommunicated each other as the false pope. Unlike the Catholic pope who is elected by the cardinals, the newly reincarnated Dalai Lama is supposed to be discovered by some monks charged with the task of finding the reincarnated Dalai Lama. This depends on the candidate recognizing artifacts belonging to the old Dalai Lama. Of course, this is random and uncertain at best. If 20 artifacts with one of them being the artifact that belonged to the old Dalai Lama were shown to 20 boys, then the probability that at least one of them will pick the right artifact is
1 - 0.95^20 = 0.64. If they were shown to 100 boys, then the probability of at least one of them picking the right artifact goes up to 1 - 0.95^100 = 0.994. So it is a mathematical certainty that sooner or later some boy will pass all the tests and be identified as the reincarnated Dalai Lama. Therefore, it is clearly nonsense to say that since a boy candidate selected the right artifacts and passed other random tests he must be the reincarnated Dalai Lama. It is also nonsense that the fact that some boy passed the tests proved the truth of reincarnation.
The 6th Dalai Lama was a man with great sexual appetite who spent his nights with many women and wrote love poems. He was sent to Beijing by the Mongol king of Tibet and died en route, probably murdered. After that there were two rival pretenders to the position of Dalai Lama. The emperor of China ultimately installed his own candidate in 1720. From this it is clear that there is really nothing holy or mystical about the Dalai Lama. In fact the Dalai Lama is whomever the people or whoever has the political power want him to be. Many of the Dalai Lamas also died young, apparently murdered by political rivals.
9th Dalai Lama: 1806 - 1815 (9 years life span)
10th Dalai Lama: 1816 - 1837 (18 years life span)
11th Dalai Lama: 1838 - 1856 (18 years life span)
12th Dalai Lama: 1857 - 1875 (18 years life span)
From the above, it is clear that if they were not murdered, then the job of Dalai Lama isn’t conducive to longevity. And if a Dalai Lama can’t even live a normal lifespan, then it certainly calls into question what kind of living god he really is? Obviously he is no god at all.
And if Tibetan monks were willing to go to the length of murdering a living Dalai Lama, then it is quite certain that they will do whatever they can to avoid bringing back the reincarnated Dalai Lama who will obviously grow up to be just as uncooperative as his prior incarnation. Therefore, the monks who murdered the Dalai Lama would surely do whatever they could to avoid bringing back the true reincarnation of the Dalai Lama and find someone else who is amenable to their domination as the new Dalai Lama. Chances are, the new Dalai Lama had been picked from a family friendly to the most powerful and influential monks of the time and not really the true reincarnated Dalai Lama, granted that there really is reincarnation.
Furthermore, if you were the powerful monk who orchestrated the murder of the Dalai Lama would you bring back the reincarnation of the murdered Dalai Lama so that he could accuse you of murdering his prior incarnation and have you skinned alive? Obviously not. You would do whatever you could to avoid bringing back the true reincarnation so as to avoid being exposed as the murderer. Therefore, everything considered, there are compelling reasons beyond reasonable doubts that the true lineage of the original Dalai Lama had been long lost. This then proves beyond any reasonable doubt that the current Dalai Lama is not the true reincarnation of the original Dalai Lama and is actually a false pretender undeserving of the title of Dalai Lama.
Another example of the political nature of the Dalai Lama is that the second Dalai Lama was the grandson of the Mongol Khan who conferred the title of Dalai Lama on the first Dalai Lama. So the Mongol Khan’s grandson was very happily discovered to be the Dalai Lama following the death of the first man to receive the title of Dalai Lama. And that gave the Mongol Khan great political influence over Tibet through his grandson. This shows that the conferring of the title on the first Dalai Lama was nothing more than a ploy for the Mongol Khan to solidify his political control over Tibet. It is quite obvious that the Mongol Khan had already planned to have one of his grandsons to become the Dalai Lama when he conferred the title of Dalai Lama on the first of the lineage. So the institution of Dalai Lama is all about politics and very little about religion or spirituality.
It was Emperor Qianlong who conferred the power of both the spiritual and political leadership on the Dalai Lama in 1751. The emperor also decreed that the selection of the Dalai Lama and other high lamas was to be under the supervision of the high commissioner of the Chinese central government. Another decree by the Chinese emperor was that the Dalai Lama must be chosen by picking out a name from a golden urn which contains several names of likely candidates. From the above, it is clear that the Chinese central government has the right through historical precedence to control the selection, sanctioning, removal, and replacement of the Dalai Lama.
Now we go back to the original question of how to neutralize Dalai Lama as a danger to China’s national sovereignty. There are many ways to deal with this. We see by the above history that it was Qianlong who conferred the power of both the spiritual and political leadership on the Dalai Lama. Therein lies the historical precedence for the right of the central government of China to remove the power of both the spiritual and political leadership from the Dalai Lama. All the central Chinese government needs to do is to issue a simple decree removing all spiritual and political power from the Dalai Lama. After the decree is issued, the Dalai Lama will no longer be able rightfully to laid claim to any power of leadership of any kind over Tibet and the Tibetan people.
Of course, the West will scream loud and long. And the Dalai Lama will deny that the Chinese government has the right to strip him of his power of leadership over Tibet and the Tibetan people. But immediately China is defining the game and the rules. The West and the Dalai Lama will then be responding to China’s initiative and start to play China’s game and by China’s rule. The onus will then be on the West and Dalai Lama to prove that he has the power he claims. All China needs to do is just refer to its decree stripping the Dalai Lama of his power and let them scream and fulminate.
Once the Dalai Lama lost his power of leadership he would be referred to as Llhamo Döndrub which is his name at birth. Since he has become just an ordinary monk, it will become pointless for China to talk to him about the future of Tibet. This will render all pressure from the West to talk to the man Llhamo Dondrub weightless and pointless.
At the same time, China can also appoint a commission to study the history of the Dalai Lama lineage to look for any evidence of skullduggery. It is likely that given all the apparent murders and political maneuverings in the past, there must be many evidence of foul plays during the selection process that can be used to prove that the lineage of the Dalai Lama was long lost and that the 14th Dalai Lama is not the true reincarnation of the original Dalai Lama. Therefore, in addition of stripping his power the Chinese government can pronounce the Dalai Lama false and could not be the reincarnation of the original Dalai Lama even if there were such a thing as reincarnation. Then it is up to the West and Llhamo Dondrub to prove he really is the reincarnation of the original Dalai Lama. Obviously, anything the West and Llhamo Dondrub say can never be fully proved. So there will always be doubt once the Chinese government pronounced him a false Dalai Lama.
Simultaneously, the Chinese government can appoint a new monk to be the head of the Tibetan Buddhism in the place of the Dalai Lama. This in itself will negate the claim of the Dalai Lama to be the spiritual head of Tibet. And as the Tibetan monks transfer their allegiance to the new head of Tibetan Buddhism, they will lose their allegiance to the Dalai Lama and forget him.
As I said above, the West and the current Dalai Lama will scream and yell and fulminate. But they will not be able to do anything. And many in the West will accept the fact that the man Llhamo Dondrub is no longer the Dalai Lama and has no value as a pawn in their mischiefs against China and drop him like a piece of trash. Some may continue to support him, but he will not have the same moral authority that he has now. And as China develops Tibet and increases the incomes and standard of living of the Tibetan people, they will forget him and concentrate on improving their own lives instead of wasting their time with somebody who represents the old brutal and tyrannical feudal system that had oppressed and brutalized their fathers and grandfathers and kept them poor. And China by taking control of the situation and using forceful initiatives can compel the West to play China’s game and by China’s rules and thereby strengthen the security of the motherland for the benefit of all the diverse peoples of the Chinese nation.
For those who wish to read more about Tibet and Dalai Lama, please go to the following links: