Marie Miller and Tenzin Lhadon
It’s a narrative that’s all too familiar: Nationalist world leaders claiming historical sovereignty over territory, weaponizing revised history to justify invasion.
In 1950, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) acted upon its self-declared inheritance over Tibet, imposing a treaty that officially annexed the region. Following the 1959 Tibetan uprising against the CCP, and the escape of the Dalai Lama to Dharamshala, India, the iron fist only tightened. The Tibetan government-in-exile estimates that in the 20 years following the uprising, 1.2 million Tibetans died as a result of China’s policies, while still many more languished in prison.
Historic revisionism is the basis for the same predatory rhetoric Xi Jinping’s government uses today as it builds entire villages in Bhutan, claims ownership over northern India’s Arunachal Pradesh as “South Tibet,” and threatens Taiwan with militaristic drills and mock missile strikes. Revisionist history is laden with propagandistic undertones – and it’s a threat to self-determination, culture, and human life.
Today, with the ink of President Joe Biden’s signature drying on the Resolve Tibet Act of 2024, the United States has an opportunity to explicitly – and officially – set the narrative straight. His signature marks a testy politicization of the Tibetan cause by the executive branch. As this law is implemented, however, the U.S. should be prepared to offer concrete support to the Tibetan community, which is already beginning to feel the CCP’s retaliatory crackdown.
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