The Militant is completely opposed to this campaign. It is aimed directly against the Chinese revolution, in which workers and peasants took power in 1949 achieving a landmark victory for all workers around the world. The Chinese revolution destroyed landlordism, forged a national unified state, and overturned capitalist relations freeing about one-quarter of the world's population from imperialist domination and the market system. Communists have given unconditional support to the workers state in China against any imperialist attack ever since.

The pro-capitalist propaganda around Tibet is not a new story. Throughout the 1950s, Washington made use of counterrevolutionary rebellions by the former feudal rulers of Tibet to try to gain a foothold to roll back the Chinese revolution, particularly after the Korean and Chinese toilers handed Washington's imperialist army its first defeat in the 1950 - 53 Korean War.

Tibet, historically a separate country, had been controlled by China for several centuries. The Tibetan system had a religious aristocracy with the Dalai Lama, the "godking" of the sect as the head, presiding over the government. Next in line was the Panchen Lama. The clergy were among the biggest landlords; one monastery near Lhasa owned estates with some 25,000 serfs. At the triumph of the Chinese revolution in 1949, the Communist Party-led troops occupied Tibet. While the Mao regime initially promised not to touch the oppressive property relations there, over the next several years the feudal relations in Tibet came into increasing conflict with the Chinese workers state. As Chinese forces moved to put down revolts by the Tibetan ruling class, the capitalist press worldwide screamed about the alleged genocide against a supposedly peaceful society. The Militant at the time described this "dreamlike system."

The "monasteries are supported by contributions from the nobility - which means, ultimately, by the labor of the peasants. In addition to monks and nobles, the warrior-tribes function as the military arm of the state," explained Daniel Roberts in an April 13, 1959, article. In fact, conflicts between the rulers were solved with harsh punishments, and as Roberts put it, "one wonders how they treat the peasants?... In Tibet, the landlords and monks lead the revolt in order to preserve a social order that most of mankind has left far behind. Although the Mao regime is bureaucratic (and although this undoubtedly affected Chinese dealings with Tibet adversely), the Chinese Communist Party defends social relations that are progressive not only in comparison with feudalism but with capitalism as well. Unquestionably, in the present conflict, the Chinese government fights on the side of social progress."

A recent report published in the December 1997 issue of the right-wing magazine The American Spectator, confirms the depth of Washington's involvement in the anticommunist revolts in Tibet. The article, titled "The Secret War Over Tibet" by John B. Roberts II, describes the Tibetan counterrevolutionaries as "heroic" and blasts the Kennedy administration for supposedly not doing enough to help them. He gives high praises to Allen Dulles, who became director of the CIA in 1953 and "oversaw the creation of an audacious covert program involving tens of thousands of Tibetan freedom fighters who fought courageously against China's People's Liberation Army in a decade-long struggle for independence. The scale of Dulles's covert war dwarfed William Casey and President Reagan's aid to Nicaragua's contras..."

Tibetan rebels received special training at Camp Hale in Colorado. At the end of the program the CIA-backed forces were sent to camps in Nepal and then infiltrated back into Tibet. Roberts adds, "By the late 1950s the CIA had plenty of assets inside Tibet. These included agents, paramilitary troops, and commanders. The number of Tibetan freedom fighters had risen to the tens of thousands." After these forces were defeated by the Chinese army in 1959, Washington backed remnant guerrilla forces in Tibet until at least 1968, according to Roberts.

Today's hue and cry over "poor little Tibet" and "human rights in China" has the same class content as in the 1950s - it's a call the freedom to restore capitalist rule as a beachhead against noncapitalist China. Class-conscious workers should oppose it in every way.

- HILDA CUZCO AND NAOMI CRAINE  
 
 
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