"None of these tribes are ethnically Tibetan, or even close, with the possible exception of the Monpas. In the case of the Monpas, it is the consensus of scholars, mainly the British, that they are closely allied to the eastern Bhutanese and any influence of Tibetan culture is due to the dominance of the Tawang monastery and its former feudal grip over this tribe."
China claim over South Tibet (which you called AP) is through its claim over Tibet (which we call now Tibet Autonomous region), which is undisputed over the world including India government.
Historically, China claim over Tibet is through its historical control of this area throughout different dynasties, Yuan Dynasty (ethnically Mongolian, now Mongolian minority in China) as well as Qing Dynasty (ethnically Manchurian, now Manchurian minority in China)) over Tibet for at least five hundred years.
You omit conveniently to mention that China and Tibet were equally provinces under the Yuan Dynasty, that the Yuan were the immediate descendants of Genghis Khan, and owned lands as far west as Persia and the Russian steppes proximate to Moscow, as well as China, Mongolia itself and Tibet, and that therefore any Chinese claim to Tibet based on the Yuan Dynasty is equivalent to one province of an empire claiming supremacy over an adjoining province of the same empire only due to the circumstance of both having been conquered together. This is bizarre. Should we then inform the world that we own Kenya, as the British had conquered us, and the British had also incidentally conquered Kenya? Or to convey an idea of proximity, Burma? Or Ceylon? Malaysia perhaps? Why not Singapore? My wife has always fancied Singapore; she may like to live there as a citizen.
Secondly, in this decidedly self-serving account, you have not informed us what the duration of the Yuan dynasty was. I presume this was not accidental, nor was the omission a stylistic one, intended to make the note more concise and read better.
Thirdly, you have omitted mention of the huge gap between the Yuan and the Qing, and any mention of the complete independence of the Tibetans in those days, an independence poignantly underlined by their kinship to the ethnic tribes in at least three, possibly four provinces of China proper which were majority Tibetan then, majority Han now.
Fourthly, you have omitted to mention that the nature of Qing overlordship was through the posting of a Commissioner in Lhasa, with a small detachment of troops sufficient for his personal security. You have omitted to mention that the nature of this overlordship was defined in international law by an Anglo-Russian treaty which clearly stipulated the suzerainty, not sovereignty, of China over Tibet; that further stipulated that neither power should deal with Tibet without the presence of a Chinese representative; that in international law, China's claims are limited to suzerainty, and that the incursion of troops and the overthrow of the sovereign administration after the completion of the Chinese revolution constituted a breach of international law and a breach of their legal position on Tibet.
Finally, you have omitted to mention that a suzerainty can lie with one power, which, when overthrown, replaced, or surrendered, has no residuary power to confer that suzerainty on its successor, and that therefore Chinese overlordship over Tibet legally ceased with the 1911 Revolution.
As what was even described in the quoted sentence from the first page, "Tawang monastery and its former feudal grip over this tribe" The South Tibet area is under control of Dalai Lama, who was the supreme ruler of Tibet including South Tibet.
A full and clear account of the Arunachal Pradesh has already been written out by me, and it is unfortunate that you have chosen to distort it and passages from it.
Only a small tract around and about the Tawang Monastery, the Monpa tribe alone, was under any kind of feudal grip of the Monastery, and this grip had no ethnic or cultural base.
All the other tribes of the province had nothing to do with this Monastery, and they had even lesser ethnic links with the Himalayan communities than the Monpa. The Monpa, as already mentioned clearly, were akin to the Bhutanese, who are in no way to be thought of as Tibetan.
The Dalai Lama had control only over Tawang, no other monastery, in administrative terms. The Dalai Lama had NO control over the rest of the province, far from being supreme ruler, although naturally his great reputation and scholarliness in certain individual cases led to his veneration of people throughout the Himalayan Buddhist tracts, not Arunachal Pradesh alone.
Each Dalai Lama has control over that area, not India. BTW, there is no India yet until British created it.
Completely untrue.
As you are so lamentably lacking in any information about this area, please be informed that India's longest lasting dynasty, the Ahom, were rulers in the Brahmaputra, and successful in resisting the Mughal Empire, and were undisputed rulers of these hill tracts as well, enjoying full sovereignty, it may be added, not suzerainty or overlordship or any other intermediate measure of administrative control. There is no recorded Tibetan challenge of the powers of this fierce, martial dynasty, throughout its 600 years of rule.
If you bother to consult the public records, freely available, you will find that British control of these hill tracts followed British conquest of Assam and the Ahoms.
Later Qing Dynasty, China was invaded by many foreign powers including the British. The central government has lost tight control over so many areas including Tibet, Hong Kong and etc. even though there were still officials in those regions. Dalai Lama then secretly broke deals with British, trying to get independent, allowing British to draw the McMahon Line and etc, which were never recognized by China Central Governments: Qing Dynasty, early China Republic, then KMT era's Republic of China (now in Taiwan), then CCP era of PRC. That is also why PRC claimed Tibet and now there is not much the whole world can dispute about.
This is grossly inaccurate again, as Tibet was never under the 'tight control' alleged. There was never any breakage or interruption of the procedure of placing Ambans in Lhasa. The situation in Tibet cannot be compared in any respect to the situation in Hong Kong.
However, the status of the Amban in Lhasa was wholly illegal after the December 1911 revolution, due to reasons already mentioned. The Qing had no authority to hand over suzerainty; suzerainty ceased with their abdication of power and did not transfer to the successor regime in law.
This, in fact, is precisely the reason why Britain offered all the princely states in south Asia the option of joining either dominion, as the states would become fully independent again after the departure of the British. Similarly, for the same legal reason, Tibet under the Dalai Lama became fully independent once the Qing ceased to enjoy the Mandate of Heaven.
Legally, today China enjoys full and undiluted administrative authority over Tibet, full sovereignty over Tibet, because of world-wide recognition that Tibet's sovereignty was extinguished by China's military conquest of Tibet.
This is what can be acknowledged by all external countries, including India.
It is depressing to encounter for the first time this kind of rampant propaganda and wilful distortion of history.
Of course, the only reason Tibet remains an issue with the West is the supposed "Human Right" issue related to those ethical Tibetans, not China's territorial claim over Tibet.
So when India members say India has historical claim over South Tibet (AP) and it has always been an integral part of India, I am curious where the historical claim comes from???
I hope that this detailed account will fully satisfy your curiousity.
The current Dalai Lama residing in India, so desperately depending on India to give him a place to stay, can even "sell" the birth place of Dalai Lama to India, which is astonishing. However, if the former Dalai Lama could come back to life again, he will definitely be very angry with this current worthless 14th Dalai Lama.
Being agnostic myself, I deprecate this barbaric and superstitious nonsense.
However, he can "sell" whatever he wants to sell. China does not recognize that since South Tibet is not his to sell. Each Dalai Lama could be the supreme leader of Tibet but all have to be recognized and censured by central government, no matter it is Yuan Dynasty, Qing Dynasty, or Republic of China or PRC. Historically, there are more than one Dalai Lama who had violations were removed from the position and later replaced by another one by the Central Government (during Qing Dynasty).
This is precisely correct, at last, in two different details, which possibly have not been realised by the commenter.
First, south Tibet was not the Dalai Lama's to sell, as it was never under his control.
Second, it is precisely the case that Chinese suzerainty over Tibet until 1911 depended on their claimed overlordship over the Dalai Lama and his acknowledgement of this claim. This is a personal bond of fealty between a crown authority, in this case, the Qing dynasty, and a subordinate, who is a designated subordinate.
In a personal feudal relationship, both the feudal lord and the vassal must exist; the bond cannot exist in a vacuum, it cannot be exercised through a legal fiction, only through an actual person on another actual person (that is to say, their offices, not the individual human being. If either were to disappear or be replaced or be substituted, the bond ceases to be.
Therefore the position is that China, through the Qing Dynasty, had a right to direct the affairs, without ruling directly herself, of Tibet, through the Dalai Lama.
In 1911, the Qing vanished. The result was a vacuum. My understanding is that in this case, the relationship ceased to be.
In 1954, the relationship was revived by force of arms. The position changed again. It is now a direct rule of Tibet by China and the Dalai Lama plays no role.
It is now a situation where an Ahom territory, conquered by the British and administered by them for decades, is disputed by a country which absorbed another country, whose departed and extinct ruler and administration had no right in the first place to administer this province.
During 1962 border conflict, China army took over South Tibet Already after India's total defeat. However, Chinaman Mao valued India as important member of Third World Countries and non-alliance members. He decided to withdrew to the control line before the conflicts and intended to set up the area as demilitarization zone preventing further conflicts.
I have not encountered this claim ever before.
Of course, defeated India rushed back again to take it over again there making the goal of demilitarization zone gone. Later, China is in the mess of Culture Revolution and even the army is under the attack by the red guards. Further resolution against South Tibet is never officially on the table. During the late 70s, China has its open and reform and is busy with economics development until now.
Sooner or later South Tibet will be back on the table officially and put on the forefront of the central government. I hope there will not be a bloody war again there. However, God forbid if there has to be any, I never doubt China will win it in a landslide way. Of course, India members can accuse me that I am dreaming or India will always kick our butt or whatsoever. It is OK. We do not want it to happen anyway, right?
