Tibetan Intifada?

Holding on to political power is the one task the Chinese Communist Party is purpose built to accomplish. One of its critical arenas has been Tibet, which has endured invasion, occupation, the deaths of perhaps a million of its citizens and a brutal, fifty-year effort to fragment Tibet's political, ethnic, and cultural identity.

The CCP will attack Tibetan dissent with a grim combination of determination, desperation, and relish, and deploy every police, military, political, propaganda, informational, and diplomatic resource it possesses, even as the government struggles to maintain the smiley face China Rising facade for the Olympics and the international community.

The question that is roiling the Chinese government and, perhaps, the Dalai Lama's government in exile in Dharmsala, is whether this represents a change in tactics, a new upsurge in militancy, and/or a challenge to the leadership of the Dalai Lama in Tibetan affairs.

~ more... ~