The 14th Dalai Lama was born in Tibet in 1935. Fifteen years later the People's Liberation began its invasion of Tibet. A poorly-armed force of 4,000 Tibetan forces hurriedly trained by the CIA faced 40,000 battle-hardened Chinese troops and were quickly routed. Chinese army trucks are shown below at Potala Palace.
Quickly, the Tibetan government enthroned the 14th Dalai Lama. Shown below is the Dalai Lama eight years later undergoing his exams in 1958.
Following the brutal Chinese treatment of the Tibetans in Lhasa due to a Tibetan uprising, the Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala, northern India in 1959 where he has since lived. At this juncture, three countries come into play -- China, Mongolia and India -- as well as the historical territory of Tibet which is now in Chinese hands. For the past 25 years, the author has been actively involved in China, Mongolia and India.
The Dalai Lama, who is approaching the age of 82 in a few weeks, has stated that he will make a decision when he reaches 90 as to whether he will be re-incarnated. However, if he does decide to be re-incarnated, it will not be in China. I agree with him in that decision for many reasons.
Therefore, once China is excluded given its occupation of Tibet, only Mongolia and India remain as logical potential places for the Dalai Lama's re-incarnation. Late last year, the Dalai Lama visited Mongolia to the chagrin of the Chinese. Despite over 500 years of deep ties to the Dalai Lama, Mongolia withered to the Chinese pressure given their massive indebtedness to China. The Mongolian Foreign Minister, Tsend Munkh-Orgil, whom the author knows, rolled over and apologized for allowing the Dalai Lama to visit Mongolia stating that he probably will not be visiting Mongolia for the next four years of the Mongolia People's Party administration.
No one is quite sure how the visa/immigration procedures function for reincarnation processing but it is most likely that the Dalai Lama has struck Mongolia off the list. Accordingly, the remaining country is India. For some time, the Dalai Lama and the Government of India have endured massive pressure from China to abort the Dalai Lama's plans to spend a week in Arunachal Pradesh in northeastern India. This includes Tawang, the strategically vital region that China claims to be a part of southernmost Tibet. He went to the region nestled in with Bhutan to the west, Tibet (a.k.a. China) to the north and more of India to the south. It is sad to see the capital of Tibet, Lhasa, written in Chinese but it is the reality in today's world.
The Dalai Lama spent one week there speaking to massive crowds.
At one point, he said he was a son of India.
Given the fact that the 6th Dalai Lama was born in Tawang, there is a very high probability that the reincarnation of the 14th Dalai Lama will be in Tawang, India. That will be a special occasion for many wonderful reasons. First of all, the avaricious, uncouth Chinese do not deserve to have a spiritual leader born in Chinese occupied Tibet and more importantly it is time to have the leader of Buddhism be re-incarnated in India where the faith began over 2,500 years ago.
The Dalai Lama's concepts are very straight forward:
This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.
Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.
Happiness is not something ready-made. It comes from your own actions.
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