To this the Viceroy replied, on June 3, 1903, that, as the Resident had already clearly recognized, it would be useless to negotiate upon matters affecting Tibet without insuring the full and adequate representation of the Dalai Lama’s Government throughout the proceedings. He was nominating as his Commissioner Colonel Younghusband, who, accompanied by Mr. White, Political Officer in Sikkim, as Joint Commissioner, would proceed to meet the Commissioners appointed by the Resident, who should, of course, be of equivalent rank, and must be attended by a Tibetan officer of the highest rank, whose authority to bind the Tibetan Government was absolute and unquestioned. On this understanding, that the Lhasa authorities would be duly and fully represented, the Viceroy was prepared to accept the Resident’s invitation that the Commissioners should meet at a very early date, and discuss, not only the exact position of the frontier under the Convention of 1890 and the mutual rights of grazing to be allowed on either side of that frontier to the people of Tibet and British territory, but also the method in which our trade relations could be improved and placed upon a basis more consonant with the usage of civilized nations and our direct and predominating interests in Tibet. And as the Resident was prepared to let his deputies meet the British representative at any place which the Viceroy might select, and as Khamba Jong, being the nearest inhabited place to the frontier in question, seemed to be the most suitable place for the meeting, he had directed Colonel Younghusband to proceed thither as soon as he conveniently could, and he trusted that the Resident would secure the attendance of the Chinese and Tibetan representatives at Khamba Jong on, or as soon as possible after, July 7.
On the same date as this letter was written I also received my own formal instructions.[[22]] I was informed that a strict insistence on the boundary-line as laid down in the Convention of 1890 was, perhaps, not essential either to the Government of India or to the Sikkim Durbar, and I was directed to give my opinion on this point after inspecting the tract in question. The matter of grazing rights was not one of great importance, and after discussion with the Chinese and Tibetan delegates I was to submit my proposals as to the agreement which might be come to in this matter. The revision of the Trade Regulations and the recognition of Gyantse as a trade-mart in place of Yatung were to form the subject of discussion with the Chinese and Tibetan delegates, and the provision of guarantees for the observance of such agreements as might be concluded were to be considered a matter of the first importance. It was further considered very desirable that arrangements for free communication between the Government of India and the authorities at Lhasa should be made, and possibly also annual meetings between British and Tibetan officials for the due settlement of the trade and frontier difficulties which might occur.
In conclusion, I was warned to be very careful to abstain from using any language or taking any action which would bind the Government to any definite course hereafter without first obtaining the sanction of the Government of India.
All was now prepared for the start of a mission. In this extraordinarily complex and intricate matter the many different lines had at last been made to converge on one point. The manifold communications which had taken place for thirty years between the Bengal Government and the Government of India, between local Indian officers and local Chinese and Tibetans; the correspondence between Simla or Calcutta and London, between the India Office and the Foreign Office, between the Foreign Office and the Russian and Chinese Governments, and between the Viceroy and our Minister at Peking and the Chinese Resident at Lhasa, had all been boiled down into the definite act of the despatch of a mission to a place a bare dozen miles inside Tibet to discuss trade-relations, frontier and grazing rights.
This was not, after all, any remarkably bold or outrageously aggressive act. Such as it was, was it justified? The narrative of the causes which led to the move has been long, but, even so, it has been hard to put their true significance so that it may be appreciated by people unacquainted with Orientals. Still, there are some fairly plain facts and considerations which emerge from the long narrative, and which all who are accustomed to the conduct of affairs may be expected to understand.
The first fact is this—that it was aggression on the part of the Tibetans or their vassals which led to action on our part, and that before ever a single soldier of the British Government had crossed the frontier into Tibet Tibetan troops had crossed it to the Indian side. It was the irruption of the Bhutanese into the plains of Bengal which caused Warren Hastings to send Bogle to Tibet in 1774. It was the invasion of Sikkim by the Tibetans which made the necessity for the treaty of 1890. And it was because the Tibetans repudiated that treaty, and occupied territory inside the boundary therein laid down, that we had to take measures to see it observed.
But even supposing they were aggressive, it may be said that we ought to have treated the Tibetans with leniency, gentleness, and consideration, because of their ignorance. So we ought, and so we did. Warren Hastings conceded the request of the Tashi Lama. And though the Tibetans for a century have been free to come down to India, with no restrictions on their trade or on their travel, we for years never pressed for any ordinary rights of trade and travel for our own subjects, whether British or Indian. We allowed the Tibetans to come down where, and when, and how they liked. For a century we let the principle of heads they win, tails we lose, continue. Even when we at last stirred, and thought of sending Macaulay to Lhasa to make some less one-sided arrangement, we gave up the idea when we saw that the Tibetans raised objection. And even, again, when the Chinese asked us to make a definite treaty with them on behalf of the Tibetans, and guaranteed its observance by them, and when the Tibetans broke it, and repudiated it, and refused to meet our officers, we continued for ten years showing them forbearance and patience. It was only at last when the Tibetans, having broken the treaty, having declined to have any communication with us, yet sent Envoys to the Russians, that we took high action, and despatched a mission with an escort into Tibet. If we had shown no inclination to hold the Tibetans and Chinese to their engagements, others might well think that they also would not be held to theirs, and our authority and influence would slacken in proportion as this impression got abroad. No Government can conduct the affairs of contiguous States if it allows a treaty to be broken with impunity.
My personal view is that the local question would have been better settled, and much subsequent international complications would have been saved if, at an earlier stage in the proceedings, when it first became amply clear that our treaty was valueless; that the Tibetans repudiated and ignored it, and that the Chinese were unable to have it observed, we had at once resumed the proceedings where we had left them when we drove the Tibetans across our border, and had again advanced into the Chumbi Valley, and stopped there till we had effected a properly recognized and lasting settlement. This was the course recommended by Sir Charles Elliott, the then Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, and whether that would have been a wise course or not, I do not see how anyone who has carefully considered the whole course of transactions which at last led up to the despatch of a mission to the first inhabited place across the border can deny that such a course was justified.
Whether the mission was conducted with due consideration or with unnecessary harshness, and whether any good came of it, either to ourselves or to the Tibetans or to anyone else, are matters for separate review, and to that purpose I will now address myself in the following narrative of the course of the mission.