Summarized, the proposals of the Government of India were: the placing of a Resident at Lhasa, or, failing that, an agent at Gyantse, with the right to proceed to Lhasa; the formal recognition of exclusive political influence; the demand of an indemnity; the occupation of the Chumbi Valley as security; the establishment of trade-marts at Gyantse, Yatung, Shigatse, and Gartok; the settlement of the Sikkim and Garhwal boundaries, Customs duties, and trade regulations. The amount of the indemnity to be demanded was not mentioned in the despatch, but in a telegram to me, giving a summary, and which was also sent to the Secretary of State on June 26, it was suggested that it should be £100,000 for every month from the date of the attack on the Mission at Gyantse until one month after the signature of the Convention.
These proposals appeared to His Majesty’s Government to be excessive, and after some telegraphic communication with the Government of India the Secretary of State telegraphed on July 26[[34]] the terms which might be named to the Tibetans, and which the Government embodied in a draft Convention which they afterwards sent to me.
Neither at Lhasa nor elsewhere was a Resident to be demanded. Provisions for the maintenance of our exclusive political influence in Tibet were to be made. An indemnity was to be asked, though the sum to be demanded was not to exceed an amount which it was believed would be within the power of the Tibetans to pay, by instalments, if necessary, spread over three years, but I was “to be guided by circumstances in the matter.” Trade-marts were to be established at Gyantse and Gartok in addition to Yatung, and a British agent was to have right of access to the Gyantse mart; the Chumbi Valley was to be occupied as security for the indemnity and for the fulfilment of the conditions regarding the trade-marts; the boundary laid down in the Convention of 1890 was to be recognized; the two Sikkim-British subjects who had been captured in 1903 were to be released; fortifications were to be demolished.
In amplification and explanation of these telegraphic instructions the Secretary of State, on August 5, addressed to the Government of India a despatch,[[35]] setting forth the deliberate policy of His Majesty’s Government. They had to consider the question, not as a local one concerning India and Tibet alone, but from the wider point of view of the relations of Great Britain to other Powers, both European and Asiatic, and as involving the status of a dependency of the Chinese Empire. Formerly European nations and their interests were, in the main, far removed from the scope of Indian policy, and the relations of India with the States on her borders rarely involved any European complications; but the effect of Indian policy in relation to Afghanistan, Siam, Tibet, or any other dependency of the Chinese Empire was now liable to be felt throughout Europe. This immediate responsibility towards Europe, which Indian policy nowadays imposed on this country, necessarily involved its correlative, and the course of affairs on the Indian frontiers could not be decided without reference to Imperial exigencies elsewhere.
His Majesty’s Government had also been consistently averse to any policy in Tibet which would tend to throw on the British Empire an additional burden. The great increase to our responsibilities, however necessary, which recent additions to the Empire had involved, made it obvious that it would be imprudent further to enlarge them except upon the strongest ground. In military and naval matters the resources of Great Britain and India must be considered together. India had from time to time given effective and ready help in the defence of British interests and British Colonies. On the other hand, it had to be remembered that the British army largely existed in order to defend India, and every new obligation undertaken by India was as much a charge upon the common stock of our heavily burdened resources as if it were placed upon the people of this country.
The satisfactory nature of the assurances given by Russia in regard to Tibet rendered it unnecessary and undesirable that any demand for the recognition of a Political Agent, either at Gyantse or at Lhasa, should be made to the Tibetans. His Majesty’s Government held that such a political outpost might entail difficulties and responsibilities incommensurate with any benefits which, in the situation created by the Russian assurances, could be gained by it.
They did not even consider it desirable to claim for the agent, who under the Trade Regulations would have access to Gyantse, the right in certain circumstances to proceed to Lhasa. The effect of this proposal, they considered, would be to alter the character of the duties of the agent, which, it was intended, should be essentially commercial, and to assimilate them to those of a Political Resident.
“As regards the amount of the indemnity,” continues the despatch, “our ignorance of the resources of the country makes it impossible to speak with any certainty. The question, in the circumstances, must be left to the discretion of Colonel Younghusband. The condition that the amount should be one which, it is estimated, can be paid in three years, indicates the intention of His Majesty’s Government that the sum to be demanded should constitute an adequate pecuniary penalty, but not be such as to be beyond the powers of the Tibetans, by making a sufficient effort, to discharge within the period named.”
This despatch did not reach me till after the Treaty was signed.