Free Tibet: A Lost Cause

This past summer, Tibet’s last hopes for freedom were spectacularly crushed under the completion of an engineering marvel. China successfully constructed the world’s longest high altitude railway, connecting the isolated city of Lhasa, Tibet, with Quighai, a Chinese province. Proud of their impressive accomplishment, Chinese officials predict enormous economic growth in this desperately poor territory, with substantial increases in trade, tourism and immigration.

When I read this article from the BBC News homepage, I was not at all surprised. This is simply another example of China using their extreme powers of innovation to expand their continental economic empire at the cost of a unique culture and people. It is quite clear that this railroad will only lead to rapid assimilation of this peaceful territory. Chinese immigrants can now move to Tibet in order to fill jobs in the newly built factories and mines. The strategic military advantages of this link far outweigh any economic benefits. The Chinese government can now extinguish any possible domestic uprisings or defend against invaders from neighbouring countries because of the ability to deploy troops quickly to these distant border regions.

The Taiwanese should study these events carefully, because they too, are “technically” part of China. Fortunately for the Taiwanese, they are not connected to China by land… yet. It might only be a matter of time before the world’s longest elevated railway traveling through some of the most treacherous high altitude terrain in the world, is shadowed by the construction of a bridge between China and Taiwan. True, these ideas may seem ridiculous, but the bridge is not the point, it is the aim to obliterate the possibility of independence from distinct territories.