1950 Invasion of Tibet
In March 1950, the Tibetan government send a delegation to confer with the newly created People’s Republic of China to get assurances that Tibetan sovereignty would be respected. The dialogue did not happen until September 16 due to a debate between Britain, India, Tibet, and China about where would be the best place to hold the meeting. At the meeting, China told the Tibetan delegation that China had a three-point proposal for Tibet. The proposal stated that Tibet would be part of China, China would be responsible for protecting Tibet, and China would take over trade and foreign policy for Tibet. The delegation wanted to keep China as protector and patron, but they had some stipulations about the proposal, namely that they did not want Chinese troops stationed in Tibet.
As the Tibetan government debated the proposal, Chinese troops entered Tibet on October 7, 1950. The plan for the invasion was to demoralize the Tibetan government by capturing the army in Chamdo and therefore putting pressure on them to negotiate for incorporation into China. The People’s Liberation Army quickly outnumbered the Tibetan forces and captured Chamdo by October 19.
Once the PLA gained complete control over Chamdo, hostilities ceased and one of the captured Tibetan military commanders was sent to the capital to reiterate the terms of negotiation. A delegation was sent to Beijing on October 21 with orders to agree to the first point of the proposal if China would guarantee the status of the Dalai Lama. The delegation was to completely reject the other two points in the proposal.
Eventually the two sides came to the Seventeen Point Agreement which incorporated Tibet into China as an autonomous region under the Dalai Lama. However, in 1955, a “Preparatory Committee for the Autonomous Region in Tibet” was created as a parallel administration that was communist. This caused the Dalai Lama to flee to India. In 1965 the Tibet Autonomous Region was established which made Tibet the equivalent of a Chinese province.