Comments by "Good Citizen" (@GoodCitizen-gm1tl) on "CMG's Spring Festival Gala showcases Xizang's vibrant culture" video.

  1. China has stopped using the word Tibet, which is a British colonial name and adopted Xizang, the Chinese name for the region in English-language publications these days. Xizang literally means "Western treasure" in Chinese, which has been the official name for the region since 1727. In the Yuan and the Ming dynasties (The region was annexed into China during the Yuan dynasty in the 1200s), the region was called Wusizang in Chinese, a transliteration of "dbus gtsang", the local name for the region. In the Qing dynasty, when the region was under China's full administration, the Qing court took the "Zang" part from the older Chinese name Wusizang and add "Western" (or "Xi") to form Xizang. Gtsang is from the local language but the Chinese character for Zang happens to mean "treasure", so the name Xizang became literally ‘Western treasure" in Chinese. It's a name with a combination of both Han Chinese and the local-language parts. Xizang has been used in China as the name for the reigion since 1727. The British tried to steal the region from the Qing-dynasty China and incorporate it into British India by invading it twice in 1888 and 1903 but failed, at the same time Russia was also encroaching into the region from the North ( by invading Xinjiang, China) and West ( by invading Afghanistan), the British therefore decided to leave Tibet as a buffer zone. China successfully expelled the Russians from Xinjiang later and kept Xizang as well.
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  2. If Tibet/Xizang were not a part of China, it would have been a part of India today. There were no way that it would remain an independent nation on its own. The British invaded it twice in 1888 and in 1903-1904 in attempt to annex it into British India but failed due to Qing China's defense. Russia was trying to encroach into the region at the same time so the British kept Xizang(Tibet) as a buffer zone. China later kicked out the Russians from Xinjiang, a region in the north of Xizang. The Sikkim Kingdom in the south was closely linked to Xizang in terms of ethnicity and culture but China didn't defend it as it was not a part of China and it fell into British hands and now it is a part of India. Had Xizang not been defended by China at that time, it would have been a part of India today as well. So no matter what, Xizang couldn't have been an independent nation by itself. Even today, India still has the unrealistic dream of annexing Xizang into its territory. They had several clashes with the Chinese military in the border in Xizang and the two sides even fought a war in 1962, in which China registered a landslide win.
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