Reflections on a Half Century of Ethnic Cleansing in Inner Mongolia
by Tsengelt Gonchigsuren
A half century ago, the Chinese Communists invaded Inner Mongolia and established a Chinese controlled Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region.(IMAR). They proclaimed it the "first ethnic autonomous region" and touted it as a "great victory" for the ethnic policies of the Chinese communist party. To mark their half century of occupation, 1997 will be a year of celebration for the Chinese government for its colonial victory in Inner Mongolia.
But for the Mongols of Inner Mongolia, it is a grievous and tragic anniversary. Looking back on the past half century history of Inner Mongolia, everything has changed, except the Chinese ethnic cleansing policy and practices and brutal oppression of the Mongols on their own soil. Once the greatest noble nomads nation in world history, over the past half century it has witnessed a killing field and wall-less concentration camp. Contrary to what the Chinese have said about "development and prosperity" in the region, from the Mongol point of view, our people, culture and ecology have been devastated and none sees the end of the devastation in sight.
These five decades can be divided into four different phases: Mao's implementation of the communist colonial rule (1947-1966), Mao's ethnic genocide (1966-1976), Deng's chauvinistic era (1977 to 1997) and we are currently in the post-Deng ultra-nationalism with an unknown future. Although I will discuss these four periods as separate phases, they are all linked by a consistent and complete denial of the Mongols' right to self-determination and even the right to be an ethnic group in their own lands.
Mao's implementation of the communist colonial rule (1947-1966)
After the collapse of the Ching Dynasty in 1912, the Mongols struggled against Chinese Nationalist and local warlords for nearly the next four decades to assert their right to self-determination. Before the Mongols could succeed in this effort, the Chinese communists gained strength and defeat ed the Chinese Nationalist forces in 1947. The communist victory did not bring any realistic benefits and assurance of a positive future to the already wounded Mongolian people or to the nationalist movement led by Prince Demchigdongrov (De Wang), the leader of the Mongolian Autonomous Government. Mongols had to struggle against a new but more dangerous national and ideological enemy - The Chinese Communists.
History did not work in favor of the Inner Mongols, who suffered a total defeat at the hands of an overwhelmingly superior military force in 1947, two years before the Chinese communists took power in China in 1949. Soon after the Chinese troops controlled Inner Mongolia in 1947, they established a regime that would serve the purposes of the Great Red Chinese Empire. In this critical period, they used a political puppet, Ulanhuu, a communist raised by the Chinese, to play a game of "ethnic autonomy, 94 backed up by millions of Chinese Liberation Army soldiers. Nearly three million Mongols fell under the tragic rule of Chinese communist "autonomy".
In the very early years of this autonomy, they launched many large campaigns in the name of "proletarian ethnic thoughts" and "struggle against ethnic enemies". Wealthy people, Buddhist monks, solders, Mongol nationalists and intellectuals became the direct targets of the Chinese communist dictatorship. Tens of thousands of Mongols were executed and hundreds of thousands were persecuted. The result of these campaigns was the total eradication of any nationalist movements, leading to total Chinese control in all Inner Mongolia.
During the first two decades of this half century of occupation, the Chinese government had already successfully eliminated the Mongols' chances of regaining independence and freedom. In the name of "developing an ethnic region" millions of Chinese workers, peasants and army veterans were settled in Inner Mongolia. Later these people played the most important role by which the Chinese authorities systematically persecuted the Mongolian population. The massive resettlement of Chinese immigrants and ethnic policies caused an enormous imbalance in the demography of the region in favor of the Chinese, and the dominance of Chinese interests and culture. In the face of this sea of Chinese immigrants, the Mongols lost their right to conduct basic political, cultural and economic activities, even their identity as Mongols.
Mao's ethnic genocide (1966-1976)
During the half century of communist occupation of Inner Mongolia, ethnic repression campaigns have been carried out against Mongols on many occasions. The largest such campaign started in the late 1960s, and continued for 10 long years. It's referred to as the case of the so called " New People's Revolutionary Party of Inner Mongolian (PRPIP)."
This case is one of the most maliciously fabricated false cases by the Chinese regime, used to mobilize the Chinese mass population to persecute the Mongols (see Chinese Genocide in Inner Mongolia, by the author of these lines, 1997). It is one of the worst ethnic genocides perpetrated by a regime against a minority people, and should be regarded as an organized, long term, state sanctioned campaign of murder.
The violent and savage nature of that campaign committed by the Chinese authorities and carried out by so called "Ordinary Chinese", is comparable to the Nazi's "Ordinary Germans" that Mr. Goldhagen described in his book "Hitler's Willing Executioners" Maoist slogans such as "the ethnic struggle eventually is a class struggle, the struggle shall be "as hard and relentless as it can be", "you die, I live", provided the justification to ordinary citizens to kill. It is an order of hatred. During that ten-years-long genocidal campaign, at least 50,000 Mongols were killed by the Chinese. The majority of these victims were the elites and intellectuals who were the core force of Mongolian national culture and society. Tens of thousands of children were orphaned and thousands of families were destroyed. About 800,000 Mongols survived the concentration camps, but were maimed after being tortured. All these were done by the Chinese openly and were a part of the daily activities of thousands of killers for many years.
There were even competitions carried out for catching some struggling Mongols. The authorities even held meetings and training courses to exchange their experiences in torture, skills and met hods that could maximize the agony of the victims. Those unspeakable crimes committed against innocent Mongols by the cold-blooded Chinese killers and torturers was partially documented by a recent book written by Mr. Tumen, "Kang Sheng and the False Case of "The People's Revolutionary Party of Inner Mongolia". The torturing of human beings to death as described in this book, is nothing less than the crimes committed by the Nazis against the Jews. It is hard to imagine that this kind of evil occurred in modern human history, especially in a country that claims a 5,000 year old civilization. The ethnic genocide and shocking ordeals endured by the Mongols during this period are still unknown to the world, and it happened 20 years after the world had seen the end of the Jewish Holocaust, and the peoples and the nations of
the world had sworn "Never Again!".
In addition to the enormous loss in human lives, the Inner Mongols also suffered irreparable cultural and material damage during this period. Historical writings, books, virtually anything written in the classical Mongolian language was burned and destroyed. Buddhist temples housing the accumulated production of centuries of canonical scriptures and commentaries were razed to the ground. Equally tragically, the Chinese murderers in their frenzy also looted and robbed the Mongols of their family heirlooms: Buddhist implements, Art objects such as musical instruments, valuable handmade jewelry, headdresses made of precious stones, silks, gold and silver objects handed down from generations, to never be returned. The Mongols who survived the genocide continued in humiliating impoverishment.
A decade of cultural and human genocide changed Inner Mongolia beyond recognition. Inner Mongolia became a hell for the Mongols as this phase found its end. Deng's chauvinistic era (1977 -1997). In 1976, Mao's death ended the darkest decade in Inner Mongolian history. But it did not end the Chinese colonial rule. His successor, Deng actually strengthened the communist rule. After 30 years of the communists ethnic cleansing policy and its practices, Mao handed Deng an Inner Mongolia left with no resistance to speak of, and a demographic ratio in Inner Mongolia which had dramatically shifted from 80 percent Mongols to 80 percent Chin ese. The Cultural Revolution's years of ethnic cleansing almost made the dream of the Chinese to see the permanent annihilation of the Mongols and the total colonization of Inner Mongolia reality. During the previous 30 years, the Mongols endured no less than 20 campaigns and the nation was devastated. In the aftermath of that genocide, Southern Mongolian will never fully recover.
Though the Deng era is marked by "economic reform" in China, the Mongols have not benefitted from it.
On the contrary, the oppressive rule in Inner Mongolia continued and remained very much the same in terms of the general direction. An entire generation of Mongols missed the chance to have a general education in their own Mongol language, let alone learning about their culture. To the Chinese rulers, the Mongol language was the language of "beasts" and "barbarians" had no culture anyway. Such an attitude added to the mental trauma suffered by many children and youths. Most adults who had suffered from torture and imprisonment were permanently damaged, both physically and mentally, and in this atmosphere of ethnic intimidation, suffered even more. Occasional violent struggles against those victims who dared to speak out about the truth and oppose the injustices occurred in many regions of Inner Mongolia. The authorities did try to ease the anger of the Mongolian victims, and mollified them with the excuse that "a small mistake was made by the "Gang of Four", and "it was corrected" by the killers themselves o
r their associates.
The 80s and 90s saw the socalled "Ruled by law" (note that this is totally contrary to the notion of "rule of law") campaign to crack down on the Mongols. Numerous arrests and imprisonments were carried out during this period. This "ruled by law" principle serves a very important role for persecuting minority dissidents, since the laws are intended to deny any freedom and rights of the minority peoples. In effect, the principle of "ruled by law" allows the oppressors to interpret the law in a completely arbitrary manner.
It spells disaster to the oppressed people. The party makes the law and the application of the laws depend purely on the party's interests. From the Constitution to the Criminal law of China, minority rights are systematically denied. One of the most important laws used to justify and even legalize oppressive colonial rule is the Law on Ethnic Regional Autonomy. The word "ethnic region" refers not to the particular ethnic group, but rather the region's administrative bureaucracy, which is just an extension of the communist party. This law means nothing for the minorities of China, but is just an instrument of repression of non-Han people. Phrases such as "with Han people's special care, the minorities can pursue the happiness and prosperity" make the law a mockery of non-Han rights. The legal aspects of the Chinese ethnic policies of this period have not been examined by legal scholars, so that criticism has not yet been widely and openly discussed regarding the legal implications of the Chinese colonial rul
e. But for all practical purposes, the complete nonexistence of minority rights continued into this period.
In the latter few years of this period, China became increasingly more concerned with the possibility of the non Han peoples following the path of the former Soviet Republics. The very obvious and first reaction of the Chinese government is to impose more repressive control on the Mongols an d other non-Han peoples. The Chinese government has cracked down again and imprisoned dozens of activists in recent years and longer sentences have been imposed on those political prisoners. The intimidation policy mixed with deceptive tactics seems to have worked in the short term in mollifying the Mongols.
Today's post-Deng ultra-nationalist era
Deng Xiao-ping is dead. The post-Deng era just started a couple weeks ago, and people are guessing the direction of Chinese development. Many people had waited for this moment, but one thing is very clear.
China's commitment to colonial rule will not end. Rising ultra-nationalism has replaced communist slogans and it is being used by the authorities to serve as the new ideology for Chinese society. The victimization and oppression against Mongols and other minorities in China still exists and there is no sign of it ending in the near future. This rising Chinese ultra-nationalism worries millions o f non-Chinese people who live in China, especially in view of the realization that there is no guarantee that the ethnic cleansing campaigns would not happen again. It is reprehensible that the Chinese authorities will not allow even one memorial to be built dedicated to those victims of Chinese genocide.
Following Deng's death, Chinese internal power struggle sharpens day by day and internal stability of the Chinese society is also under serious challenge. Although these might bring some odd opportunities to the minorities for improving their struggle, it will more likely bring serious problems to the minorities. In order to distract the people's dissatisfactions and ease the tension of internal struggles, the authorities would not hesitate in sacrificing the non-Han peoples. In the name of "protecting the motherland", and propaganda campaigns such as "Mongols are threatening the national security of China" and the "Chinese people need to steadfastly fight against the non-Han separatists", the Chinese authorities could easily launch a new campaign against the minorities. A small, and already severely wounded group like the Mongols could not accept another campaign like the Chinese have carried out over the past few decades. None should be surprised if the Chinese masses rose up in fanatical support of such a
campaign against the Mongols and other minorities. The future of the minorities will be in great danger and their culture, language and even people could be completely wiped out in the next campaign. The Mongols would be forced to fight a battle not only for individual survival, but the survival of their nationhood. This last battle could be linked with the battle that Mongolia has to fight against possible Chinese aggression, which will prove to also be the most serious one that Mongolia has ever had to face.
Just a few months from now, Hong Kong reverts back to China. Under the "Chinese-British Joint Declaration", Hong Kong will have "high autonomy", a status which has never been given to any non-Han minorities. The people of Hong Kong though are Chinese, and consequently would appear to have much less reason and justification and national interest to seek this kind of "high autonomy". How could they receive this kind of treatment, but other areas such as Tibet, Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia are persecuted.
It would appear that if Hong Kong can be accorded this kind of treatment, the Mongols of Inner Mongolia, whose reasons for seeking "high autonomy" are even more compelling, should be accorded similar treatment.
The Chinese government tells some glorious tales and cites some numbers such as "after the establishment of the IMAR, we have done such and such" during these 50 years. They should just say that "we have killed these many Mongols, orphaned these many, maimed these many and destroyed this much. Now we can enjoy the land of Genghis Khan." But the Chinese authorities continue to lie. But a big lie like the "50 year anniversary of the Inner Mongolia Autonomy Region" is a lie that can be rebutted by historical facts and figures. Here are the true facts and figures: During these 50 years, 150 thousands Mongols were killed as a direct result of tortures.
800,000 Mongols were maimed as a direct result of the same tortures. Thousands of temples and sacred sites were destroyed.
Millions of acres of grassland and forest were destroyed.
The culture, language and lifestyle of the Mongols are devastated.
Numerous ethnic genocidal campaigns were launched against Mongols and to day we live in fear that it may happen again.
Dozens of Mongolian political prisoners are held in Chinese prisons.
In conclusion, over these past 50 years, Inner Mongolia has gone through Mao's era, Deng's era, and now today is in the post-Deng period. It doesn't matter how the Chinese political situation or the leaders change, the way they treat Mongols remains totally unacceptable by any standard. The ethnic policy of China has been against the fundamental interest of survival of the Mongols and as long as Inner Mongolia remains under Chinese colonial rule, the future of the Mongols is very dark. Another campaign of genocide is a distinct possibility. Self-determination is the only possible goal for the Mongols to pursue, not the genocidal "Inner Mongolian Autonomy Region" or partnership with any other form of Chinese chauvinistic rule.
